The filmmaker Kleber Mendonça Filho received the Best Foreign Film award for “The Secret Agent” at the 2026 Critics Choice Awards on the red carpet — before the ceremony began.
Other categories were also left out of the event, such as International Series, Comedy Film and Animation Series, as well as technical awards such as Art Direction, Sound and more.
This happens because the awards show has an established broadcast time and due to the number of categories There’s no time for everyone on stagetherefore, chooses to reveal some winners beforehand and only mention them during the ceremony.
Who chooses the winners at the Critics Choice Awards?
Annually, the CCA, considered the largest association of critics in the United States and Canadais responsible for organizing the awards, representing media experts and entertainment journalists.
As the official website explains, some specific skills are required to join the association, including that everyone must be “a film critic or TV journalist whose coverage of a wide range of films playing in theaters or on broadcast is regularly available to a wide audience.”
Today, according to Joey Berlin, CEO of CCA, awards are determined by 576 members. There are another 100 non-voting members. “It’s a remarkably diverse and inclusive group that qualifies to vote by regularly reaching a large audience with its coverage of new films and/or television,” he said in an interview with Variety magazine.
“In short, it’s a group of leading film and television critics and entertainment reporters — people whose job it is to keep up with a steady stream of new shows and movies and help audiences find the good stuff,” he added.
