BAFTA 2011 winners

It was a good night for The King's Speech on Sunday, picking up seven British Academy Film awards, including Best Film, Best British Film and Best Actor for Colin Firth (a very popular winner). Inception and The Social Network both picked up three awards, with David Fincher winning Best Director for the latter. 

Here is the full list of winners at the BAFTA awards 2011:

Academy Fellowship
Sir Christopher Lee

Best Film

The King's Speech

Best Actor

Colin Firth (The King's Speech)

Best Actress

Natalie Portman (Black Swan)

Best Director

David Fincher (The Social Network)

Best Adapted Screenplay
The Social Network (Aaron Sorkin)

Best Animated Feature Film
Toy Story 3

Outstanding British Contribution to Film

The Harry Potter film series

Best Original Screenplay
The King's Speech (David Seidler)

Best Supporting Actor
Geoffrey Rush (The King's Speech)

Outstanding British Film

The King's Speech

Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer
Four Lions

Best Supporting Actress

Helena Bonham Carter (The King's Speech)

Special Visual Effects

Tim Burke, John Richardson, Nicolas Aithadi, Christian Manz (Inception)

Best Original Score

Alexandre Desplat (The King's Speech) 

Best Foreign Language Film

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Cinematography

Roger Deakins (True Grit)

Production Design

Guy Hendrix Dyas, Larry Dias, Doug Mowat (Inception)

Costume Design

Colleen Atwood (Alice in Wonderland)

Sound

Richard King, Lora Hirschberg, Gary A. Rizzo, Ed Novick (Inception)

Make-up and Hair

Valli O'Reilly, Paul Gooch (Alice in Wonderland)

Editing

Angus Wall, Kirk Baxter (The Social Network)

Short Animation

The Eagleman Stag

Short Film

Until the River Runs Red

Orange Rising Star Award

Tom Hardy

BAFTA 2011 nominees

The BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) Film Awards Nominees have been announced for 2011.

British period drama The King's Speech came out with the most nominations, getting 14, followed by Black Swan with 12 and Inception with 9.

Personally, I was very happy to see Nick Whitfield nominated in the 'Outstanding Debut By A British Writer, Director Or Producer' category for his excellent film, Skeletons, and Pete Postlethwaite for Supporting Actor in The Town.

Here is the full list of nominees:

Best Film

Black Swan (Mike Medavoy, Brian Oliver, Scott Franklin)

Inception (Emma Thomas, Christopher Nolan)

The King's Speech (Iain Canning, Emile Sherman, Gareth Unwin)

The Social Network (Scott Rudin, Dana Brunetti, Michael De Luca, Céan Chaffin)

True Grit (Scott Rudin, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen)

Outstanding British Film

127 Hours (Danny Boyle, Simon Beaufoy, Christian Colson, John Smithson)

Another Year (Mike Leigh, Georgina Lowe)

Four Lions (Chris Morris, Jesse Armstrong, Sam Bain, Mark Herbert, Derrin Schlesinger)

The King's Speech (Tom Hooper, David Seidler, Iain Canning, Emile Sherman, Gareth Unwin)

Made in Dagenham (Nigel Cole, William Ivory, Elizabeth Karlsen, Stephen Woolley)

Outstanding Debut By A British Writer, Director Or Producer

The Arbor (Director, Producer - Clio Barnard, Tracy O'Riordan)

Exit Through the Gift Shop (Director, Producer – Banksy, Jaimie D'Cruz)

Four Lions (Director/Writer - Chris Morris)

Monsters (Director/Writer – Gareth Edwards)

Skeletons (Director/Writer – Nick Whitfield)

Director

Danny Boyle (127 Hours)

Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan)

Christopher Nolan (Inception)

Tom Hooper (The King's Speech)

David Fincher (The Social Network)

Original Screenplay

Mark Heyman, Andrés Heinz, John McLaughlin (Black Swan)

Scott Silver, Paul Tamasy, Eric Johnson (The Fighter)

Christopher Nolan (Inception)

Lisa Cholodenko, Stuart Blumberg (The Kids Are All Right)

David Seidler (The King's Speech)

Adapted Screenplay

Danny Boyle, Simon Beaufoy (127 Hours)

Rasmus Heisterberg, Nikolaj Arcel (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo)

Aaron Sorkin (The Social Network)

Michael Arndt (Toy Story 3)

Joel Coen, Ethan Coen (True Grit)

Film Not In The English Language

Biutiful (Alejandro González Iñárritu, Jon Kilik, Fernando Bovaira)

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Søren Stærmose, Niels Arden Oplev)

I Am Love (Luca Guadagnino, Francesco Melzi D'Eril, Marco Morabito, Massimiliano Violante)

Of Gods and Men (Xavier Beauvois)

The Secret in their Eyes (Mariela Besuievsky, Juan José Campanella)

Animated Film

Despicable Me (Chris Renaud, Pierre Coffin)

How to Train Your Dragon (Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois)

