- Title: BRITAIN-BAFTA NOMINATIONS "The Grand Budapest Hotel" tops Bafta nominations list
- Date: 9th January 2015
- Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (JANUARY 9, 2015) (REUTERS) **** WARNING CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY **** VARIOUS OF FRY AND CLAFLIN POSING AT PHOTOCALL (SOUNDBITE) (English) STEPHEN FRY, ON NOMINATIONS, SAYING: "It's really exciting. As you say a marvelous year for British talent both behind the camera and in front of it. The nominations for Best British film really are s
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- Story Text: "The Grand Budapest Hotel", an offbeat comedy starring Ralph Fiennes as the concierge of a luxury hotel in a bygone Europe, topped the shortlist for Britain's BAFTA awards, with 11 nominations, including for best film.
Wes Anderson, the film's director and fellow producers Steven Rales, Scott Rudin, Jeremy Dawson took Friday morning's announcement, which was also streamed live on the internet, with delight.
"We are all four of us thrilled, honored, humbled, elated -- and deeply grateful to the British Academy for this recognition of our movie," they said in a statement.
The film is followed by "Birdman" and "The Theory of Everything", which received ten nominations each and "The Imitation Game" whose list of nominations total nine.
All four films will vie for the top prize of best film at the BAFTA awards. Director Richard Linklater's "Boyhood" is the fifth and final contender in this category.
"The Grand Budapest Hotel" also features in the Best Director and Original Screenplay categories. Ralph Fiennes is also nominated in the Leading Actor category.
He is joined by fellow Brits Eddie Redmayne ("The Theory of Everything") and Benedict Cumberbatch ("The Imitation Game"). Actors Michael Keaton ("Birdman") and Jake Gyllenhaal ("Nightcrawler") complete the Leading Actor category.
Nominated Leading Actresses include Amy Adams ("Big Eyes"), Felicity Jones ("The Theory of Everything"), Julianne Moore ("Still Alice"), Reese Witherspoon ("Wild") and Rosamund Pike ("Gone Girl").
British actor and nominations presenter Stephen Fry said he was particularly please to see a high number of British talent featuring across categories.
"It's really exciting. As you say a marvelous year for British talent both behind the camera and in front of it. The nominations for Best British film really are superb all of them. And they are so diverse. We were saying earlier, from 'Under The Skin' to 'Paddington' is quite a range to be honest. It's amazing. And obviously the sort of best known actors like Eddie Redmayne and Benedict Cumberbatch and Ralph Fiennes and Imelda Staunton getting nominated, that's really good news," Fry told Reuters Television following the announcement.
Fry was joined on the podium by fellow British actor Sam Claflin ("The Hunger Games", "The Riot Club"), who said he was pleased to see how well British film and talent is doing at the moment.
"British film is getting stronger and stronger as -- the years go on. But I think it really has, it kind of catapulted a lot of new directors, new writers, new talent you know to our screens and that's always exciting," Claflin said.
Fry, who will once again be hosting this year's BAFTA ceremony, also spoke about the importance of glamorous awards shows particularly for smaller films, which often struggle to get funding.
"The fact one gets big Hollywood names to come along because they're nominated as well. So there are nominations for Steve Carell and Edward Norton and so on and that's a terrific thing because that I think helps get attention for the smaller films and the smaller filmmakers," he remarked.
And Sam Claflin said how awards can remind people of the importance to spend money and watch films on a big screen.
"I think the experience of sitting in the cinema and seeing a film on the big screen you know there's nothing like it. You can't -- imitate that on Netflix, on your laptop or anywhere else for that matter. It's I think you need that -- sort of, you need to be a cinemagoer really really you know feel the passion and all the talent that goes into these projects," he said.
Winners of Britain's most prestigious film prize will be announced at a ceremony at London's Royal Opera House on February 8. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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