'Oppenheimer' leads BAFTA Film Awards nominations
LONDON (Reuters) - Historical drama "Oppenheimer", one of last year's highest earning movies, led nominations for the BAFTA Film Awards on Thursday, securing 13 nods.
"Oppenheimer", about the making of the atomic bomb, was followed by sex-charged gothic comedy "Poor Things", with 11 nominations for Britain’s top movie awards, which will be handed out at a ceremony next month.
Martin Scorsese's "Killers of the Flower Moon", about the murders of members of the Osage Nation in the 1920s and "The Zone of Interest", which tells the story a family living next to Auschwitz, both received nine nods.
"Oppenheimer", "Poor Things" and "Killers of the Flower Moon" will compete for the annual ceremony's top prize, best film, alongside courtroom drama "Anatomy of a Fall" and "The Holdovers", a comedy set in a boys' boarding school.
Pink-themed phenomenon "Barbie", the highest grossing film of 2023, missed out in that category but got five nominations overall. "It has been an outstanding year for filmmaking as represented by the 38 films nominated today," Anna Higgs, chair of BAFTA Film Committee, said in a statement.
"They showcase ambitious, creative and hugely impressive voices from independent British debuts to global blockbusters, from complex moral issues through to joyful journeys of self-discovery. They all ultimately explore human connection."
Based on the 2005 biography "American Prometheus" by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, "Oppenheimer" focuses on J. Robert Oppenheimer, taking audiences back to when the American theoretical physicist oversaw the creation of the atomic bomb during World War II.
An awards season favourite, it has picked several prizes already, including five Golden Globes. Cillian Murphy was recognised in the BAFTA leading actor category for his portrayal of Oppenheimer. Fellow cast mates Robert Downey Jr. and Emily Blunt were also nominated in the supporting acting categories.