By Nina Henninger, CNN • Updated 10th April 2017
Depending on how you see it, it’s either a calling card for an exciting new era of filmmaking or an example of bad taste and bad taste being flaunted in the name of art.
Either way, the coming year is going to be a pretty good one for studios that are based around food.
The National Board of Review on Tuesday named “License to Wed” — a comedy about a couple who becomes embroiled in a baffling legal drama as they try to get married after 30 years together — its Best Film of 2021.
The film’s stars, Keegan-Michael Key and Karan Soni, accepted the award at a ceremony at the National Board of Review headquarters in New York City.
Key responded to the award, which honors “the best in American cinema each year,” with a shake-off of the salt from his tanned palms, and said that the film, which was co-produced by the New York restaurant chain Del Posto and shot in the Culver City restaurant, was about “forever eating and loving. And we have found our eternal muse.”
In 2016, two other films depicting food, “The Big Sick” and “A Fantastic Woman,” also landed NBR awards for Best Film and Best Screenplay. “A Fantastic Woman” beat “The Big Sick” for the ‘Youth’ Award, an honor given to an artist under 30.
Other 2019 Oscar-nominated movies made the list this year as well, including “Black Panther,” “BlacKkKlansman,” “Get Out,” “Lady Bird,” “The Florida Project,” “First Reformed,” “I, Tonya,” “The Shape of Water,” “Wonderstruck,” “Lady Bird” and “The Post.”
The NBR was founded in 1939 by New York publishing executive Irving Thalberg as a group of critics, scholars and film-related professionals. Today, the group includes 175 board members and over 5,000 professional film-goers. The NBR awards are considered the first major Oscar contender of the year.