Will and Cate rub shoulders at the BAFTA Awards

Christopher Nolan secured his first BAFTA best director win, while Barbie, the biggest blockbuster of the year, left the ceremony empty-handed | FULL LIST

Prince William, Prince of Wales, president of Bafta speaks with Cate Blanchett at the Bafta Film Awards 2024. Picture: Jordan Pettitt/Getty Images

The Prince of Wales found himself in the company of Australian acting royalty Cate Blanchett on the front row of the 2024 British Academy Film Awards on Sunday night in London.

Prince William, who has served as president of the academy since 2010, stepped out on the red carpet at London’s Royal Festival Hall solo, as his wife, Kate Middleton, recovers after a planned abdominal surgery in January. Middleton’s calendar has been cleared of official royal duties until Easter.

Britain's Prince William, Prince of Wales, president of Bafta, speaks with Australian actress Cate Blanchett during the BAFTA British Academy Film Awards at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, in London. Picture: Jordan Pettit/POOL/AFP

In the auditorium, William was seated next to Cate Blanchett and the football star David Beckham.

Christopher Nolan’s historical biopic about J. Robert Oppenheimer, the “father of the atomic bomb,” won 7 of the 13 awards it was nominated for, including, best actor for Cillian Murphy, and best supporting actor for Robert Downey Jr.

Actor Michael J. Fox, who has battled Parkinson’s for decades, received a standing ovation as he presented the award for best film to Nolan for Oppenheimer.

Oppenheimer star Cillian Murphy and All of Us Strangers star Andrew Scott attend the 2024 EE BAFTA Film Awards. Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images

It is the first time that Nolan, an eight-time BAFTA best director nominee, has taken home the win. In his acceptance speech, the 54-year-old director, one of the most critically and commercially successful British filmmakers of the century, noted that his film ends with “a dramatically necessary note of despair.”

He went on to acknowledge the people and organisations who tirelessly worked to further nuclear disarmament. “In the real world, there are all kinds of individuals and organisations who have fought long and hard to reduce the number of nuclear weapons in the world. And since 1967, they’ve done it by almost 90 per cent.

“It’s important to acknowledge their work, which shows the necessary and potential of efforts for peace.”

Producer Emma Thomas and director Christopher Nolan pose with the Best Film Award for Oppenheimer. Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images

Yorgos Lanthimos’ erotic fantasy Poor Things was the other major winner of the evening, taking home five of the 11 awards it was nominated for.

The film’s star, Emma Stone — who plays a woman with the brain of a baby, and has dominated the major acting awards this season— beat out Margot Robbie for the best lead actress trophy. Stone used her speech to thank her mother, “Without her, none of this would exist, including my life. So thank you, mom!”

Emma Stone poses in the Winners Room with the Leading Actress Award during the EE BAFTA Film Awards 2024. Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images

Margot Robbie attends the EE BAFTA Film Awards 2024, where her film, Barbie, left empty handed. Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images

Jonathan Glazer’s holocaust drama The Zone of Interest took out three awards for best sound, outstanding British film, and best film not in the English language.

Most of the major televised awards shows this year have been silent on the war in the Middle East, but in accepting the trophy for best film not in the English language, The Zone of Interest’s producer James Wilson spoke on what he called “selective empathy.”

In a speech that was met with cheers from the crowd, Wilson said that a friend had recently written to him, explaining that they “couldn’t stop thinking about the walls we construct in our lives which we choose not to look behind.”

British film director Jonathan Glazer and producer James Wilson pose with the awards for outstanding British film and for best adapted screenplay for The Zone of Interest. Picture: Justin Tallis/AFP

“Those walls aren’t new from before or during or since the Holocaust, and it seems stark right now that we should care about innocent people being killed in Gaza or Yemen in the same way we think about innocent people killed in Mariupol or in Israel. Thank you for recognising a film that asks you to think in those spaces.”

Earlier, on the red carpet, British film director Ken Loach walked with the filmmaking team behind his movie The Old Oak, carrying a Stop the War Coalition poster that read, “Gaza: Stop the Massacre.”

Rebecca O'Brien, Paul Laverty, Ken Loach and guests attend the 2024 EE BAFTA Film Awards. Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images

20 Days in Mariupol, a film about the first three weeks of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, won best documentary. Its director, Associated Press video journalist Mstyslav Chernov, used his speech to highlight the recent fall of Avdiivka, saying: “Mariupol is a symbol of everything that happens, of struggle, of faith.

