NEW YORK, January 5, 2004 -- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King won nine awards including Best Picture in the 7th Annual Online Film Critics Society Awards. The awards were voted by the 146-member Online Film Critics Society, the international professional association of Internet-based cinema journalists.

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King also picked up the Best Director Award for Peter Jackson, the Best Adapated Screenplay Award (for Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh), Best Original Score honors for Howard Shore, and technical awards for achievements in Cinematography, Art Direction, Costume Design, Sound and Visual Effects.

Lost in Translation won two awards: Bill Murray for Best Actor and Sofia Coppola for Best Original Screenplay. Naomi Watts was named Best Actress for 21 Grams, Peter Sarsgaaard won Best Supporting Actor honors for Shattered Glass and Shohreh Aghdashloo won the Best Supporting Actress Award for House of Sand and Fog.

The Brazilian City of God was named Best Foreign Language Film. Capturing the Friedmans took the Best Documentary prize and Finding Nemo was named Best Animated Feature.

Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini shared the Breakthrough Filmmaker prize for their direction of American Splendor. New Zealand newcomer Keisha Castle-Hughes won the Breakthrough Performance Award for her film debut in Whale Rider.

Founded in 1997, the Online Film Critics Society has been the key force in establishing and raising the standards for Internet-based film journalism. The OFCS membership spans the U.S., Canada, Europe, Latin America, Africa, and Asia/the Pacific Rim, with journalists representing many of the most important online news sites including Salon, Slate, TV Guide Online, IndieWire, Netflix, Film Threat, eFilmCritic.com and the Internet Movie Database.

The Society's web site, which has been hosted since January 2001 by the highly influential film resource Rotten Tomatoes (www.rottentomatoes.com), provides the most comprehensive online listing of reviews and original interviews with the leading artists in today's cinema, plus links to the most important motion picture-related web sites.

For more information, visit the Online Film Critics Society at www.ofcs.org.

For a complete list of the year's nominees, click here.

Click Here to Return to Listing of Awards.