Joker Is the Movie of the Year, According to British People
Now that we’ve had a few days to recover from the annual delightfully confounding awards show that is the Golden Globes, let’s take a gander across the pond to see what the latest fuss is, as the British Academy of Film and Television Arts has announced the list of nominees for its 2020 ceremony. The two big takeaways? The British apparently love Joker, which leads with 11 nominations, and diversity and representational issues are a problem on both shores of the Atlantic, because this year, all the BAFTA acting nominees are white.
The BAFTA nominations, which were announced this morning, honored Todd Phillips’s twisted take on the classic Batman villain, as Joker is up for Best Film, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Leading Actor (Joaquin Phoenix), and more. Martin Scorsese’s Netflix mob epic The Irishman and Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood tied for a close second, snagging 10 nominations each. Sam Mendes’s faux-one-take World War I movie 1917, which won the top prize at the Golden Globes, earned nine nominations.
Parasite received four nominations, including Best Film, Film Not in the English Language, and Bong Joon Ho earned a nod for directing.
The acting nominations, however, are a total whiteout this year; not a single person of color earned a nomination in either the leading or supporting actor or actress categories. Margot Robbie was nominated twice in Supporting Actress though, first for Bombshell and then again for Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood. And, as with the Golden Globes, the Director nominations were all-male.
To the BAFTA’s... well, not quite credit, but at least severely limited self-awareness, executives recognized that the lack of diversity is a bad look.
“Clearly everybody knows that everybody in the four acting groups of nominees are white, it's infuriating,” Marc Samuelson, chairman of BAFTA's film committee, told the U.K. news agency PA. “We can't make the industry do something, all we can do is encourage and push and inspire and try to help people coming in at the bottom end.”
Amanda Berry, BAFTA’s chief executive, pointed to the “six female directors in the shorts category” as something that gave her hope for the future, and while that’s nice, it doesn’t change the fact that Todd Philips has a great chance of winning the top directing award when the BAFTAs are held on February 2.
See the full list of nominees below.
Best Film
1917
The Irishman
Joker
Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
Parasite
Leading Actress
Jessie Buckley, Wild Rose
Scarlett Johansson, Marriage Story
Saoirse Ronan, Little Women
Charlize Theron, Bombshell
Renée Zellweger, Judy
Leading Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Adam Driver, Marriage Story
Taron Egerton, Rocketman
Joaquin Phoenix, Joker
Jonathan Pryce, The Two Popes
Supporting Actress
Laura Dern, Marriage Story
Scarlett Johansson, Jojo Rabbit
Florence Pugh, Little Women
Margot Robbie, Bombshell
Margot Robbie, Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
Supporting Actor
Tom Hanks, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood
Anthony Hopkins, The Two Popes
Al Pacino, The Irishman
Joe Pesci, The Irishman
Brad Pitt, Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
Outstanding British Film|
1917
Bait
For Sama
Rocketman
Sorry We Missed You
The Two Popes
Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director, or Producer
Bait, Mark Jenkin (Writer-director), Kate Byers, Linn Waite (Producers)
For Sama, Waad Al-Kateab (Director-producer), Edward Watts (Director)
Maiden, Alex Holmes (Director)
