BAFTA lacks diversity (in all sorts of ways) and goes all in on "Joker"

by Nathaniel R

I've made it no secret over the years that I think BAFTA is the worst of the major awards organizations. They always appear to have watched an extremely limited pool of films (even less than Oscar's tunnel vision screener stack) and they regularly ignore British fare unless it's tipped to be hot at the Oscars (like 1917). This year is no different. They threw all their weight behind Joker (an astounding 11 nominations) and three of the films which feel like possibilities to win the Oscar for Best Picture: The Irishman, Once Upon a Time..., and 1917 (their one UK-produced love). Those four movies handily dominated the nomination count.

We also have to call bulls*** on BAFTA executives blaming the film industry for their lack of diverse nominations this year. Their acting nominees are all white this year and their directing nominees all male. They've responded saying:

"We'd have liked to have seen more diversity in the nominations, it does continue to be an industry-wide issue. I think more films need to be made, and entered, giving people a chance to see them. We'd absolutely like to see more diversity, but I also don't want to take away from those celebrating today."

As you all know, since I've been chastised for it before, I'm not always happy about where the complaints about diversity are focused. In some years the Oscar voters have been (I feel) wrongly targeted when there just weren't a lot of options for them. This year however there is no excuse as there are multiple lauded actors of color from films like Us, Dolemite is My Name, Waves, The Farewell, Luce, Harriet, Hustlers, and Parasite. And it's also been a great year for female directors given Little Women, Hustlers, Atlantics,A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, and The Farewell.

The full list of nominations with commentary are after the jump...

Best Film
1917 
The Irishman
Joker
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood
Parasite

In other words the five exact frontrunners for Oscar's Best Picture prize.

Leading Actress
Jessie Buckley, Wild Rose
Scarlett Johansson, Marriage Story
Saoirse Ronan, Little Women
Charlize Theron, Bombshell
Renée Zellweger, Judy

 Nice to see Jessie Buckley recognized here. They really ought to support their own more often rather than just predicting the Oscar list. 

Leading Actor
Leonardo Dicaprio, Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood
Adam Driver, Marriage Story
Taron Egerton, Rocketman
Joaquin Phoenix, Joker
Jonathan Pryce, The Two Popes

 No Antonio Banderas is deeply distressing.

Supporting Actress
Laura Dern, Marriage Story
Scarlett Johansson, Jojo Rabbit
Florence Pugh, Little Women
Margot Robbie, Bombshell
Margot Robbie, Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood

 Was the double nomination for Robbie necessary? This points to how few movies they're watching we think. 

Supporting Actor
Tom Hanks, A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood
Anthony Hopkins, The Two Popes
Al Pacino, The Irishman
Joe Pesci, The Irishman
Brad Pitt, Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood

It's almost shocking how uniform the precursors have been with supporting actor this year. Time to change the Oscar predictions to just this. And at least two of those are leads but what can you do. We've grown hoarse from complaining each year about category fraud.

Outstanding British Film
1917
Bait
For Sama
Rocketman
Sorry We Missed You
The Two Popes

It's nice that they are forced into recognizing their own industry in a few categories rather than just celebrating Hollywood. If they weren't forced into it with these special categories, they've already shown that they would rather not.  Could you imagine if the Oscar ignored American movies but for an "Outstanding Hollywood Picture" category? Hee!

Outstanding Debut By A British Writer, Director Or Producer
Bait, Mark Jenkin (Writer/Director), Kate Byers, Linn Waite (Producers)
For Sama, Waad Al-Kateab (Director/Producer), Edward Watts (Director)
Maiden, Alex Holmes (Director)
Only You, Harry Wootliff (Writer/Director)
Retablo, Álvaro Delgado-Aparicio (Writer/Director)*

Interesting that two documentaries made this list.

Film Not In The English Language
The Farewell
For Sama
Pain And Glory
Parasite
Portrait Of A Lady On Fire

Portrait of a Lady on Fire sure has cleaned up with precusors. It's unfortunate that France didn't select it for Oscar because we think that might have helped it toward Best Cinematography and Best Director, too.

Documentary
American Factory
Apollo 11
Diego Maradona
For Sama
The Great Hack

Apollo 11 sure feels unstoppable given the precursors.

