BAFTA's 2023: What does it mean?

---

On Sunday night, the annual British Academy Film Awards took place. Lot's of stars from all around the world, some local, some not, gathered in London where the British Academy had the opportunity to award some of the greatest work in filmmaking this year.

But one question now remains... What does it mean for the Oscars?

Annually, the Bafta's are one of the final pre-cursors throughout the awards season, and usually leave us within touching distance of Oscar night. The biggest night of them all.

And this year, the case is no different.

There are still so many questions up in the air as to who will win gold on the big night. What will win Best Picture? Who will win Best Actor? Will Blanchett take home her third award? And so on and so on.

We would have hoped that after Sunday night, some of these questions will have been answered... unfortunately that is not the case.

One of the biggest moments of the night was when Austin Butler took home the Best Actor in a Leading Role award for his impressive performance as "The King of Rock 'n Roll" in Baz Luhrmann's Elvis.

For some time, this category seems to have been a three-horse-race between Butler, Farrell and Fraser. But the three could well be narrowing down to a two after Butler's impressive win away from home-turf, especially from a group of voters that were not afraid to award The Banshees of Inisherin in other acting categories.

Yes, you read that right. The Banshees of Inisherin took home two acting awards through the form of Barry Keoghan in Best Supporting Actor and Kerry Condon is Best Supporting Actress.

After these categories were announced, it seemed a sure thing that Colin Farrell would be joining his fellow cast members in taking home a Bafta Award later on in the night. But when Butler's name was announced, there was a fair bit of head-scratching going on throughout the Southbank Centre's Royal Hall.

One of the larger sweepers of the night came through the form of German film: All Quiet On The Western Front. The Netflix movie took home awards such as Best Original Score, Best Cinematography, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Sound, Best Director, and the biggest award of the night, Best Film.

Edward Berger's win for his direction in All Quiet On The Western Front came as a huge shock to audiences all around the world, mainly due to the fact that Berger wasn't even nominated for an Academy Award for his work on this film.

So if you were hoping that the Bafta's would give us some clearance as to who will be taking home the gold for direction on Oscar night, you have a right to be disappointed.

Best director is the one I never would have thought it would ever work, and for Best Film? I mean it's a German movie, for Christ sake. Who votes for that? - Edward Berger

It came as absolutely no surprise when Cate Blanchett's name was read out as the 2023 Bafta Winner for best Actress. Although there is a strong following of support around Michelle Yeoh to take home the Oscar on the night, Blanchett just seems to keep on winning and proving to us even further, the she is in fact one of the modern-day greats.

One thing unique about Bafta is that they take the initiative to award an up-and-coming, young actor with the EE Bafta Rising Star Award. There has been many winners in the past that have gone on to do phenomenal things in TV & Film.

Winners such as: Tom Hardy, James McAvoy, Tom Holland, Kirsten Stewart. To name a few. So it goes without saying that the annual winner of this award has a bright future on the big screen.

This year's winner of the EE Bafta Rising Star Award was Emma Mackey. We first saw the young French-British actress on the small screen in the Netflix original: Sex Education. And last year we saw her again as Emily Bronté in Frances O'Connor's "Emily".

Given the recent track record of this award's winners, it's fair to say that Mackey will be one to look out for in the near and distant future.