The Boston Society of Film Critics have spoken! (I got this direct from my pal Dan Kimmel, critic for the Worcester (Massachusetts) Telegram & Gazette and a member of BSFC.)

Best Picture: The Departed (runner-up: United 93)

Best Director: Martin Scorsese, The Departed (runner-up: Paul Greengrass, United 93)

Best Actor: Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland (runner-up: Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson)

Best Actress: Helen Mirren, The Queen (runner-up: Judi Dench, Notes on a Scandal)

Best Supporting Actor: Mark Wahlberg, The Departed (runners-up: TIE Michael Sheen, The Queen; Alec Baldwin, The Departed/Running with Scissors/The Good Shepherd)

Best Supporting Actress: Shareeka Epps, Half Nelson (runner-up: Meryl Streep, The Devil Wears Prada)

Best Ensemble Cast: United 93 (runner-up: The Departed)

Best Screenplay: William Monahan, The Departed (runner-up: Peter Morgan, The Queen)

Best Foreign Language Film: Pan's Labyrinth (runner-up: Volver)

Best Documentary: TIE Deliver Us From Evil/Shut Up & Sing (runner-up: 51 Birch Street)

Best New Filmmaker: Ryan Fleck, Half Nelson (runners-up: Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris, Little Miss Sunshine)

Best Cinematography: Guillermo Navarro, Pan's Labyrinth (runners-up: TIE Stuart Dryburgh, The Painted Veil; Xiaoding Zhao, Curse of the Golden Flower)

And from the other coast, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association bestows honors upon:

Best Picture: Letters from Iwo Jima (runner-up: The Queen)

Best Director: Paul Greengrass, United 93 (runner-up: Clint Eastwood, Flags of our Fathers, Letters from Iwo Jima)

Best Actress: Helen Mirren, The Queen (runner-up: Penelope Cruz, Volver)

Best Actor: TIE Sacha Baron Cohen, Borat and Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland

Best Screenplay: The Queen by Peter Morgan (runner-up: Little Miss Sunshine by Michael Arndt)

Best Supporting Actress: Luminita Gheorghiu, The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (runner-up: Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls)

Best Supporting Actor: Michael Sheen, The Queen (runner-up: Sergi Lopez, Pan's Labyrinth)

Best Foreign Language Film: The Lives of Others directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck (runner-up: Volver directed by Pedro Almodovar)

Best Documentary/Non-Fiction Film: An Inconvenient Truth directed by Davis Guggenheim (runner-up: Darwin's Nightmare directed by Hubert Sauper)

Best Production Design: Eugenio Caballero, Pan's Labyrinth (runners-up: Jim Clay, Veronica Falzon, Geoffrey Kirkland, Children of Men)

Best Animation: Happy Feet by George Miller (runner-up: Cars by John Lasseter and Joe Ranft)

We're starting to see what the Oscars may look like. It's gonna be all about The Departed and United 93, both unlikely choices for Oscar: the first is a popcorn flick, usually beneath Oscar's contempt even when it's damn good, like this one, and the other opened way back in April, long enough ago that even the good stuff has since been forgotten. And all about Forest Whitaker and Helen Mirren, as rulers of nations loved and hated in equal measures by their own people.

Biggest surprise on these two rosters, from my perspective: Best Actor for Sacha Baron Cohen? High five! In my review of the film, I called Baron Cohen's work "one of the greatest performances in the history of cinema," and I wasn't exaggerating. I'm delighted that I'm not the only one who recognizes how difficult comedy can be, and how much more difficult Baron Cohen made his job with his guerilla improvising.

Second biggest surprise: all the applause for Michael Sheen as Prime Minister Tony Blair in The Queen. Not that I don't think his praises deserve to be sung to the rafters -- he's fantastic in the film. I just thought I was the only one madly in love with him.

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