Butler's Cinema Scene

Chiwetel Ejiofor in “12 Years a Slave”

Steve McQueen’s ante-bellum drama “12 Years a Slave” made off with the big wins Sunday in voting by members of the Kansas City Film Critics Circle.

The movie won top honors for best picture, best actor (Chiwetel Ejiofor), supporting actress (Lupita Nyong’o), supporting actor (Michael Fassbender) and for John Ridley’s screenplay adaptation.  McQueen tied for best director with “Gravity’s” Alfonos Cuaron.

Sandra Bullock was named best actress for her performance as an astronaut stranded in space in “Gravity.”

A second tie occurred in the animated featuring voting, with the honors split between “Frozen” and “Despicable Me 2.”

France’s “Blue Is the Warmest Color” was named best foreign language film.

Best original screenplay honors went to Spike Jonze for “Her,” in which an introvert played by Joaquinn Phoenix falls in love with the Siri-like operating system on his computer. “Her” also won the Vince Koehler Award for Best Fantasy, Science Fiction or Horror film.

“The Act of Killing,” in which former right-wing Indonesian death squad members were encouraged to re-enact their crimes for the camera, was named best documentary.

| Robert W. Butler