BAFTA Awards

More awards before the Oscars, here are some thoughts on the BAFTA winners and nominees - unsurprisingly similarities, and some not.  Please note that I had not prior read the list of nominees before the winners were announced.

Best Picture - King's Speech --- was there really any doubt? The nominees are identical to the Oscars, but we already know who's been raking in the awards and will probably take the Oscar as well.  Of course, the facts that this is about a British king, starring lots of British actors probably didn't hurt either. And thus, not surprising either that it also nabbed the Outstanding British film of the year.


Best Actor - Colin Firth --- see above comments, but of course, Colin Firth was quite deserving of the award in the same field of same Oscar fellow nominees. Sadly for them, there's probably already a spot on the mantle in Firth's home for that statue come Feb 27


Best Actress - Natalie Portman --- Nina Nina Nina, another well deserved win, and perhaps another indication that she will probably nab the Oscar from Annette Benning who incidentally also does a great job in the Kids Are Alright.  The nice surprise nomination is definitely Noomi Rapace for her role as Lisbeth Salander, glad to see her get acknowledged for a fantastic job as the butt-kicking Salander!


Best Supporting Actor - Geoffrey Rush --- I have to think it's because he was in the winning British film.  He does a great job as usual, but it's a usual Rush performance.  Having seen The Fighter since watching the Golden Globes and predicting Rush win the Globe, I have to argue that Christian Bale should've gotten this one.


Best Supporting Actress - Helena Bonham Carter --- see above. Very surprised Melissa Leo wasn't even nominated, not only has she already won other awards for her role in the Fighter, but to see the other ladies (though talented in their own right) nominated is yet another surprise and more films to check out (ie Another Year and Made in Dagenham)


Directing - David Fincher --- hmm...interesting Tom Hooper didn't snag this one, but with a field as tight as it is, it could have gone several ways.


Best Original Screenplay - The King's Speech --- see way above. It's a good script, don't get me wrong, but I would like to acknowledge the years Nolan put into Inception that still has us spewing theories on the ending and the film overall. The complexities in building each element of the plot and characters was great.


Best Adapted Screenplay - The Social Network --- another tight field. Excited to see The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo here.  Having read all 3 books, this was the one best adapted of the trilogy (the other two I must say needs to be re-written for screen, there was so much they left out!). Toy Story 3 and 127 Hours, also good to see nominated, both solid scripts.  True Grit, I shall see tomorrow and decide then =)


Cinematography - True Grit --- seeing this tomorrow to see what made it stand out from this group of nominees that included Black Swan, 127 Hours, The King's Speech and Inception


Best Editing - The Social Network --- another strong field.


Best Production Design - Inception --- thankyou BAFTA for this one! This was a film were production design definitely added to the layers of the film, drawing audiences deeper and deeper into each dream world. Another hard choice as each nominee presented a very unique world from the others.


Best Costume Design - Alice in Wonderland --- now of course that was a lot of unique outfits one can't just walk into the store for (not even a costume place).  Sometimes this category can be predictable given the genres of films nominated.  Mind you, the costumes in Black Swan were beautiful


Film Music - The King's Speech --- I like Alexandre Desplat's work. I do, I don't know if this one stands out for me. Given the field though, I would've gone with Desplat.  Rahman is fantastic as well, but there were just parts of that score that didn't seem fitting.


Best Make Up/Hair - Alice in Wonderland --- see Costume, I think it goes hand in hand.  In my film and video projects though, I definitely have gained an appreciation to the work of our make up teams, so wonderful to see the acknowledging of all nominees.


Best Sound - Inception --- This award seems to usually get awards to the film with lots of sound effects and work, mostly would be a Hollywood blockbuster film so not much of a surprise here.


Special Visual Effects - Inception --- For those of you who haven't seen Inception, you'll wonder why.  For those of you have, you wouldn't have been surprised at some of the effects called upon in this film.  Alice in Wonderland would have been runner up in my books as there's not much new in Harry Potter than the usual greatness.  


Best Film in Language Not English - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo --- This film was phenomenal and so well executed.  It's appearance here as a nominee and winner reminds me that it was not nominated for the Oscars, nor even shortlisted.  Strange, shocking, but I'm glad it won the BAFTA.  With the Hollywood remake in the works, I'm curious to see how it turns out.  I went by the video store the other day and came across Let Me In the remake of another Swedish film Let the Right One In  which was fantastic, though the Hollywood version didn't seem to have done nearly as well.


Best Animated Feature - Toy Story 3D --- no surprise there. Though I will say I quite liked How To Train Your Dragon as well.


The rest of the winners, I'll leave for now, but that was my take on the BAFTA outcome, just my opinion is all.  Excited for the Oscars in less than 2 weeks time, come back before it starts for predictions and wishful wins.