19/02/2024 - Christopher Nolan’s epic biographical drama has taken home seven awards, finding favour in both above-the-line and technical categories

BAFTA has finally learned to stop worrying and love Christopher Nolan. The British-US transplant, one of the industry’s most successful and respected directors, has finally achieved major awards-season success, with his near-billion-dollar-grossing biopic Oppenheimer [+see also:
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film profile] winning seven awards. Cillian Murphy – just last week toplining the well-received Berlinale opener Small Things Like These [+see also:
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With Oppenheimer also a partial co-production with the UK, European cinema could also largely pat itself on the back, as Yorgos Lanthimos’s Poor Things [+see also:
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interview: Suzy Bemba
Q&A: Yorgos Lanthimos
film profile] and Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest [+see also:
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A surprise, rather than an upset, was a victory for Earth Mama, Savanah Leaf’s Film4-backed, Northern California-set realist drama, over How to Have Sex [+see also:
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interview: Molly Manning Walker
film profile]. Special guests at the Royal Festival Hall ceremony included Prince William, BAFTA’s president, and Sophie Ellis-Bextor, performing what else but “Murder on the Dancefloor”, inspired by its Saltburn [+see also:
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film profile]-stirred revival in the charts; a nude Barry Keoghan proved unavailable. Somehow, the US-centric spectacle of “awards season” still has about a month to run, with the Oscars taking place on 10 March and surely more gongs for the European industry awaiting.

The full list of award winners is as follows:

Best Film
Oppenheimer [+see also:
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Outstanding British Film
The Zone of Interest [+see also:
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Best Director
Christopher Nolan - Oppenheimer

Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer
Earth Mama - Savanah Leaf (UK/USA)

Best Film Not in the English Language
The Zone of Interest - Jonathan Glazer

Best Leading Actress
Emma Stone - Poor Things [+see also:
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interview: Suzy Bemba
Q&A: Yorgos Lanthimos
film profile] (Ireland/UK/USA)

Best Leading Actor
Cillian Murphy - Oppenheimer

Best Supporting Actress
Da’vine Joy Randolph - The Holdovers (USA)

Best Supporting Actor
Robert Downey Jr - Oppenheimer

Best Animated Film
The Boy and the Heron - Hayao Miyazaki (Japan)

Best Adapted Screenplay
Cord Jefferson - American Fiction (USA)

Best Original Screenplay
Justine Triet, Arthur Harari - Anatomy of a Fall [+see also:
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interview: Justine Triet
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Best Production Design
Shona Heath, James Price, Zsuzsa Mihalek - Poor Things

Best Original Score
Ludwig Göransson - Oppenheimer

Best Cinematography
Hoyte van Hoytema - Oppenheimer

Best Editing
Jennifer Lame - Oppenheimer

Best Casting
Susan Shopmaker - The Holdovers

Best Sound
Johnnie Burn, Tarn Willers - The Zone of Interest

Best Special Visual Effects
Simon Hughes - Poor Things

Best Make-up & Hair
Nadia Stacey, Mark Coulier, Josh Weston - Poor Things

Best Documentary
20 Days in Mariupol [+see also:
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interview: Mstyslav Chernov
film profile] - Mstyslav Chernov (Ukraine)

Best Costume Design
Holly Waddington - Poor Things

Best British Short Film
Jellyfish and Lobster - Yasmin Afifi (UK)

Best British Short Animation
Crab Day - Ross Stringer (UK)

EE Rising Star
Mia McKenna-Bruce