December 21, 2009 – The Florida Film Critics Circle (FFCC) has named Up In The Air its Best Picture of 2009. The film, about a man who travels the country to fire people for big corporations, won a total of three awards, including Best Director (Jason Reitman) and Best Actor (George Clooney).

Director Lee Daniels’ acclaimed independent film Precious won both Best Actress (Gabourey Sidibe) and Best Supporting Actress (Mo’Nique). Sidibe also won the Pauline Kael Breakout award. The Best Supporting Actor award went to Christoph Waltz for his performance as a Nazi commander in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds.

The group’s closest competition was for Best Screenplay, in which the writers of (500) Days of Summer, Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber, narrowly defeated Reitman and Sheldon Turner’s script for Up In The Air.

In other awards, Mauro Fiore won Best Cinematography for Avatar, Up was the runaway winner for Best Animated Film, Sin Nombre won Foreign Language Film and the dolphin-killing polemic The Cove took Best Documentary.

Best Film:

Up in the Air

Best Director:

Jason Reitman – Up in the Air

Best Actor:

George Clooney – Up in the Air

Best Actress:

Gabourey Sidibe ­– Precious

Best Supporting Actor:

Christoph Waltz – Inglourious Basterds

Best Supporting Actress:

Mo’Nique – Precious

Best Screenplay:

Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber – 500 Days of Summer

Best Animated Film:

Up

Best Cinematography:

Mauro Fiore – Avatar

Best Documentary Film:

The Cove

Best Foreign Language Film:

Sin Nombre – Spain

Pauline Kael Breakout Award:

Gabourey Sidibe – Precious