Dune may have won the most awards, but The Power of the Dog proved too strong when it came to the night’s top categories at the Bafta Film Awards.
The western, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, won Best Picture and Best Director for Jane Campion, which benefited it ahead of the Oscars later this month.
Elsewhere, Rebel Wilson made a secure hosting debut, while the likes of Will Smith, Troy Kotsur, and Ariana DeBose cemented their Oscar-winning status.
Here are seven highlights from this year’s ceremony, which marked a return to a full capacity in-person event at the Royal Albert Hall.
The Baftas are a more serious and formal affair than many other awards shows, and it can be quite difficult to get the audience laughing.
As a result, a few jokes from presenter Rebel Wilson fell a little flat, but we felt the Australian comics actress did a good job overall, delivering some solid one-liners in her opening monologue.
- “You may be wondering, ‘Why is Rebel Wilson the host of the Baftas, isn’t she Australian?’ Yes, I’m from the bush, but if you think about it, don’t we all?”
- “Everyone asks me why I lost weight, clearly to get Robert Pattinson’s attention. Just kidding, I didn’t lose weight for a guy, I did it to get more roles.”
- “Lady Gaga is nominated for House of Gucci. Apparently they all had Italian accents in this film, I didn’t notice that.”
- “Tom Hiddleston is here, but he’s not nominated tonight, he’s just here Loki.”
- “We wanted to open the show with a Bond number because Bond is turning 60 and his friends are turning 25.”
- “I’m proud to announce that the new James Bond will be me. Bond is going to Australia and it will be called ‘Die Another G’Day’.”
- “The next prize is for the best original music. Mine was actually the last time I was here at the Baftas when I got Idris Elba’s phone number.”
“Next time I think I’ll check the weather report and maybe wear a little less fabric?” the Best Supporting Actress winner told press backstage after a slightly rain-soaked red carpet.
But what many don’t know is that her stunning Oscar de la Renta dress was actually a political statement — when paired with that of her West Side Story co-star.
“Has anyone seen what Rachel Zegler is wearing? Because we are both serious about Ukraine, we reflect that in color,” she said.
It wasn’t the only reference to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine at the ceremony. woody norman, the 13-year-old star of C’Mon C’Mon and Boiling Point star Stephen Graham both wore ribbons in the colors of the Ukrainian flag on their suits. Benedict Cumberbatch, meanwhile, wore a blue and yellow badge.
“It is appalling what we see every day” he told BBC News on the red carpet. “We all must continue to put pressure on the Putin regime, continue to help wherever we can, be it through donations or housing refugees, all of which I aspire to and have done.”
The musician’s film Summer of Soul won Best Documentary, but we were mostly impressed that he was awake enough for the Baftas given his busy schedule.
Questlove walked from the DGA Awards in Los Angeles on Saturday night to the Baftas in London on Sunday afternoon. Oh, and he also has to be back in LA by Monday night for his regular job – his group The Roots is the house band of a US chat show.
“I’m going straight to the airport [after the Baftas] and tomorrow I have to work with Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show,” he explained, adding that there is one last place he wants to visit before leaving London.
“When she was with us, Amy Winehouse actually introduced me to a shop called Beigel Bake, a 24-hour bakery. That’s how she always ended my London trips when we started our friendship, so I always go there and honor her.”
If you happened to be in Brick Lane late Sunday night, that really was Questlove you saw buying a rainbow bagel.
More from the 2022 Baftas:
- Full length winners and nominees
- The 2022 Bafta Film Awards red carpet in pictures
- Cumberbatch’s cowboy film wins top Bafta award
The Coda star has become an awards season favorite and has a good chance of winning the Best Supporting Actor Oscar following his Bafta win.
“I think it’s a great reward for many years of an extremely tough journey,” the deaf actor said backstage through an interpreter. “It was hell at times, I feel like a survivor.
“Sometimes I slept in the back seat of my car, I surfed the couch and on the set of A Streetcar Named Desire I slept on the bed on set because it was just so hard for me to survive as a starved actor back then. “
Kotsur is now getting the biggest recognition of his career thanks to Coda, which was directed and adapted by Sian Heder.
“Hollywood has taken a long time to accept actors who happen to be deaf. With Coda, it really was the right team, the right director, the right script,” he said.
The After Love star snagged the Best Actress Bafta, though the film hasn’t featured prominently at other awards this season.
Scanlan is perhaps best known for her role in the excellent TV political satire The Thick Of It, so could her first Bafta for a film role mean she’ll be more focused on film projects in the future?
“Well, movies and TV are changing, aren’t they? I think I’ll change with that,” she said
“Some of those boundaries are breaking down, and the way we tell stories is changing because of the platforms we get those stories through. So I’ll just go with that flow, ride that wave.”
You may have heard that this year, the Oscars controversially decided to pre-record eight of their 23 categories to save time during the broadcast.
At the Baftas, Best Editing winners Elliot Graham and Tom Cross of No Time To Die were asked what they thought of the Academy’s decision, which was unpopular in the film industry.
“I’m glad you asked that. I speak for myself, I’m not a fan,” Cross said. “I think it spoils the whole process — it’s not what the Academy of Motion Picture, Arts and Sciences is about.
“I’m lucky to have been there before and I just think every Oscar statue is gold – it’s not silver, it’s not bronze. All of these nominees deserve to stand up.”
Co-winner Elliot Graham agreed: “I grew up wanting to be a member of the Academy, so that’s a dream come true and I think it is [messed] they have to think about it.”
After Drive My Car won Best Non-English Language Film, director Ryusuke Hamaguchi opened his acceptance speech with a joke: “Well that took away my jet lag, thanks!”
During the backstage press conference, he explained more, “I only arrived in this country yesterday, so it’s about 5 a.m. Japan time right now.”
Following in the footsteps of recent major award winners such as Roma, Parasite and Minari, Hamaguchi acknowledged how attitudes towards subtitled films have changed.
“What makes us feel is the change and acceptance of these films in the UK and US,” he said. “The impact of Parasite two years ago on this was huge, and the next generation of Asian films is here ready to go.”
With just two weeks to go, all eyes will now be on the Oscars on March 27, which will mark the pinnacle of awards season.
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