Gotham Awards 2026: Five Films Tie at Four Nominations Each as A24 and Neon Lead

Five films tied for the lead with four nominations each as the Gotham Awards unveiled their 2026 slate: All of a Sudden, Clarissa, The Invite, La Gravida and Tender Loving Care. The 38th ceremony, held at Cipriani Wall Street in Lower Manhattan, opens the movie awards season in New York.

Seven further films took three nominations apiece: Everytime, Josephine, Minotaur, Possible Love, Primetime, Teenage Sex and Death At Camp Miasma and Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother. The spread marks a sharp break from 2025, when Paul Thomas Anderson's Warner Bros. thriller One Battle After Another set a record with six nominations.

A24 and Neon topped the distributor count with 15 and 14 nominations respectively. The new distributor 1-2 Special landed multiple nominations, as did Mubi. In total, the nominations covered 42 features and 25 performances across 11 categories.

Executive Director of The Gotham Film & Media Institute Jeffrey Sharp said: "It has been a remarkable year for film, with audiences turning out in theaters for bold, distinctive work from first-time filmmakers and established artists alike."

He added: "This year's nominations, alongside our Tributes and the return of the Audience Award, reflect that abundance and celebrate the creative community that has been at the heart of The Gothams for more than three decades."

What changed in the rules?

Two mechanical shifts shape this year's field. First, the Gothams eliminated the budget cap for eligibility in 2023, ahead of the 33rd edition; previously, budgets could not surpass $35 million. That change opened the category to larger-budget fare from major studios, which now competes alongside smaller independent titles.

Second, the Best Feature category itself expanded last year, which explains the eleven-title field this time: Clarissa (Neon), Club Kid (A24), The Debut (A24), Dreams in Nightmares (Lunette Films), The Invite (A24), Josephine (Sumerian Pictures), Mouse (Independent Film Company), Paper Tiger (Neon), Primetime (A24), Teenage Sex and Death At Camp Miasma (Mubi) and Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother (Amazon MGM Studios).

A24 places four titles in Best Feature alone, with Primetime produced by Robert Pattinson and Ari Aster among its credited producers, and The Debut directed by Jesse Eisenberg with Emma Stone among its producers.

Who votes, and how?

The mechanism runs in two stages. Committees of film critics, journalists, festival programmers and film curators selected the nominees. Separate juries of writers, directors, actors, producers, editors and other industry professionals will determine the winners.

The Audience Award, returning after a six-year hiatus, works differently: Gotham members vote directly for the winner. Organizers curated this year's nominees from submitted films, measured by opening-weekend per-theater average against the highest-rated and most-watched films of 2026, as reported in box office tracking and on Letterboxd. The award, in the Gothams' wording, celebrates films that "transcend the screen to become defining cultural moments."

The Audience Award shortlist leans commercial: Backrooms (A24), La Bola Negra (Netflix), The Drama (A24), The Invite (A24), Michael (Lionsgate), Obsession (Focus Features), Project Hail Mary (Amazon MGM Studios) and You Can See Everything (A24) — with The Invite the only title to cross over into the juried Best Feature race.

Where does the race stand?

The International Feature category carries heavy name recognition: Ryusuke Hamaguchi's All of a Sudden (Neon), Andrey Zvyagintsev's Minotaur (Mubi), Lee Chang-dong's Possible Love (Netflix), Pawel Pawlikowski's Fatherland (Mubi) and Mike Leigh's Tender Loving Care (Bleecker Street) all compete. Hamaguchi, Zvyagintsev, Schoenbrun, Leigh and Sandra Wollner for Everytime fill the Best Director category in parallel.

The lead performance field includes Mahershala Ali, Gillian Anderson, Jeon Do-yeon, John Malkovich, Ian McKellen, Julianne Moore, Sophie Okonedo, Andrew Scott and John Turturro, plus John Early, who also appears in Breakthrough Director for Maddie's Secret. Supporting nominees include Penélope Cruz, Adam Driver, Andrew Garfield and Sandra Hüller.

Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim pull a double, nominated in Documentary Feature for You Can See Everything while Oppenheim's Primetime competes in Best Feature.

Winners will be announced at the Cipriani Wall Street ceremony in Lower Manhattan.