The Playlist

Cannes 2013: Surprises & Notable Absence ...

The obsessives' guide to contemporary cinema via film discussion, news, reviews, features, nostalgia, movie music, soundtracks, DVDs and more.

Interviews

'Argo' Wins Best Film & Best Director At The 2013 BAFTAs, Emmanuelle Riva Wins Best Actress

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
February 10, 2013 2:01 PM
|
10 Comments

Awards

Over the weekend, Hollywood's A-list have been flying into London, to be greeted by the traditional British February welcome of rain-that-sometimes-turns-into-snow, in order to brave tonight's British Academy of Film and Television Awards (or BAFTA Awards), the U.K. equivalent to the Oscars.

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
February 8, 2013 3:03 PM
|
4 Comments

Awards

We're two weeks out from the Academy Awards, but this weekend brings the last of the major precursor ceremonies (excluding the WGAs) before Oscars -- the British Academy Of Film and Television Arts Awards, or the BAFTAs. Historically leaning more towards celebrating homegrown fare than following the award season narratives, things have changed in the last few years with BAFTA moving the ceremony before the Oscars, and with a significant proportion of AMPAS members being British, it can be a good indicator of how things will go with the Academy.

By Kevin Jagernauth
|
January 30, 2013 2:02 PM
|
3 Comments

News

The Oscars aren't the only major awards ceremony in February that will attract movie stars and airheaded red carpet commentators in equal measure. Across the pond, the BAFTAs will hand out their trophies a couple weeks earlier, and attendees will get something nice too, just for showing up.

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
January 9, 2013 2:53 AM
|
6 Comments

Awards

This week is so awards-heavy that the British Academy Of Film And Television Arts (or BAFTA, to their mum) had to squeeze their announcement in at 7.30 GMT, a time when it's dark in the U.K, New York and Los Angeles. And while BAFTA can often back British fare over the films that have otherwise dominated the awards conversation, this year saw them stick fairly closely to the awards narrative in general, with "Skyfall," "Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" and "Anna Karenina" all failing to sweep the board in the way that some had suggested (though all made the 'Best British Film' nominees).

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
February 12, 2012 2:18 PM
|
5 Comments

Awards

We're coming into the last gasp of the awards season now, and while most eyes tonight will be on the Grammys, in the aftermath of the death of Whitney Houston yesterday, the Orange British Academy Film Awards are being given out at the Royal Opera House in London. It's one of the last major ceremonies of the calendar, two weeks before the Oscars, and whereas few surprises are expected there, BAFTA has the potential to make things a little more interesting.

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
January 17, 2012 3:09 AM
|
4 Comments

Awards

BAFTA nominations were announced early/late/unreasonably late this morning by Daniel Radcliffe and Holliday Grainger, and after a pretty shoddy longlist, which serves mainly to drain the suspense from the nominations list and to let Emma Watson tell her friends "I was this close to a BAFTA nomination!," the organization redeemed itself to a degree.

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
January 6, 2012 2:07 PM
|
0 Comments

Awards

Gosh, wasn't it nice to have a break from all this awards malarkey over the Christmas break? It's three weeks since our last column, and until the start of this week, the guilds and critics awards had been quiet, with holiday season box office and the actual Oscar ballots going out had been the only real happenings. But things geared up again this week, with Tuesday's announcement of the Producers' Guild Awards nominations, yesterday's Writer's Guild nods, and the BAFTA longlist being announced today, and so here we are again. So how does all this week's news effect the races?

By Kevin Jagernauth
|
February 14, 2011 12:25 AM
|
0 Comments

Tom Hardy Honored With Orange Wednesdays Rising Star AwardThe awards season train for "The King's Speech" keeps on going this weekend with the film picking up 7 BAFTA Awards on Sunday including Best Film, Best Original Screenplay and a trio of trophies for the film's lead actors, Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush and Helena Bonham Carter. However, it wasn't an entire clean sweep of the major categories as "The Social Network" fans will be pleased to know that David Fincher took home Best Director; the film also won Adapted Screenplay and Editing honors.

By Oliver Lyttelton
|
January 18, 2011 8:26 AM
|
3 Comments

'Black Swan' Does Well, 'The Social Network' Less So So, the British Academy Of Film and Television Award nominations were announced in the wee hours of this morning by Dominic Cooper and Talulah Riley, and while it hasn't changed the shape of the awards race by any means, there's certainly a few eyebrows raised as a result. The nominations are now nestled neatly in a slot between the Golden Globe ceremony and the Oscar nominations, and so have some degree of value, at least as a precursor, in the Oscar prediction game.