Ida’s rivals are Leviathan by Andrey Zvyagintsev, The Lunchbox by Ritesh Batra, Two Days, One Night by the Dardenne brothers and Stephen Daldry’s Trash. Pawlikowski, who had already won a BAFTA award for Last Resort and My Summer of Love, is an incontestable favorite in this group.
Łukasz Żal and Ryszard Lenczewski nominated for BAFTA
Although nominating Ida for best non-English film can’t be surprising for anyone who has even the tiniest notion of how the film was received internationally, a nomination for Żal and Lenczewski is rather unanticipated.
Among nominations in their category we will find superproductions like Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar with images by Hoyte van Hoytem, Mr. Turner by Mike Leigh filmed with a kick by Dick Pope, Birdman by Alejandro González Iñárritu with glamorous images by Emmanuel Lubezki and Wes Anderson’s amazing Grand Budapest Hotel filmed by Robert Yeoman.
The restrained, black-and-white scenes by Żal and Lenczewski are made in academic format 4:3 and in comparison to rivals, they stand out not only in their form but also because of their delicacy and artistic beauty. Żal and Lenczewski have already won a set of prestigious prizes: the European Film Award, the award of American Society of Cinematographers and the golden frog at the International Film Festival of the Art of Cinematography Camerimage.
On Febuary 8th, during a formal gala in Royal Opera House in London, we will find out if they can add BAFTA to their list of awards.
BAFTA awards, also called the British Oscars, are accorded every year by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts. With their history reaching 1948, the awards are now given in 23 categories. The big winner of this year nominations is Wes Anderson’s Grand Budapest Hotel, nominated in 11 categories.
More information on the official BAFTA website.
Source: BAFTA, own materials, translated by Agata Wissuwa, January 9th 2015