Most people consider the National Board of Review irrelevant, and yet they continue to write about the organization's annual film honors. Like the Oscars, though, it doesn't matter if the NBR is irrelevant or not. It's been around for nearly a century now, and it's been a significant part of awards season for many decades. Maybe the organization is made up of paid-entry film buffs rather than critics or "experts" but at the end of the day its members are simply movie lovers like you and me. And sometimes those members even champion and endorse movies that deserve that extra notice.

Sure, the 2007 mentions by the NBR seem so exhaustive that I almost can't even think of a movie that didn't get an award. Also, many of them seem like obvious and predictable decisions (doesn't this just mean the movies were noteworthy enough to receive the awards anyway?). Some of the winners, though, are pretty satisfying. Tim Burton probably won't win an Oscar for best director, so it's good to see him honored here. Also, I wouldn't have expected Lars and the Real Girl to get an original screenplay mention from anywhere. Nor did I expect for The Bucket List to land on any top ten lists. Mostly, I'm delighted to see Casey Affleck recognized for his acting.

Check out all the awards after the jump.

Well, awards season has officially begun -- while film critics nationwide have been trying to cram in screenings of movies before their respective critic's awards nominations close (BFCA members, for example, have to file their nominations before Midnight Friday), one group has already made it's choices. The National Board of Review has named Clint Eastwood's Letters from Iwo Jima as the best film of the year. Other surprises can be found on the full list of winners, including Martin Scorsese winning Best Director for The Departed, and Forrest Whittaker winning Best Actor for The Last King of Scotland; at the same time, The National Board of Review is easily one of the most mysterious of all critic's groups who hand out gongs at the end of the year -- as David Poland concisely points out at his blog, The Hot Button, the New York-based NBR isn't exactly the most accurate Oscar predictor. Add in the fact that the NBR is notoriously troubled by accusations of corruption and incompetence, and Iwo Jima's win may seem more like a blessing than a curse for Warner Bros, who moved Iwo Jima up to be released and eligible for awards consideration in 2006 after the critical and box-office disappointment of Flags of Our Fathers, Eastwood's first World War II epic of the year. ...

Does hearing about this award spark your cuiosity about Letters from Iwo Jima? Or leave you wondering more about who the heck the National Board of Review actually are?