“Thank [you] for empowering our voice, and let’s keep fighting.”

Greta Gerwig’s Barbie, the highest-grossing film of last year, was not nominated in the best movie or best director categories — and left the awards empty-handed. As did other buzzy films such as Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, Celine Song’s Past Lives, and Bradley Cooper’s Maestro.

Best supporting actress Da'Vine Joy Randolph poses on the red carpet upon arrival at the BAFTA British Academy Film Awards. Picture: Adrian Dennis/AFP

Actress Da’Vine Joy Randolph continued her winning hot streak, taking out best supporting actress for her role as a grieving mother Mary Lamb in Alexander Payne’s 1970s-set drama The Holdovers. Randolph, who won the same award at the Golden Globes and the Critic’s Choice, said in her speech that “Mary was a character that is so much bigger than me.

“There have been countless Marys throughout history who never got a chance to wear a beautiful gown and stand on this stage in London.”

Australian star Sophie Wilde attends the EE BAFTA Film Awards 2024. Picture: John Phillips/Getty Images

Australian young guns Jacob Elordi and Sophie Wilde were both up for the Rising Star award. Elordi for his role as frat boy Felix Catton in Emerald Fennell’s class satire Saltburn, and Wilde for her role in this year’s big AACTA-winner Talk To Me. They lost out to Mia McKenna-Bruce for her star-turn in the Un Certain Regard-winning consent drama, How to Have Sex.

BAFTA Awards 2024 — The Winners

Leading actor

WINNER: Cillian Murphy — Oppenheimer

Bradley Cooper — Maestro

Colman Domingo — Rustin

Paul Giamatti — The Holdovers

Barry Keoghan — Saltburn

Teo Yoo — Past Lives

Leading actress

WINNER: Emma Stone — Poor Things

Fantasia Barrino — The Color Purple

Sandra Hüller — Anatomy of a Fall

Carey Mulligan — Maestro

Vivian Oparah — Rye Lane

Margot Robbie — Barbie

Rising star award

WINNER: Mia McKenna-Bruce

Phoebe Dynevor

Ayo Edebiri

Jacob Elordi

Sophie Wilde

Director

WINNER: Oppenheimer — Christopher Nolan

All Of Us Strangers — Andrew Haigh

Anatomy Of A Fall — Justine Triet

The Holdovers — Alexander Payne

Maestro — Bradley Cooper

The Zone Of Interest — Jonathan Glazer

Make-up and hair

WINNER: Poor Things — Nadia Stacey, Mark Coulier, Josh Weston

Killers Of The Flower Moon — Kay Georgiou, Thomas Nellen

Maestro — Sian Grigg, Kay Georgiou, Kazu Hiro, Lori McCoy-Bell

Napoleon — Jana Carboni, Francesco Pegoretti, Satinder Chumber, Julia Vernon

Oppenheimer — Luisa Abel, Jaime Leigh McIntosh, Jason Hamer, Ahou Mofid

Costume design

WINNER: Poor Things — Holly Waddington

Barbie — Jacqueline Durran

Killers Of The Flower Moon — Jacqueline West

Napoleon — Dave Crossman, Janty Yates

Oppenheimer — Ellen Mirojnick

Outstanding British film

WINNER: The Zone Of Interest

All Of Us Strangers

How To Have Sex

Napoleon

The Old Oak

Poor Things

Rye Lane

Saltburn

Scrapper

Wonka

British short animation

WINNER: Crab Day — Ross Stringer, Bartosz Stanislawek, Aleksandra Sykulak

Visible Mending — Samantha Moore, Tilley Bancroft

Wild Summon — Karni Arieli, Saul Freed, Jay Woolley

British short film

WINNER: Jellyfish And Lobster — Yasmin Afifi, Elizabeth Rufai

Festival Of Slaps — Abdou Cissé, Cheri Darbon, George Telfer

Gorka — Joe Weiland, Alex Jefferson

Such A Lovely Day — Simon Woods, Polly Stokes, Emma Norton, Kate Phibbs

Yellow — Elham Ehsas, Dina Mousawi, Azeem Bhati, Yiannis Manolopoulos

Outstanding British contribution to cinema

WINNER: June Givani

Production design

WINNER: Poor Things — Shona Heath, James Price, Zsuzsa Mihalek

Barbie — Sarah Greenwood, Katie Spencer

Killers Of The Flower Moon — Jack Fisk, Adam Willis

Oppenheimer — Ruth De Jong, Claire Kaufman

The Zone Of Interest — Chris Oddy, Joanna Maria Kuś, Katarzyna Sikora

Sound

WINNER: The Zone Of Interest — Johnnie Burn, Tarn Willers

Ferrari — Angelo Bonanni, Tony Lamberti, Andy Nelson, Lee Orloff, Bernard Weiser

Maestro — Richard King, Steve Morrow, Tom Ozanich, Jason Ruder, Dean Zupancic

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One — Chris Burdon, James H. Mather, Chris Munro, Mark Taylor