Animated Film
Frozen 2
Klaus
A Shaun The Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
Toy Story 4

We're still mystified as to why Farmageddon wasn't submitted for the Oscars in Best Animated Feature.

Director
1917, Sam Mendes
The Irishman, Martin Scorsese
Joker, Todd Phillips
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood, Quentin Tarantino
Parasite, Bong Joon Ho

Will this also be the DGA list today?

Original Screenplay
Booksmart, Susanna Fogel, Emily Halpern, Sarah Haskins, Katie Silberman
Knives Out, Rian Johnson
Marriage Story, Noah Baumbach
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood, Quentin Tarantino
Parasite, Han Jin Won, Bong Joon-Ho

Whoa. Major get for Booksmart. We were not expecting it to show up here.

Adapted Screenplay
The Irishman, Steven Zaillian
Jojo Rabbit, Taika Waititi
Joker, Todd Phillips, Scott Silver
Little Women, Greta Gerwig
The Two Popes, Anthony Mccarten

Same list as the WGA but for The Two Popes where A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood was.

Original Score
1917, Thomas Newman
Jojo Rabbit, Michael Giacchino
Joker, Hildur Guđnadóttir
Little Women, Alexandre Desplat
Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker, John Williams

Voters are always on autopilot with John Williams. How many Star Wars nominations does he need? Is there really that much new music in each of the pictures? Disappointed that Pain and Glory isn't here.

Casting
Joker, Shayna Markowitz
Marriage Story, Douglas Aibel, Francine Maisler
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood, Victoria Thomas
The Personal History Of David Copperfield, Sarah Crowe
The Two Popes, Nina Gold

A random nomination for the star-studded David Copperfield movie. Otherwise they just drew from their Oscar-focused lists. The Two Popes is a really weird inclusion though given that it's almost a two-hander.

Cinematography
1917, Roger Deakins
The Irishman, Rodrigo Prieto
Joker, Lawrence Sher
Ford V Ferrari, Phedon Papamichael
The Lighthouse, Jarin Blaschke

The same as the ASC except for The Lighthouse. And it's a bit of a shock that it was Robert Richardson that fell away for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood rather than say, Rodrigo Prieto or Lawrence Sher, or Phedon Papamichael. 

Editing
The Irishman, Thelma Schoonmaker
Jojo Rabbit, Tom Eagles
Joker, Jeff Groth
Ford V Ferrari, Andrew Buckland, Michael Mccusker
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood, Fred Raskin

If this is the Oscar list we're going to be so mad because how do you do Best Editing without Parasite this year? If you do, you're doing it wrong!

Production Design
1917, Dennis Gassner, Lee Sandales
The Irishman, Bob Shaw, Regina Graves
Jojo Rabbit, Ra Vincent, Nora Sopková
Joker, Mark Friedberg, Kris Moran
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood, Barbara Ling, Nancy Haigh

Frustratingly this is the same list as ADG's Best Period film nominations so they've ignored all fantasy, sci-fi, horror, and contemporary offerings. There is no way in the world that Parasite is not better designed than some of these nominees.

Costume Design
The Irishman, Christopher Peterson, Sandy Powell
Jojo Rabbit, Mayes C. Rubeo
Judy, Jany Temime
Little Women, Jacqueline Durran
Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood, Arianne Phillips

A respectable if uninspired list.

Make Up & Hair
1917, Naomi Donne
Bombshell, Vivian Baker, Kazu Hiro, Anne Morgan
Joker, Kay Georgiou, Nicki Ledermann
Judy, Jeremy Woodhead
Rocketman, Lizzie Yianni Georgiou

All five of these made Oscar's finalist list but they'll have to fend off Dolemite is My Name, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Little Women, Maleficent 2, and Downton Abbey to score Oscar nominations. 

Sound
1917, Scott Millan, Oliver Tarney, Rachael Tate, Mark Taylor, Stuart Wilson
Joker, Tod Maitland, Alan Robert Murray, Tom Ozanich, Dean Zupancic
Ford V Ferrari David Giammarco, Paul Massey, Steven A. Morrow, Donald Sylvester
Rocketman, Matthew Collinge, John Hayes, Mike Prestwood Smith, Danny Sheehan
Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker, David Acord, Andy Nelson, Christopher Scarabosio, Stuart Wilson, Matthew Wood

They went in a slightly different direction than the American guild CAS which nominated The Irishman and Once upon a Time in Hollywood instead of the Star Wars episode and 1917 which are included here.

