Which critics can you trust?

Hear ye! Hear ye! Shohei Ohtani has arrived at Chavez Ravine and has spoken. No guarantees for a World Series title were made, but, c’mon, did they have to be? I’m already staking out my spot along the parade route. I’m not telling you exactly where, in case you’re tall. I don’t want my view obstructed.

I’m Glenn Whipp, columnist for the Los Angeles Times and host of The Envelope’s Friday newsletter. There were plenty of awards handed out this week, including those from at least one group not plagued by questions over integrity, governance and potential conflicts of interest.

How ‘The Zone of Interest’ took top honors from LAFCA

Jonathan Glazer’s “The Zone of Interest” was the big winner at the Los Angeles Film Critics Assn.’s year-end voting meeting, taking prizes for best picture, director and music. The organization also honored four women in its acting categories, which, for the second year in a row, were not categorized by gender: Sandra Hüller (“Anatomy of a Fall,” “The Zone of Interest”) and Emma Stone (“Poor Things”) were named top lead performers, while Rachel McAdams (“Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.”) and Da’Vine Joy Randolph (“The Holdovers”) won supporting performance honors. Andrew Haigh won the screenplay prize for his drama “All of Us Strangers.”

“The Zone of Interest,” a chilling look at the family life of Auschwitz commandant Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel) and his wife, Hedwig (Hüller), opens in theaters today, and my pal Times film critic Justin Chang wrote a terrific review. “What does a Nazi do on his day off?” Justin asks in the provocative first sentence. I’ll let you read the rest ... or bookmark it to return to after you’ve seen the film.

I’ve watched “Zone” twice, first at the Telluride Film Festival and then again last week at the Aero Theatre as part of a double bill with Glazer’s first film, the exhilarating “Sexy Beast.” And it hit just as hard on repeat viewing, this movie about a contented family that wants to have a nice home with a beautiful garden, a good, stable job with the bonus of time off for relaxing vacations, things they’ve worked hard for, things they believe they deserve. And once you — and I’m personalizing this now, because the film requires this of its audience — once you have these things, what are you willing to disassociate from in order to keep them? Indifference is the root of hideous evil.

“The Zone of Interest” is set in the past but very much about the present and how humans accept the unacceptable when it suits their interests. As such, as a voting member of L.A. critics, I’m thrilled we honored it repeatedly, even though after we gave Glazer the award for director, I hoped we’d pivot to another historical drama in conversation with modern perils, “Oppenheimer.”

Justin and I had a long written conversation shortly after that vote, championing our favorites and lamenting the near-miss of a McAdams/Ryan Gosling “Notebook” reunion. (OK ... that was just me.)

Sandra Hüller in a scene from the movie “The Zone of Interest.”

(A24)

Early Oscar predictions for actor and supporting actor races

If you’ve seen Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” you may well still be sifting through some complicated feelings about Leonardo DiCaprio’s character — and perhaps even his performance in the film.

Know this: You’re not alone. In fact, DiCaprio himself still has trouble reconciling the actions of his character, Ernest Burkhart, a dimwitted WWI veteran who arrives in Oklahoma to work for his wealthy uncle, William Hale (Robert De Niro), a calculating rancher with an eye on laying claim to the oil-rich tribal lands owned by the Osage Nation. At Hale’s behest, Ernest marries Mollie (Lily Gladstone) and — spoiler alert — begins, again at the suggestion of his uncle — to help plot the murders of Mollie’s family and even Mollie herself, even as he continues to profess his love for his wife.

“It was the most bizarre, twisted, love story I’d ever come across,” DiCaprio said at a recent screening of the film that was packed with academy and guild voters, along with, sure, people who came out just to see Leonardo DiCaprio. “Here’s this man in court, giving testimony admitting to being a part of killing off his wife’s entire bloodline ... but as horrible as it may seem and as twisted as it may seem, they did have a love for one another.”

It’s presumed that DiCaprio is going to be nominated for an Oscar for his lead turn in “Killers of the Flower Moon,” a movie that figures to earn at least 10 nominations and stands, at the moment, as one of the best picture front-runners. There is a small voice telling me that he could be left out because of the way audiences react to his character. But I banished that voice to a corner of the room when making my early Oscar predictions for the lead and supporting actor categories.

The lead and supporting Oscar actor categories are crowded with great talent.

(Jason McDonald / Netflix; Yorgos Lanthimos / Searchlight; Melinda Sue Gordon / Universal; David Lee / Netflix; Claire Folger / MGM-Orion via AP; Jaap Buitendijk / Warner Bros.; Melinda Sue Gordon / Apple; Melinda Sue Gordon / Apple; Francois Duhamel / Netflix; Seacia Pavao / Focus; Melinda Sue Gordon / Universal; Photo illustration Susana Sanchez / L.A. Times )

Streisand to receive SAG Life Achievement honor

Barbra Streisand owns 10 Grammys, two Oscars, five Emmys, three Peabodys, an honorary “Star of the Decade” Tony and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Come February, she’ll have an award from one of the few groups on the planet yet to celebrate her.

Streisand has been named the 59th recipient of SAG-AFTRA’s highest tribute, the organization announced Thursday: the SAG Life Achievement Award, given for career achievements and humanitarian accomplishments. The 81-year-old multi-hyphenate legend will receive the honor at the 30th annual Screen Actors Guild Awards on Feb. 24 in a ceremony that will stream live on Netflix for the first time.

“Ever since I was a young girl sitting in the Loew’s Kings Theatre in Brooklyn, I dreamed of being one of those actresses I saw on the screen,” Streisand said in a statement. “The movies were a portal to a world I could only imagine. Even though I was an unlikely candidate, somehow my dream came true. This award is especially meaningful to me because it comes from my fellow actors, whom I so admire.”

The news comes a month after Streisand’s exhaustive, 992-page memoir (the audiobook clocks in at 48 hours), “My Name Is Barbra,” landed in stores. The long-awaited accounting of the way she was has earned acclaim for what the New Yorker called a “maximalist approach to her own life, studying every trial, triumph and snack food of a six-decade career.” It continues to reside near the top of the New York Times’ bestseller list.

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