BAFTA's Oscar Predictions... er, Nominations. BAFTA's Nominations!
Wednesday, January 9, 2019 at 8:29AM
NATHANIEL R in BAFTA, Best Picture, Bohemian Rhapsody, Oscars (18), precursor awards

by Nathaniel R

The BAFTA nominations are in and, what do you know? There is no difference whatsoever in which 8 or 9 films each awards group watches each year! One longs for a utopia where each major organization longs to shout their own identity out to the world (in some ways we are what we love) rather than just predict the Oscars but in our current dystopia, people in the industry -- no matter which country they live in! -- only watch 9 movies a year before voting. 

Here are the nominees with commentary...

Best film


In the bygone years of five nominations only for Best Picture at the Oscars the race looks like it would be down to 7 films now, these 5 above as well as Black Panther and (ugh) Vice. In fact, having 7 nominees only at Oscar this year wouldn't surprise us at all given how dominant those 7 films appear to be. It makes sense that Panther and Vice would be the two to fall out with BAFTA since they're surely more resonant in America...

Outstanding British film

The Favourite gets the annual "both lists" plug but it is interesting to see a documentary make the list. There are six nominees -- Guy Lodge informs us that this one is half juried. So a panel selects three entries and the general voting population of BAFTA selects the others. It's pretty easy to see which is which!

And yes this means Bryan Singer got a nomination this awards season.

Bryan Singer gets a BAFTA nod. Yikes. pic.twitter.com/oPgZrxXaHL

— Guy Lodge (@GuyLodge) January 9, 2019

Leading actor

The only uniquely British inclusion for the British Academy is Steve Coogan in Stan & Ollie. This is a reminder that the fifth slot at the Oscars is still very much in play and we still believe passion votes (you have to have #1s) will give it to Ethan Hawke for First Reformed.

Leading actress


Viola Davis, surprise! And, as with Best Actor this serves as a reminder that the fifth slot is very much in play. Mary Poppins Returns apparently just didn't make a splash within the industry so Emily Blunt will have to wait another 12 years for that first Oscar nomination she deserved 12 years ago.  Another noticeable exclusion: Even though BAFTA embraced Roma and BlacKkKlansman, notice that their leading actors did not make the corresponding lead lists.

Supporting actor

40% leading actors! This appears to be the Oscar list (it's the exact same list as the Globes), give or take Sam Elliott. And I can't believe we have to say "or take" because he absolutely deserves to be there. If there weren't so many Category Fraud inclusions each year, there would be room for the great character actors! GRRRRRRRRRR

Supporting actress

40% leading actresses. Same list as SAG but for Claire Foy in place of Emily Blunt's leading role in A Quiet Place.  Despite missing SAG and BAFTA we don't think Regina King, our Globe winner, is in trouble and we suspect that it's Robbie and Foy fighting for that fifth slot even though we have to wonder what happened to the great Elizabeth Debicki in Widows (besides Category Fraud crowding her out, of course) and Nicole Kidman this year, who seemed to be in both lead and supporting conversations just a couple of months ago. 

Director

Oooh, some intrigue. This list is MILES better than what the Directors Guild of America came up with.  Here's hoping that the Lanthimos and Pawlikowski inclusions suggest that it's Farrelly and McKay who are vulnerable in best director and not anyone else. 

EE Rising Star Award (voted for by the public)

We previously discussed this category here. I'm rooting for Erivo. You?

Outstanding debut by a British writer, director or producer

Ray & Liz was well liked on the festival circuit but hasn't opened in the US yet. And Beast made a much bigger splash in the UK (given its awards presence here and elsewhere over there) as opposed to here in the States where it earned $800,000 at the arthouse box office this past summer. The other three are new titles to us so we'll have to investigate.

Film not in the English language

Italy's Dogman, which took Best Actor at Cannes, missed the finalist list for the Oscars this year but the rest of them might well become nominees at Oscar. 

Documentary

McQueen and They Shall Not Grow Old did not make the Oscar finals but the rest were major box office hits and are also expected to become nominees. 

Animated film

Since they only have 3 nominees in BAFTA (which is all they should really have at the Oscars, given the small amount of movies eligible) this is a reminder that these are the only three films that could actually win the Animated Feature Oscar. I know people think that Into the Spider-Verse has the win locked up but I think it's still a fight, because Oscar loves Pixar most (they've won 50% of the Oscars in the category) and Wes Anderson is still Oscar-less. 

Original screenplay


Good showing for Cold War at BAFTAs. Interesting that Vice managed so many nominations but not Best Film

Adapted screenplay

Color me surprised that A Star is Born keeps making writing lists. As you know, I love the movie, but I suspected that the writer's branch would give it a pass with so many other more "writerly" options (like Leave No Trace) out there as well as other adaptation options that lean populist (Crazy Rich Asians, Black Panther). Note: Death of Stalin was ineligible here, since it was nominated last year but IS eligible for the Oscars this year.

Original music

Great to see BlacKkKlansman makes this list because Spike Lee's main composer Terence Blanchard has still never been Oscar nominated! BAFTA doesn't differentiate between songs and score which is why A Star is Born is here.

Cinematography

Okay. So. Bohemian Rhapsody (sigh). Newton Thomas Sigel, Bryan Singer's regular DP,  has never been Oscar-nominated despite great great work in his filmography in films like Refn's Drive, Russell's, Three Kings and Singer's X2. And he did have to briefly take over the Directors chair on that movie when Bryan Singer went AWOL on set so one feels for him because surely that shoot was a nightmare. But still. It remains insane that this is the movie that has risen up so strongly for awards. When was the last time a production this troubled, with such a clearly fictional self-flattering point of view about real history (hi surviving Queen members), did this well? 

The longwinded point is this: Sigel is talented but if we're talking the shooting of concert scenes, Matthew Libatique's work on A Star is Born, which was excluded, is pretty great. 

Costume design


The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is a wildcard in the Oscar race, and not just in this category. It *technically* qualifies for the Oscars but, unlike Roma, which got a lot of media attention for its itty bitty theatrical race, this surely feels more Netflixy and thus more TV to some voters. But Oscar loves the Coen brothers so we'll see. 

Editing

Sigh. no comment

Production design

How many times does Stuart Craig need to be nominated for doing Potterverse films? He's been nominated for 9 BAFTAs for the 10 Potterverse films, winning 2 of them just for this series alone. How many times is enough? I'm asking for a friend, who is me, who doesn't want movie awards to become Emmy Awards which is a real possibility in our current franchise world. 

Make-up and hair

The only one of these that didn't make Oscar's 7 film wide finals is The Favourite. But Oscar only allows 3 nominations and it's competitive. 

Sound

Unlike their American counterparts BAFTA doesn't let the sound people have two separate awards.

Special visual effects

Fantastic Beasts didn't make the 10 wide finals for Oscar's Visual Effects so this can't be the Oscar list. But the fifth slot (if First Man is truly in there which we're not certain of) is a wide open competition. We knew all along that Black Panther would sail in to a nomination on its popularity but it's kind of a shame because the visual fx are one of its weakest elements in terms of craft since some other departments were just killing it. That final battle sequence between Killmonger and Black Panther is soooo rubbery. It's too early to pour one out for a snub but I feel for Ant-Man and the Wasp which I'd argue has the best fx of a Marvel movie this year and it's surely the one that Oscar will skip just as BAFTA did.

British short film

British short animation

Outstanding contribution to British cinema

Article originally appeared on The Film Experience (http://thefilmexperience.net/).
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