Only You, Harry Wootliff (Writer-director)
Retablo, Álvaro Delgado-Aparicio (Writer-director)
Film Not in the English Language
The Farewell
For Sama
Pain and Glory
Parasite
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Documentary
American Factory
Apollo 11
Diego Maradona
For Sama
The Great Hack
Animated Film
Frozen 2
Klaus
A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
Toy Story 4
Director
Sam Mendes, 1917
Martin Scorsese, The Irishman
Todd Phillips, Joker
Quentin Tarantino, Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
Bong Joon Ho, Parasite
Original Screenplay
Susanna Fogel, Emily Halpern, Sarah Haskins, Katie Silberman, Booksmart
Rian Johnson, Knives Out
Noah Baumbach, Marriage Story
Quentin Tarantino, Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
Han Jin Won, Bong Joon Ho, Parasite
Adapted Screenplay
Steven Zaillian, The Irishman
Taika Waititi, Jojo Rabbit
Todd Phillips, Scott Silver, Joker
Greta Gerwig, Little Women
Anthony Mccarten, The Two Popes
Original Score
Thomas Newman, 1917
Michael Giacchino, Jojo Rabbit
Hildur Guđnadóttir, Joker
Alexandre Desplat, Little Women
John Williams, Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker
Casting
Shayna Markowitz, Joker
Douglas Aibel, Francine Maisler, Marriage Story
Victoria Thomas, Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
Sarah Crowe, The Personal History of David Copperfield
Nina Gold, The Two Popes
Cinematography
Roger Deakins, 1917
Rodrigo Prieto, The Irishman
Lawrence Sher, Joker
Phedon Papamichael, Le Mans ’66
Jarin Blaschke, The Lighthouse
Editing
Thelma Schoonmaker, The Irishman
Tom Eagles, Jojo Rabbit
Jeff Groth, Joker
Andrew Buckland, Michael Mccusker, Le Mans ’66
Fred Raskin, Once Upon A Time... In Hollywood
Production Design
Dennis Gassner, Lee Sandales, 1917
Bob Shaw, Regina Graves, The Irishman
Ra Vincent, Nora Sopková, Jojo Rabbit
Mark Friedberg, Kris Moran, Joker
Barbara Ling, Nancy Haigh, Once Upon A Time... In Hollywood
Costume Design
Christopher Peterson, Sandy Powell, The Irishman
Mayes C. Rubeo, Jojo Rabbit
Jany Temime, Judy
Jacqueline Durran, Little Women
Arianne Phillips, Once Upon A Time... In Hollywood
Make Up & Hair
Naomi Donne, 1917
Vivian Baker, Kazu Hiro, Anne Morgan, Bombshell
Kay Georgiou, Nicki Ledermann, Joker
Jeremy Woodhead, Judy
Lizzie Yianni Georgiou, Rocketman
Sound
1917, Scott Millan, Oliver Tarney, Rachael Tate, Mark Taylor, Stuart Wilson
Joker, Tod Maitland, Alan Robert Murray, Tom Ozanich, Dean Zupancic
Le Mans ’66, David Giammarco, Paul Massey, Steven A. Morrow, Donald Sylvester
Rocketman, Matthew Collinge, John Hayes, Mike Prestwood Smith, Danny Sheehan
Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker, David Acord, Andy Nelson, Christopher Scarabosio, Stuart Wilson, Matthew Wood
Special Visual Effects
Greg Butler, Guillaume Rocheron, Dominic Tuohy, 1917
Dan Deleeuw, Dan Sudick, Avengers: Endgame
Leandro Estebecorena, Stephane Grabli, Pablo Helman, The Irishman
Andrew R. Jones, Robert Legato, Elliot Newman, Adam Valdez, The Lion King
Roger Guyett, Paul Kavanagh, Neal Scanlan, Dominic Tuohy, Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker
British Short Animation
Grandad Was A Romantic, Maryam Mohajer
In Her Boots, Kathrin Steinbacher
The Magic Boat, Naaman Azhari, Lilia Laurel
British Short Film
Azaar, Myriam Raja, Nathanael Baring
Goldfish, Hector Dockrill, Harri Kamalanathan, Benedict Turnbull, Laura Dockrill
Kamali, Sasha Rainbow, Rosalind Croad
Learning To Skateboard In A Warzone (If You’re A Girl), Carol Dysinger, Elena Andreicheva
The Trap, Lena Headey, Anthony Fitzgerald
Rising Star Award
Awkwafina
Jack Lowden
Kaitlyn Dever
Kelvin Harrison Jr.
Micheal Ward
Originally Appeared on GQ
