Baftas 2025: the biggest winners and losers
Even though this year’s awards season race is the most unpredictable in years, a far cry from 2024 when Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer was virtually guaranteed to win every major prize at every notable ceremony, the 2025 edition of the Baftas didn’t throw up a lot of surprises.
It’s an oxymoronic situation for the annual parade of galas: it’s harder than it’s been in a long time to predict which actors and filmmakers will be walking away with the most prestigious prizes in the industry, but there haven’t been any egregious snubs or notable shocks.
Everyone nominated for every top honour deserves to be in the mix, so it’s hard to begrudge them. However, everybody knows that awards season is much better and a lot spicier when surprises happen, and while there were a couple of instances of minor upsets, nobody completely overturned the boat.
Still, once the entire set of Baftas had been handed out, there were obvious winners and losers. In some cases, this made the upcoming Academy Awards clearer and easier to predict, but in others, the waters had only muddied further.
Bafta winners:
Conclave
The biggest success story of the night by far, Edward Berger’s riveting papal thriller took home both ‘Outstanding British Film’ and ‘Best Film’, establishing Conclave as the top dog of this year’s Baftas.
Clearly, we knew what we were talking about when we named it the best movie of 2024, a sentiment reflected by the Baftas. Conclave scooped four gongs in total, with Peter Straughan’s ‘Best Adapted Screenplay’ win joined by Nick Emerson’s ‘Best Editing’ triumph.
However, as the most-nominated film of this year’s Baftas with 12 nominations, a hit rate of 33% pales in comparison to many of the other awards season juggernauts Conclave will be looking to emulate.
The Brutalist
Another four-time Bafta winner, The Brutalist‘s Brady Corbet has to be considered the frontrunner to win ‘Best Director’ at the Oscars after previously claiming a Golden Globe for his efforts.
Similarly, the ‘Best Actor’ race looks as though it’s Adrien Brody’s to lose, with well-deserved wins for ‘Best Cinematography’ and ‘Best Score’ rounding out the period epic’s quartet. The ‘Best Picture’ field remains wide open for the Oscars, but The Brutalist has definitely edged its way to the head of the pack for acting and directing.
Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
The beloved British duo were always nailed on to win ‘Best Animated Film’ and ‘Best Children and Family Film’, a category newly created for this year’s Baftas that was never realistically awarded to anything else.
More than 35 years after their first appearance in A Grand Day Out, the cheese-obsessed inventor and his faithful canine companion continue their impressive streak of awards season domination. A pair of awards season’s most reliable power players anytime they take centre stage in a new story, the Oscar looks as though it’s theirs to lose.
Bafta losers:
The Substance
For a while, Demi Moore was running away with awards season after the resurgent star of The Substance went on a tear through the Golden Globes, Critics Choice Awards, and countless more ceremonies. And yet, she seems to have dropped off the radar.
It can’t be said that Mikey Madison didn’t deserve to be named ‘Best Actress’, but having won the Bafta that many predicted had Moore’s name written all over it, her Oscars chances may have taken a hit. Carolie Fargeat’s did win ‘Best Makeup and Hair’, but it was a paltry return considering it was in the mix for ‘Best Film’ and ‘Best Director’, among others.
Karla Sofía Gascón
The most-nominated film at this year’s Oscars with a frankly ludicrous 13 nominations, Emilia Pérez couldn’t have cared less that it was being criticised from all corners when it looked well place to mount a serious awards season tilt.
While Jacques Audiard’s musical drama did win ‘Best Film Not in the English Language’ and Zoe Saldaña continued her quest to hoover up every ‘Best Supporting Actress’ prize under the sun, Karla Sofía Gascón was a notable absentee from the Baftas.
Of course, everybody knows why, with the actor’s colleagues having distanced themselves from her hate-filled social media posts that were unearthed to cut her awards chances out from under the knees, and she looks set to spend the rest of awards season on the outside looking in, and she probably won’t even be in attendance for the Oscars, either.
A Complete Unknown
James Mangold’s A Complete Unknown was nominated for six Baftas but walked away empty-handed, a poor return based on its position as a contender for ‘Best Film’, ‘Best Director’, and ‘Best Actor’.
In fact, of the five films in the running for ‘Best Film’, which also included Conclave, The Brutalist, Emilia Pérez, and Anora, Mangold’s Bob Dylan biopic was the only one that didn’t win a single Bafta. Unfortunately, it’s shaping up to be one of those movies that’s just there: it’s been in the mix all the way through awards season, but the top prizes will always remain out of reach.