Toy Story 3 (Lee Unkrich)

Leading Actor

Jarvier Bardem (Biutiful)

Jeff Bridges (True Grit)

Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network)

Colin Firth (The King's Speech)

James Franco (127 Hours)

Leading Actress

Annette Bening (The Kids Are All Right)

Julianne Moore (The Kids Are All Right)

Natalie Portman (Black Swan)

Noomi Rapace (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo)

Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit)

Supporting Actor

Christian Bale (The Fighter)

Andrew Garfield (The Social Network)

Pete Postlethwaite (The Town)

Mark Ruffalo (The Kids Are All Right)

Geoffrey Rush (The King's Speech)

Supporting Actress

Amy Adams (The Fighter)

Helena Bonham Carter (The King's Speech)

Barbara Hershey (Black Swan)

Lesley Manville (Another Year)

Miranda Richardson (Made in Dagenham)

Original Music

127 Hours (AR Rahman)

Alice in Wonderland (Danny Elfman)

How to Train Your Dragon (John Powell)

Inception (Hans Zimmer)

The King's Speech (Alexandre Desplat)

Cinematography

127 Hours (Anthony Dod Mantle, Enrique Chediak)

Black Swan (Matthew Libatique)

Inception (Wally Pfister)

The King's Speech (Danny Cohen)

True Grit (Roger Deakins)

Editing

127 Hours (Jon Harris)

Black Swan (Andrew Weisblum)

Inception (Lee Smith)

The King's Speech (Tariq Anwar)

The Social Network (Angus Wall, Kirk Baxter)

Production Design

Alice in Wonderland (Robert Stromberg, Karen O'Hara)

Black Swan (Thérèse DePrez, Tora Peterson)

Inception (Guy Hendrix Dyas, Larry Dias, Doug Mowat)

The King's Speech (Eve Stewart, Judy Farr)

True Grit (Jess Gonchor, Nancy Haigh)

Costume Design

Alice in Wonderland (Colleen Atwood)

Black Swan (Amy Westcott)

The King's Speech (Jenny Beavan)

Made in Dagenham (Louise Stjernsward)

True Grit (Mary Zophres)

Sound

127 Hours (Glenn Freemantle, Ian Tapp, Richard Pryke, Steven C Laneri, Douglas Cameron)

Black Swan (Ken Ishii, Craig Henighan, Dominick Tavella)

Inception (Richard King, Lora Hirschberg, Gary A Rizzo, Ed Novick)

The King's Speech (John Midgley, Lee Walpole, Paul Hamblin)

True Grit (Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff, Peter F Kurland, Douglas Axtell)

Special Visual Effects

Alice in Wonderland (Nominees TBC)

Black Swan (Dan Schrecker)

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (Tim Burke, John Richardson, Nicolas Ait'Hadi, Christian Manz)

Inception (Chris Corbould, Paul Franklin, Andrew Lockley, Peter Bebb)

Toy Story 3 (Nominees TBC)

Make Up & Hair

Alice in Wonderland (Nominees TBC)

Black Swan (Judy Chin, Geordie Sheffer)

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (Amanda Knight, Lisa Tomblin)

The King's Speech (Frances Hannon)

Made in Dagenham (Lizzie Yianni Georgiou)

Short Animation

The Eagleman Stag (Michael Please)

Matter Fisher (David Prosser)

Thursday (Matthias Hoegg)

Short Film

Connect (Samuel Abrahams, Beau Gordon)

Lin (Piers Thompson, Simon Hessel)

Rite (Michael Pearce, Ross McKenzie)

Turning (Karni Arieli, Saul Freed, Alison Sterling, Kat Armour-Brown)

Until the River Runs Red (Paul Wright, Poss Kondeatis)

Orange Wednesdays Rising Star Award

Gemma Arterton

Andrew Garfield

Tom Hardy

Aaron Johnson

Emma Stone

This final award is the only one voted for by the public. You can cast your vote here: BAFTA Rising Star Award

The winner will be announced at the awards on February 13th 2011.

Review: Sparkle

After Neil Hunter and Tom Hunsinger’s impressive film Lawless Heart back in 2001, the writer/director pair return with Sparkle, a fun romantic comedy about love lives, betrayal and quirks of fate. The latter plays a big part in the story, which at times feels like it has more coincidences than a Charles Dickens novel (and that’s an awful lot, in case you don’t know).

Sam Sparks, a bored young waiter meets Vince (Bob Hoskins) and his brother Bernie when they come to his restaurant. Their father has a stroke and Vince offers the London flat he used to live in to Sam, who can’t believe his luck as he has high ambitions for a top job in the city. Unfortunately, his Mom (Lesley Manville) decides to tag along in the hope that her singing career will take off, Vince doesn’t mind though, as he has taken quite a shine to her. Finding a job as a waiter thanks to Bernie, Sam then charms Sheila (Stockard Channing), an older lady he meets while working. They become lovers and he starts a job as her P.A. But then at one of Sheila’s parties, Sam meets the young, vibrant Kate and he finds himself falling in love. Things start to become very tangled indeed when Sam ends his affair with Sheila, it is revealed that she is Kate’s Mom and that Bernie is the Dad she never knew about (see what I mean about the coincidences?) I thought London was a massive city, but apparently it’s a small world after all.

