Every year I tend to tune into the BAFTA awards and usually do so in the knowledge that I’ll likely come away from it thinking that the whole ceremony was full of spectacular misjudgements. Last night, for the first time in years, I felt quite proud to be British.
This was mainly to do with the fact that BAFTA almost completely ignored Avatar, aside from two minor technical awards. Instead, they chose to honour the superb The Hurt Locker with Best Film and Best Director for Kathryn Bigelow.
What has always annoyed me about previous ceremonies is the way that the show fawns over Hollywood in a really embarrassing way and then promptly awards a lesser British film with the important awards (see: The Queen and Atonement in particular). There was always a massive lack of balance, which helped to create a really peculiar series of contradictions, almost that they were acknowledging that they needed Hollywood's star appeal, but were going to ignore it in the end anyway. It's little wonder that not many of the big names turned up on Sunday night.
In fairness, they still did those annoying things, but this time they achieved the balance that they so desperately needed. In giving both lead actor prizes to Brits through Colin Firth and Carey Mulligan they secured a certain level of British victory and by gifting any B list Hollywood actor a chance to present an award (I’m thinking mainly of Matt Dillon and Uma Thurman to be honest, but there’s plenty to choose from) they managed to keep a degree of Hollywood swooning. The difference this year was that both actors completely deserved their awards but have been largely ignored during awards season because of the classic Oscar philosophy of rewarding actors who’s “time has come”.
While giving the awards to Firth and Mulligan as opposed to Jeff Bridges and Sandra Bullock like the Oscars will do in a few weeks time was purely a patriotic move by BAFTA voters keen to ensure that the British film industry had something to take home, it was ultimately the right move and ensured that at least one major awards ceremony had recognised the great work that the two Brits had committed to celluloid.
It all added to the balance of the evening; BAFTA rewarded virtually all of the top films in some way or another through either acting wins (A Single Man, An Education, Precious, Inglorious Basterds) or through writing and directing (Up In The Air and Hurt Locker). The latter film winning the main prize was a fantastic kick in the shins for Avatar director James Cameron, something that most industry people seem reluctant to do for fear of derailing his billion dollar machine. Well, in actual fact, the Hurt Locker is a far greater artistic achievement and that cancels out virtually any argument you can make for Avatar.
What does this all mean for the Oscars then? The answer to this is most likely to be nothing at all – Avatar will still win a number of important Academy Awards because of the sheer amount that Hollywood has invested in that film to get returning dollars through the multiplexes. A vote against Avatar is almost a vote against the highly lucrative 3D market, something which is practically saving the industry globally at the minute.
So, in real terms, the BAFTAs gave the British industry a huge lift, managed to reward virtually every major work that needed rewarding and ignored Avatar in favour of the far superior Hurt Locker. With the exception of Jonathan Ross as host (laughs were not a-plenty from the Americans), it was a great night for film and a reward for the art of film-making.
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