Kneecap’s Rich Peppiatt has won the award for outstanding debut by a British writer, director or producer at this year’s Bafta awards.
Selena Gomez and Zoë Saldaña, the stars of the Netflix film Emilia Pérez, presented the English film-maker with his prize.
“It’s funny how life works,” he said, explaining that he met Kneecap, the Northern Irish rap trio who the film is about, after meeting his wife and moving to Belfast with her.
The director of the Irish-language movie, which was nominated in six Bafta categories, said that Kneecap was a movement and that “everyone should have their language respected, their culture respected”.
Conclave won best film, beating Anora, The Brutalist, A Complete Unknown and Emilia Pérez for the award, the ceremony’s biggest prize.
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Conclave, Edward Berger’s Vatican-set thriller starring Ralph Fiennes as a cardinal overseeing the election of a new pope, went into this year’s Bafta ceremony with a dozen nominations – the most of any contender. It ended up with four awards: for best picture, outstanding British film, adapted screenplay and editing.
Accepting the second of those, Berger – who swept the board at the awards two years ago with his remake of All Quiet on the Western Front, which won seven prizes – said: “We live in a time of a crisis of democracy. Institutions used to bringing us together are used to pull us apart. Sometimes it’s hard to keep the faith, and that’s why we make movies.”
The Brutalist, Brady Corbet’s epic drama about a Hungarian modernist architect working in the United States after the second World War, went home with best director, leading actor, cinematography and score.
In his speech after winning best actor, its star Adrien Brody, who recently appeared on the West End stage in The Fear of 13, thanked the British public for “embracing me and my creative endeavours”, saying “England has felt quite a lot like home lately”.
There was a surprise in the best-actress category, as Anora’s Mikey Madison – who was beaten by David Jonsson to the rising-star award on Sunday – took the prize over the front-runner, Demi Moore, for The Substance and the much-loved Hard Truths star Marianne Jean-Baptiste.
In Sean Baker’s Palme d’Or winner, which also won best casting, Madison plays an exotic dancer who begins a romance with the son of a Russian oligarch. On the podium she gave a shout-out to the “sex worker community”, saying: “You deserve respect and human decency. I will always be a friend and an ally and I implore others to do the same.”
The American actors Kieran Culkin and Zoë Saldaña were named the winners in the supporting-actor categories.
Culkin won for his role in Jesse Eisenberg’s comedy drama A Real Pain, while Saldaña won for her role in Netflix film Emilia Pérez.
Culkin did not attend the ceremony on Sunday; his costar Eisenberg, who is also the film’s director, accepted on his behalf, joking that it was, “like, the fifth” one he has done for the actor.
“We have a similar life, but his is 20 per cent better than mine,” he said.
An emotional Saldaña thanked her mother for “being such a selfless person” before breaking down in tears. “Films are supposed to change minds and challenge hearts,” she said.
Elsewhere, the animated feature Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl was named the winner of the children’s and family film award at the ceremony, which was held at Royal Festival Hall, at London’s Southbank Centre, for the second year.
The children’s and family film award is a new category this year, and the first new category to be introduced to the EE Bafta film awards in five years.
The Aardman film also won the Bafta for animated film, with director Nick Park joking: “I didn’t actually write a second speech.”
Also taking home gongs at the ceremony, hosted for a second year by Doctor Who and Rivals star David Tennant, was Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two, which won the first award of the night when it scored the prize for special visual effects.
Emilia Pérez was also among the night’s earlier winners, winning the gong for film not in the English language, having been the second-most nominated title at this year’s Bafta film awards, with 11 nominations in total.
Accepting the prize, the film’s French director, Jacques Audiard, said he was “touched”, and said the prize “was for everyone who worked tirelessly on this film”.
He also paid tribute to his fellow nominees from Ireland’s Kneecap and Brazil’s I’m Not There.
Audiard said “he would like to thank the wonderful talents” and also named his “dear Zoë” [Saldaña] and “Selena”.
He also named Karla Sofía Gascón, who he called “dear”, who was not attending the ceremony amid controversy about her past tweets. – Reuters/PA