Apart from this, I thought the film was funny and enjoyable, with some great performances from the entire main cast. With its many intertwining love stories, an alternative title could have been ‘Four Relationships and a Funeral’. Newcomer Shaun Evans has a tough job making Sam someone the audience wants to root for. At the start of the film he isn’t a very likeable character, he is rather arrogant and conceited. He does seem to genuinely care for Kate though, and when they meet there is a marked change in him. I like the scene towards the end when he is trying to prove his love and he tries to win a cuddly dolphin that Kate wanted earlier from the fair. A seemingly impossible task, he tries again and again and it makes you support him because he wants it so much.

Bob Hoskins plays Vince, a quiet, meek character who you feel real sympathy for throughout the film. I was very glad that he ended up happy as he was such a kind, loveable person. I also really liked Anthony Head’s character, Tony, who lifted the film with his warmth and humour. As a fan of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it was nice to see one of my favourite actors from the series, and quite a departure for him to be playing a gay man after the stiff-upper-lipped librarian Giles.

There are little moments in the film when Hunter and Hunsinger‘s genius really sparkles (sorry, I just had to do it). My favourite scene is when Sam is preparing drinks in Sheila’s kitchen, a seemingly ordinary task, nothing wondrous about it. But as Kate watches through the banisters of the stairs, she slowly realises his betrayal. How? Because he knows where everything is kept. There are numerous white cupboards and drawers, yet he knows where to look for the things he needs. The only way he would know this is if he’d been in this kitchen many times before, and the only reason he would have been there is…

So, a charming little love story with some funny moments and something we all wish for: a happy ending. If you’re willing to overlook the inter-related elements that often stretch the believability, then you should enjoy this story and the many wonderful performances. A glistening film? A shining gem? A sparkling tale? Pick your own wordplay; they could all be used to describe Sparkle.

Review: Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel

His mates mocked his new scarf but he knew they were just jealous

I stumbled upon this low-budget British sci-fi (sorry, science fiction) film when they aired the premiere on UK TV. I hadn’t heard anything about it previously but thought I’d give it a watch as it starred Chris O’Dowd (Roy from the very funny comedy series ‘The IT Crowd’). I’m glad I did because it turned out to be an enjoyable film.

It starts off with Ray (O’Dowd) getting fired from the amusement park he works at as a result of his speech about time travel (which starts off the film as an opening narration), which detracts into a rant about exterminating a species on an alien planet before the camera reveals that he is in fact standing in front of a group of children dressed as a member of the ‘planetary peace corps’. Ultimately shouting “Are you nappy-wearing motherfuckers ready to lock and load, and get it on?” doesn’t go down too well with his boss.

Later, Ray heads down the pub with his mates Toby and Pete. There he is approached by a woman named Cassie (Anna Faris) who claims to be from the future. Being something of a science fiction geek, he suspects this is merely a prank his mates have come up with, despite the fact that when he returns to them, they say they had nothing to do with it. Toby believes it would make a really good idea for a film, while Pete dismisses it as silly. However, when Pete goes to the toilet, he comes back to find the bar full of dead bodies, including his own. Scared and confused, he hides in the toilets and when he returns to the bar again, everything is back to normal...

It turns out there is a time leak in the toilets, one that Cassie is looking for so she can fix it. Every time the three friends enter the toilets, they travel forwards or backwards in time. The pace quickens as they try to avoid ‘themselves’ from different times as well as the dangers that might be lurking in a strange, apocalyptic future. There is also the mystery of a painting of them on the outside of the pub holding a piece of paper…what is written on it, and why would someone want them dead because of it?

I think this film tried hard to get the geeks on their side with the many movie and TV references. Originally, I didn’t want to be swayed so easily but I did become more supportive of the group as soon as they mentioned Firefly - I guess that’s an easy target nowadays.

I like that it took an everyday activity: just going to the pub with a couple of mates, and added an extraordinary element: discovering a time leak in the toilets through which they could travel. So it’s a science fiction film that feels like it could happen to the average person because these are average guys, not men from the future, or robots, or spacemen. They are easier to relate to and identify with. Ray is an untraditional hero and Chris O’Dowd plays him as believable, likeable and funny. Anna Faris is her usual ditsy self, and Marc Wootton and Dean Lennox Kelly are well suited to their roles.

Overall, it’s a charming and original sci-fi comedy with a very British sense of humour. The script could have benefitted from being a little longer (the film only lasts 80 minutes) and having a few more jokes (sometimes it favours more serious dramatic moments over laughs, which don’t work as well) but these are minor niggles. This is a quirky and fun film that packs an unexpected punch.