Final BAFTA Predictions

Not gonna lie, I did dreadfully with nominations, but with how awards tend to go that may be a promising sign for this.

Best Film

One Battle After Another

Alternate: Hamnet

OBAA has shown 0 signs of weakness whatsoever, no reason to doubt it.

Best Director

Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another

Alternate: Chloe Zhao, Hamnet

Best Actress

Jessie Buckley, Hamnet

Alternate: Emma Stone, Bugonia

Not that it matters who’s second, but I can’t see them giving it a sole nominee like Byrne and Reinsve is not the type of performance the industry awards.

Best Actor

Timothee Chalamet, Marty Supreme

Alternate: Leonardo DiCaprio, One Battle After Another

I’d actually be shocked if DiCaprio won. At this point he has nothing going for him aside from “strength of OBAA,” but that hasn’t helped him anywhere thus far. If Chalamet loses somewhere, I think it’ll be to MBJ at SAG.

Best Supporting Actress

Teyana Taylor, One Battle After Another

Alternate: Inga Ibsdotter-Lilleaas, Sentimental Value

I know some people see this as highly competitive but I think Inga’s far more subtle than what the industry typically awards. She has got a leg up in the screentime/film presence department, though.

Best Supporting Actor

Stellan Skarsgard, Sentimental Value

Alternate: Sean Penn, One Battle After Another

I think this is a much tighter race than Supporting Actress. Skarsgard is way less showy than Penn and is in a much weaker movie, and was not able to break through at SAG like almost every other foreign language performance that’s won with the industry. However, the fact that Skarsgard’s been going hard on the campaign trail (especially with Penn not trying at all), and the OBAA have been splitting everywhere it counts still makes me lean Skarsgard.

That LFCC win for Penn did make me switch for a bit until I considered that Skarsgard probably missed in the first place because of vote splitting between Lead and Supporting and not necessarily genuine apathy. Had he been nominated in Supporting Actor, he could have beaten Penn.

But there is a very real possibility Penn wins this and then the Oscar. If he does I will be kicking myself for not having the guts to predict it, especially after drawing attention to the importance of LFCC.

Best Original Screenplay

Sentimental Value

Alternate: Sinners

Another massive headache of a category. Sinners is exactly the sort of thing they would not award, not just because it’s not to their tastes but because it’s not “writer”-y enough. The difference between this and American Fiction is that it’s not actually that screenplay-driven. Sentimental Value, on the other hand, is, and they liked it well enough. But here’s my thing: they liked Marty Supreme a whole lot more. Yeah, it’s not “European,” but Licorice Pizza was a hell of a lot less European than Belfast and that still won. Given that it’s extremely dialogue-driven, I could very well see this pull off a surprise upset. 

However, that also may be my personal bias talking, so I’ll go with Sentimental Value.

Best Adapted Screenplay

One Battle After Another

Alternate: Hamnet

Best International Film

Sentimental Value

Alternate: The Secret Agent

Actually fairly plausible that The Secret Agent takes this. Yes, it flopped on the longlists, but only because of low visibility. The fact it got a Screenplay nomination shows that they have since seen the movie and love it. There could very well be a groundswell of support for it, despite the mass nomination differences. However, as someone who predicted I’m Still Here to win the BAFTA last year for similar reasons, I’m not getting burned twice.

Best Animated Film

Little Amelie

Alternate: Zootropolis 2

I just can’t get over the fact that the first Zootopia couldn’t win here, not to mention Toy Story 4. And whatever group votes for Elio will clearly be peeling off from Zootopia 2 voters. I feel like they’ll give Zootopia 2 the family film prize and take the opportunity to award Little Amelie here. 

Best Documentary Film

The Perfect Neighbour

Alternate: 2000 Meters to Andriivka

I’m gonna say that the 2 anti-Russia documentaries will simply split the vote and cause our easy frontrunner to prevail.

Best British Film

Hamnet

Alternate: I Swear

Best British Debut

Pillion

Alternate: My Father’s Shadow

Best Casting

Marty Supreme

Alternate: One Battle After Another

Horrifically open category. In the past, I’ve predicted the film that successfully cast an iconic role or character, which is how I called Elvis. But all 5 of the nominees this year are original. After The Holdovers and Anora wins, I figure it makes sense to predict the film that "discovered" a young talent… and yet that still doesn’t rule out any of these movies. So I’m just going with Marty Supreme because of the very publicized stunt casting and the fact that they may want to award OBAA elsewhere.

Best Cinematography

Sinners

Alternate: One Battle After Another

That BSC win makes One Battle tempting, but Sinners’ just feels so flashy for the industry to deny. It seems to be on a similar trajectory to Dune vs. Power of the Dog.

Best Editing

F1

Alternate: One Battle After Another

Don’t really see a reason for One Battle to win this aside from “it’s winning Best Picture,” which BAFTA cares about least of all for this category. There is a car chase at the end, sure, but it’s nowhere near as flashy as F1’s stuff.

Best Sound

F1

Alternate: Sinners

BAFTA’s bizarre hatred for racing movies in this category makes me want to switch off F1, but between Sinners (music) One Battle (vaguely action-y) and Warfare (war), I’d have no idea what to choose.

Best Visual Effects

Avatar: The Way of Water

Alternate: F1

Best Music

Sinners

Alternate: One Battle After Another

Best Production Design

Frankenstein

Alternate: Hamnet

Best Costume Design

Frankenstein

Alternate: Hamnet

Best Makeup/Hairstyling

Frankenstein

Alternate: Sinners

Off-topic but I still can’t believe Hamnet got nominated here.