Sir Sam Mendes‘ 1917 won big at the BAFTA Film Awards Sunday night. In all, the World War I film nabbed seven awards, including Best Film, Best British Film, Best Director and Best Cinematography. Mendes is the first British winner of Best Director since Danny Boyle won for Slumdog Millionaire in 2009.
Joker won three, including Best Actor for Joaquin Phoenix, while Renee Zellweger won Best Actress of her role in Judy.
Parasite picked up two biggies: Best Original Screenplay and Best Film Not in the English Language.
Mendes told the BBC: “I couldn't be more thrilled. There's the personal delight in seeing a story very close to me and my family be developed and enlarged but the massive thing has been audiences going in large numbers. None of us knew if an audience would turn up, it wasn't certain at all. It's coincided with awards season and the fact this is still number one in the UK after four weeks, the awards have really alerted people to the fact the movie is on, it rarely happens like that.”
Other winners included Brad Pitt for Best Supporting Actor in Quentin Tarantino‘s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and Laura Dern as Best Supporting Actress in Marriage Story.
The BAFTAs were the last major awards show pre-Oscars on Sunday. Zellweger, Phoenix, Dern and Pitt have triumphed in their categories at every major ceremony, making them, observers believe, a shoe-in at the Oscars.