Oppenheimer — Willie Burton, Richard King, Kevin O’Connell, Gary A. Rizzo

Original score

WINNER: Oppenheimer — Ludwig Göransson

Killers Of The Flower Moon — Robbie Robertson

Poor Things — Jerskin Fendrix

Saltburn — Anthony Willis

Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse — Daniel Pemberton

Documentary

WINNER: 20 Days in Mariupol

American Symphony

Beyond Utopia

Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie

Wham!

Supporting actress

WINNER: Da’Vine Joy Randolph — The Holdovers

Emily Blunt — Oppenheimer

Danielle Brooks — The Color Purple

Claire Foy — All of Us Strangers

Sandra Huller — The Zone of Interest

Rosamind Pike — Saltburn

Supporting actor

WINNER: Robert Downey Jr — Oppenheimer

Robert De Niro — Killers of The Flower Moon

Jacob Elordi — Saltburn

Ryan Gosling — Barbie

Paul Mescal — All of Us Strangers

Dominic Sessa — The Holdovers

Adapted screenplay

WINNER: American Fiction — Cord Jefferson

All Of Us Strangers — Andrew Haigh

Oppenheimer — Christopher Nolan

Poor Things — Tony McNamara

The Zone Of Interest — Jonathan Glazer

Cinematography

Oppenheimer — Hoyte van Hoytema

Killers Of The Flower Moon — Rodrigo Prieto

Maestro — Matthew Libatique

Poor Things — Robbie Ryan

The Zone Of Interest — Łukasz Żal

Editing

Oppenheimer — Jennifer Lame

Anatomy Of A Fall — Laurent Sénéchal

Killers Of The Flower Moon — Thelma Schoonmaker

Poor Things — Yorgos Mavropsaridis

The Zone Of Interest — Paul Watts

Casting

WINNER: The Holdovers — Susan Shopmaker

All Of Us Strangers — Kathleen Crawford

Anatomy Of A Fall — Cynthia Arra

How To Have Sex — Isabella Odoffin

Killers Of The Flower Moon — Ellen Lewis, Rene Haynes

Film not in the English language

WINNER: 20 Days in Mariupol

Anatomy Of A Fall

Past Lives

Society Of The Snow

The Zone Of Interest

Outstanding debut by a British writer, director or producer

WINNER: Earth Mama — Savanah Leaf (writer, director, producer), Shirley O’Connor (producer), Medb Riordan (producer)

Blue Bag Life — Lisa Selby (director), Rebecca Lloyd-Evans (director, producer), Alex Fry (producer)

Bobi Wine: The People’s President — Christopher Sharp (director) [also directed Moses Bwayo]

How To Have Sex — Molly Manning Walker (writer, director)

Is There Anybody Out There? — Ella Glendining (director)

Animated film

WINNER: The Boy And The Heron

Chicken Run: Dawn Of The Nugget

Elemental

Spider-man: Across The Spiderverse

Special visual effects

WINNER: Poor Things — Simon Hughes

The Creator — Jonathan Bullock, Charmaine Chan, Ian Comley, Jay Cooper

Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 — Theo Bialek, Stephane Ceretti, Alexis Wajsbrot, Guy Williams

Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One — Neil Corbould, Simone Coco, Jeff Sutherland, Alex Wuttke

Napoleon — Henry Badgett, Neil Corbould, Charley Henley, Luc-Ewen Martin-Fenouillet

Original screenplay

WINNER: Anatomy Of A Fall — Justine Triet, Arthur Harari

Barbie — Greta Gerwig, Noah Baumbach

The Holdovers — David Hemingson

Maestro — Bradley Cooper, Josh Singer

Past Lives — Celine Song

Best film

WINNER: Oppenheimer

Anatomy Of A Fall

The Holdovers

Killers Of The Flower Moon

Poor Things