Special Visual Effects
1917, Greg Butler, Guillaume Rocheron, Dominic Tuohy
Avengers: Endgame, Dan Deleeuw, Dan Sudick
The Irishman, Leandro Estebecorena, Stephane Grabli, Pablo Helman
The Lion King, Andrew R. Jones, Robert Legato, Elliot Newman, Adam Valdez
Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker, Roger Guyett, Paul Kavanagh, Neal Scanlan, Dominic Tuohy

All five are Oscar finalists too. We still don't understand how anyone thinks The Irishman de-aging is successful but...

British Short Animation
Grandad Was A Romantic, Maryam Mohajer
In Her Boots, Kathrin Steinbacher
The Magic Boat, Naaman Azhari, Lilia Laurel

None of these are on the Oscar finalist list but they have different eligibility

British Short Film
Azaar, Myriam Raja, Nathanael Baring
Goldfish, Hector Dockrill, Harri Kamalanathan, Benedict Turnbull, Laura Dockrill
Kamali, Sasha Rainbow, Rosalind Croad
Learning To Skateboard In A Warzone (If You’re A Girl), Carol Dysinger, Elena Andreicheva
The Trap, Lena Headey, Anthony Fitzgerald

You guys. Lena Heady made a short film!!!

Rising Star Award
Awkwafina
Jack Lowden
Kaitlyn Dever
Kelvin Harrison Jr.
Micheal Ward

Unlike the other nominations, this is a juried award each year and then the public votes on the outcome. 

Comments

[Luke]

True story I can pass on about your average BAFTA voter (in this case my friend's dad - a production designer). He watches maybe 2, 3 of the films. And the rest of the DVDs he hands to his kids and tell them to report back to him who to vote for. They in turn watch maybe 2 or 3 and then report back, and the rest of the screeners just sit on my friend's shelf unwatched for the rest of the year. Maybe BAFTA needs an overhaul.

[Glenn Dunks]

ugh, the “BAFTA just didn’t vote for them” crowd are here too. It’s just too depressing.

I miss the old BAFTA. They were fun.

[kermit_the_frog]

Arkaan - all accusations of racial bias towards BAFTA are absolutely founded in fact (basically, POC excellence has to be unquestionably superior to white talent, otherwise members clearly just opt for white mediocrity as their default).

That said, the "Denzel Washington Example" is often misused as evidence - of his 8 Oscar nominations, only 2 performances (Cry Freedom and Fences) were actually eligible in the same BAFTA year... so definitely two snubs as both these films received other nominations, but not quite as clear-cut as 8 TIMES would have you believe.

The third instance would be Training Day - in those times, it was frequent that an ineligible winner of the Oscar would receive an "afterglow" nomination from BAFTA the following season - Halle Berry got one (like Hilary Swank and Charlize Theron) but Denzel was left out.

The eligibility issue is a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy in the UK - studios believe that the UK public doesn't respond to "black cinema" so never make awards season a priority... resulting in performances not being eligible (hey Alfre Woodard) and members not voting for them, in turn resulting in poor box office and evidence that "the UK public doesn't respond to black cinema".

Personally, I'd prefer they followed the lead of their exceptional TV branch (who in the past decade have awarded Best Leading Actress nominations to Sophie Okonedo, Nadine Marshall, Georgina Campbell, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Thandie Newton and Sandra Oh) and make all nomination processes jury-based, with members voting only for winners...

[Chinoiserie]

It would be amazing if there was some awards show that would pick movies form all over the world without any specific language or geographical bias. Maybe EU should try to support movies and start something like this for European movies.

[Dorian]

These nominations are a disgrace. #BAFTASoAryan.

[Martin]

Well your outcry was not unheard - I literally just watched a report on the sky news about exactly this issue with the BAFTA.
It is really sad because - I don't think the few stars have to pick up all prizes worldwide - so much more outstanding work out there... which makes me wish now that Oscar voters will surprise - nearly a lemming-like behaviour ... where is the fun ?

[RobMiles]

No performance by a POC deserved to be nominated this year.