The film ‘One Battle After Another’, by American director Paul Thomas Anderson, was positioned Tuesday with 14 nominations as the favorite of the 79th edition of the BAFTA awards, the most important British film awards, where the Spanish ‘Sirat’, by Oliver Laxe, also got a nomination.
In the race for the BAFTAs, to be held on February 22 in London, ‘One Battle After Another’ is closely followed by ‘The Sinners’, with 13 nominations; as well as ‘Hamnet’ and ‘Marty Supreme’, with 11; ‘Frankenstein’ and ‘Sentimental Courage’, with eight each; or ‘Uncontrollable’ and ‘Bugonia’, with five.
Three nominations went to ‘The Ballad of the Island’, ‘Pillion’ and ‘F1’, while ‘Wicked: Part II’, ‘Zootropolis 2’ and Brazil’s ‘The Secret Agent’ got two, the latter in both the best original screenplay and best foreign language film categories.
BAFTAs: Brazil, ‘Sirat’ and Del Toro on the shortlist
The film by Brazilian filmmaker Kleber Mendonça Filho will also compete for the best foreign language film award with the Spanish film ‘Sirat’, by French-Galician director Óliver Laxe, as well as with ‘Sentimental Value’, by Joachim Trier; ‘The Voice of Hind’, by Kaouther Ben Hania, and ‘A Simple Accident’, by Jafar Panahi.
Sirat’, directed and written by Laxe, continues to accumulate international recognition, after recently achieving two nominations for the upcoming Oscars, with a story that goes deep into the Moroccan desert to follow the desperate search of a father, Luis (Sergi López), and his youngest son, Esteban (Bruno Núñez), to find Mar, his daughter and older sister, who disappeared months ago in an illegal rave in the mountains.
The president of the Academy of Cinema and Television, Sara Putt, praised the film by the French-Galician filmmaker in statements to EFE: “‘Sirat’ is an excellent film. It’s a challenging film, it’s very different and I think that’s what makes it memorable and exciting. Congratulations to everyone involved”.
Latin American representation was also completed with the nomination of Puerto Rican actor Benicio del Toro as best supporting actor for his performance in ‘One Battle After Another’, who will opt for the second golden mask in his list of nominees, after having won it in 2001 for ‘Traffic’.
Del Toro will be battling in the same category with fellow actor Sean Penn, as well as Australian actor with Basque roots Jacob Elordi (‘Frankenstein’), Paul Mescal (‘Hamnet’), Peter Mullan (‘Uncontrollable’) and Stellan Skarsgard (‘Sentimental Value’).
Similarly, Brazilian filmmaker Petra Costa will fight for the award in the best documentary category, after obtaining a nomination with ‘Apocalypse in the Tropics’, focused on how the evangelical movement that paved the way for the presidency of Jair Bolsonaro.
A list dominated by “excellence
Of the 220 films initially submitted to the BAFTAs, only 46 have managed to get a nomination on Tuesday, in a list that, in Putt’s opinion, has put “excellence” as the main selection criterion.
Under this premise, the queen category of the awards, the best film, ‘One Battle After Another’ will have as rivals ‘The Sinners’, ‘Hamnet’, ‘Marty Supreme’ and ‘Sentimental Courage’; which also repeat in the best director category, including Yorgos Lanthimos, for ‘Bugonia’.
Timothée Chalamet (Marty Supreme) is positioned as the odds-on favorite to win the golden mask in the best actor category, where he will face Leonardo Dicaprio (‘One Battle After Another’); Ethan Hawke (‘Blue Moon’), Jesse Plemons (‘Bugonia’), Michael B. Jordan (‘The Sinners’) and Robert Aramayo, for ‘Uncontrollable’.
In the Best Actress category, Irish actress Jessie Buckley has, barring a major surprise, the highest number of chances to win the award, but she will face tough competition: Rose Byrne (‘If I Could, I’d Kick You’), Kate Hudson (‘Song Sung Blue’), Chase Infiniti (‘One Battle After Another’), Renate Reinsve (‘Sentimental Value’) and Emma Stone (‘Bugonia’).
British actors Aimee Lou Wood (‘The White Lotus’) and David Jonsson (‘Industry’) announced the nominations at a ceremony held Tuesday at BAFTA headquarters in central London.
The 79th BAFTA Awards gala, presented for the first time by Scottish actor and presenter Alan Cumming, will take place on February 22 at the Royal Festival Hall in the British capital, reported Agencia EFE.
Find out more at ‘QueOnnda.com’.
