Bafta film awards: What are the UK’s best chances for a win?

With the UK accounting for only a small minority of acting nominees at the Bafta film awards on Sunday, the country’s best hopes for success may come in the categories that celebrate achievement behind the camera.

No UK performers have been nominated for best supporting actor – for the second year in a row – while Felicity Jones is the sole UK nominee in the supporting actress category, for her role in the epic period drama The Brutalist.

Two of the six contenders for best actor are from the UK: Ralph Fiennes, nominated for the religious thriller Conclave, and Hugh Grant, for the horror movie Heretic, though Adrien Brody, US star of The Brutalist, is the frontrunner.

The UK’s strongest chance for an acting gong could be in the best actress category, where the nominees include Cynthia Erivo (for the musical fantasy Wicked) and Marianne Jean-Baptiste (for the drama Hard Truths).

The award for best actress is the only one of the Bafta acting categories never to have been won by a non-white performer.

Erivo and Jean-Baptiste are both black, so if either of them win on Sunday they will make history.

Last year, the UK was responsible for three of the six nominees for best director, including the winner Christopher Nolan.

This year, not a single nominee for best director is from the UK.

None of the movies nominated for best film this year are wholly UK productions, though two are co-productions between the UK and other countries: The Brutalist and Conclave.

The same is true for best documentary, with the UK represented only by two co-productions: Black Box Diaries, about a sexual assault in Japan, and Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story.

Just one UK writer has been nominated in both the original screenplay and adapted screenplay categories: Rich Peppiatt (for Kneecap) and Peter Straughan (Conclave) respectively.

Kneecap, a UK-Ireland co-production about the rise of a Belfast-based hip-hop trio, also appears in the category for best film not in the English language, by virtue of it being predominantly in Irish.

There is a big-hitter in the category for best animated film, in the shape of Wallace And Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl – perhaps one of the UK’s strongest chances of a Bafta win.

Wallace and Gromit also appears in the newly-created category of best children’s and family film, giving it a second chance at Bafta glory.

The technical categories could serve up enough wins to spare the UK too much embarrassment at missing out on the more high-profile awards.

Three of the five nominees for best editing are from the UK: Nick Emerson (for Conclave), Joe Walker (Dune: Part Two) and the jointly-nominated Julian Ulrichs and Chris Gill (for Kneecap).

The veteran British costume designer Jacqueline Durran has been nominated for her work on the Second World War drama Blitz, while cinematographer Lol Crawley has landed a nomination for The Brutalist.

The UK is represented twice in the category for best production design: by Suzie Davies for Conclave and by the jointly-nominated Nathan Crowley and Lee Sandales for Wicked.

There are also two UK nominees for best original score, Daniel Blumberg (The Brutalist) and Robin Carolan (Nosferatu), and two UK teams of nominees for best make-up and hair: David White and Suzanne Stokes-Munton (Nosferatu), and Frances Hannon, Laura Bloun and Sarah Nuth (Wicked).

Carla Stronge (Kneecap) and the jointly-nominated Nina Gold and Martin Ware (Conclave) ensure the UK has a couple of contenders in the best casting category.

Finally, it would not be a film awards ceremony without one or more members of the British-born Corbould family getting a nod for best visual effects – and sure enough, two of the brothers are among this year’s nominees: Neil Corbould, one of the team that worked on Gladiator II; and Paul Corbould, part of the team behind Wicked.

The 2025 Bafta film awards take place on Sunday February 16 and are being broadcast on BBC One from 7pm.