The 79th BAFTA Awards ceremony will take place on Sunday evening at London's Royal Festival Hall. The event will be presented, for the first time, by the actor Alan Cumming and will award the best films projected in British cinemas in 2025. The 2026 edition of the BAFTA Awards, British cinema's equivalent of the Oscar Awards, will take place starting at 21:00 Romanian time.
“Hamnet” may beat feature films “One Battle After Another” and “Sinners” to win the top prize at BAFTA, as the heartbreaking drama about William Shakespeare, his wife Agnes and the death of their son is likely to win over British voters, experts polled by Reuters said. In other categories, like best director and best actor, the race seems much tighter.
BAFTA 2026 Best Film Nominations
The nominations were announced on January 27.
The five feature films competing in the best film category are: “Hamnet”, “One Battle After Another”, “Sinners”, “Marty Supreme”, “Sentimental Value”' (dir. Joachim Trier)”.
Action-packed black comedy “One Battle After Another,” directed by American filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson, has 14 nominations, the most at the BAFTA Awards, followed by vampire horror “Sinners,” which received the most nominations at next month's Oscars.
But “Hamnet,” directed by Chinese filmmaker Chloé Zhao, is both analysts' and bookmakers' favorite to take home the BAFTA Best Picture trophy.
“I think it will be 'Hamnet'. 'One Battle After Another' is another great film, but 'Hamnet' … it just seems like the kind of film that BAFTA will prefer,” Tim Richards, founder and chief executive of cinema group Vue, told Reuters.
Who will the BAFTA Award for Best Director go to?
The best director will be chosen from the following six: Paul Thomas Anderson, Ryan Coogler, Josh Safdie, Joachim Trier, Chloe Zhao and Yorgos Lanthimos (for the film “Bugonia”).
Ian Sandwell, film editor at Digital Spy, said BAFTA loves to recognize its own artists.
“So it wouldn't surprise me to see ('Hamnet') take home Best Picture, and maybe even Chloé Zhao take out Paul Thomas Anderson in the director category as well as the acting awards,” he said.
Richards said that if “Hamnet” wins best picture, Anderson could receive best director, or vice versa, as BAFTA splits the big trophies between “two extraordinary films”.
Zhao, 43, won both the 2021 BAFTA, Golden Globe and Oscar for best director for his feature film “Nomadland”. Her new film has now also set a record for the most BAFTA Award nominations for any film directed by a woman.
As for Anderson, 55 years old, the American filmmaker has no less than 11 Oscar nominations as a director, producer or screenwriter, thanks to films such as “Boogie Nights”, “Magnolia”, “Inherent Vice”, “Phantom Thread” or Licorice Pizza. Even though he drew the short draw each time, his period film “There Will Be Blood from 2007” is considered one of the best of the 21st century.
At the BAFTA gala, he triumphed only once, in 2022, but won the prize for the best original screenplay, not the director, thanks to the feature film “Licorice Pizza”.
At the Golden Globes in January, “One Battle After Another” brought him 3 statuettes: for direction, for best screenplay, and for best comedy or musical film (as a producer).
Heavy names also in the running for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor
The nominees for best actress in a leading role are: Jessie Buckley for Agnes Shakespeare in “Hamnet”, Rose Byrne for Linda in “If I Had Legs I'd Kick You”, Kate Hudson for Claire Sardina in “Song Sung Blue”, Chase Infiniti for Willa Ferguson in “One Battle After Another”, Renate Reinsve for Nora Borg in “Sentimental Value” and Emma Stone for Michelle Fuller in “Bugonia”.
In the category of best actress in a leading role, Jessie Buckley is considered the clear favorite to play Shakespeare's wife, according to the bookies.
In the best actor category, the following were nominated: Robert Aramayo for the role of John Davidson in “I Swear”, Timothee Chalamet for the role of Marty Mauser in “Marty Supreme”, Leonardo DiCaprio for the role of Bob Ferguson in “One Battle After Another”, Ethan Hawke for the role of Lorenz Hart in “Blue Moon”, Michael B. Jordan for the double role of Elijah Moore/Elias Moore in “Sinners” and Jesse Plemons for the role of Teddy Gatz in “Bugonia”.
The best actor category is more difficult to predict, with Timothée Chalamet of “Marty Supreme” competing with Leonardo DiCaprio and Michael B. Jordan for their performances in “One Battle After Another” and “Sinners.”
Sandwell recalled that Chalamet had racked up awards in the run-up to the BAFTAs, including a Golden Globe, for the electrifying film about an aspiring table tennis player, in which Gwyneth Paltrow plays his lover. “It would be his first [Premiu BAFTA]so it will probably happen,” said the specialist.
But Sandwell said he would like to see British actor Robert Aramayo take home the trophy for his acclaimed performance as Tourette's activist John Davidson in I Swear.
“Sometimes the BAFTAs throw a surprise in these lead actor categories and give the award to a local talent and it would be absolutely fantastic to see him win on the night,” he said.
In the Supporting Actor categories, the competition is wide open, but the bookies are currently favoring Stellan Skarsgård and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas from Norwegian family drama Sentimental Value.
Netflix's most-watched film ever, the animated 'KPop Demon Hunters', is not among the nominations as it did not have a UK cinema release before being streamed. At the Globes gala in January, the feature film about a group of girls who sing Kpop and protect the world from demons with their music won the award for best animated film.
But the star singers of the animated feature will perform their global hit “Golden” during the BAFTA Awards.
