Bafta 2014

[Stavros]

If you were not present at the BAFTA ceremony in London last night, and watched it on tv, you would not know who won several awards. This is because the producers of the show have reached an arrangement with the BBC to defer broadcasting to avoid beginning the broadcast before the 9pm watershed -some years ago when, I recall the film and tv awards were broadcast live on the night, a so-called comedian called Tony Slattery, drunk or angry, issued a venomous tirade of filthy, verbal abuse at the audience, destroying his career in the process (not that it mattered to anyone except him), and guaranteeing that grown-ups would have to make do with an edited show in later years.

So no Foreign Film award -which went to that vacuous rubbish The Great Beauty; none of the awards for The Great Gatsby which won the same number of awards as 12 Years a Slave, while the 6 awards for Gravity made it the film of the night. And no time for the cinematography award which must be one of the most important in the film industry.

What we did get was the predictable, supercilious drivel from MD Stephen Fry that is intended to make Americans laugh uncontrollably at his awfully posh English accent; and time wasted on an award to a fraud called Peter Greenaway who hasn't had a serious review of his work since the catastrophic Baby of Macon in 1993 -by which time most people had come to the conclusion his films were not worth making, let alone watching. Can anyone name the 20 films he has made since 1993?

I don't know how anyone can choose between Gravity and 12 Years a Slave at the technical level, as both had phenomenal cinematography, the perennial problem of awards being they never look entirely right, and anyway as only a few thousand people vote for them, I suspect it is business as usual with friends voting for each other's work....rant over.

[Prospero]

Phew... you didn't enjoy the show then Stavros! Gatsby might have garnered plenty of awards, but they were for things such as design. It didn't even come into the reckoning for the major awards.

I agree with you regarding the way the show is presented now. It IS clearly aimed at our American friends.

Greenaway has given up making films (to many people's relief) and i agree his ward was a curiosity. But he continues to work as an artist. i saw an installation he did a couple of years ago at the venice Biennale which was magical.

Dd the BBC carry the award for best documentary - the incredible and shocking "The Act of Killing"?

[Stavros]

Phew... you didn't enjoy the show then Stavros! Gatsby might have garnered plenty of awards, but they were for things such as design. It didn't even come into the reckoning for the major awards.

I agree with you regarding the way the show is presented now. It IS clearly aimed at our American friends.

Greenaway has given up making films (to many people's relief) and i agree his ward was a curiosity. But he continues to work as an artist. i saw an installation he did a couple of years ago at the venice Biennale which was magical.

Dd the BBC carry the award for best documentary - the incredible and shocking "The Act of Killing"?

No they did not, it was also nominated in the Foreign Films category -I don't know anything about it, I assume it is good. I will take your comments on Greenaway on trust, I was a few feet away from him at the premiere of one his films (The Falls) at the LFF and acquired an almighty loathing for him and his films. Sad but true.

[ShereeW]

I quite fancied Greenaway's "The Pillow Book," but maybe it was because I was a lad of just 22 at the time.

[robertlouis]

Umm. Fellas, it was on primetime BBC1 straight after the amazingly popular - and populist - Call the Midwife, so the aim was to prevent the cosy cardigan Sunday night audience from switching over.

So don't expect anything other than a red carpet focused shallow jamboree. If they were taking it seriously it would have been on BBC4.

[rodinuk]

BAFTAs are the fluffer for the Oscars then.....

I like Greenaway's Prospero's Books but for the visuals not the whole film as such.

But it's great to see Chiwetel Ejiofor being awarded a BAFTA because his acting is superb and IMHO his portrayal of Lola in Kinky Boots was inspirational.

[robertlouis]

But it's great to see Chiwetel Ejiofor being awarded a BAFTA because his acting is superb and IMHO his portrayal of Lola in Kinky Boots was inspirational.

I agree. He was also terrific in Dirty Pretty Things, one of the best British films of recent years.

[Prospero]

Buthe got it for "12 years a slave" and well deserved

[Stavros]

Prospero I think you said you didn't watch the programme on tv -so you missed Helen Mirren close her speech with Prospero's parting words -rendered with gentle beauty.

Be cheerful, sir.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air.
And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself –
Yea, all which it inherit – shall dissolve,
And like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.

[Prospero]

I didn't see the BBC coverage because i was at the awards ceremony