5 Strange Tidbits About BAFTA History

After The Hurt Locker triumphed at the BAFTAs last night, focus has again -- reasonably -- shifted to Oscar odds, namely the tumbling chances for James Cameron. But the BAFTAs have long proven themselves fascinating on their own. The British Academy of Film and Television's history bears just as storied a past as the Oscars (and Emmys), though they began a full 20 years after Wings won the first Academy Award for Best Picture in 1928. In fact, the scandals, contradictions, and anomalies in BAFTA's archives feel certifiably stranger than any of our stateside issues with Academy voting.

There used to be 19 nominees for Best Film.

Doubling the Oscars' ten Best Picture nominee count to ten would seem bombastic now, but the BAFTAs used to nominate nearly that many in its early days. From 1952-64, the amount of "Best Film" nominees ranged anywhere from 12-19, with an additional category for "Best British Film" that featured 4-5 candidates. In the '70s, the ceremony underwent a massive reduction in film nominees, as only four films garnered top honor nods in each year throughout the decade, and no award was given for "Best British Film."

What wins "Best Film" usually loses "Best British Film."

Since the Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film was established for the 1993 ceremony, there has not been a single film to win both Best British Film and Best Film, even though some movies have been nominated in both categories. Weirder yet, The Full Monty, The Queen, Atonement, and Slumdog Millionaire all competed in both categories but only won Best Film. Nil by Mouth, The Last King of Scotland, This is England, and Man on Wire took home the British prizes in those respective years. To make a lowbrow comparison, it's like Beyonce winning the VMA for "Video of the Year" but losing "Best Female Video" to Taylor Swift. Prior to 1993, a "Best British Film" award was last awarded out in 1968, when A Man for All Seasons took home the Mask statuettes for Best Film and Best British Film.

Two films once tied for Best Picture.

While America is still attempting to stomach the 1968 Oscar tie for Best Actress (Barbra Streisand in Funny Girl and an absentee Katharine Hepburn in The Lion in Winter both won), that still isn't quite as anticlimactic as the prospect of two films tying for Best Picture. In 1962, the BAFTAs saw The Hustler and Ballad of a Solider tie for "Best Film from any Source," which includes non-UK entries.

The BAFTAs also award video games.

The BAFTAs have long been associated with honoring the finest in film and television, but in 1998, the academy announced a commitment to video games with its Interactive Entertainment Awards. That soon split into two separate ceremonies, the BAFTA Interactive Awards and the BAFTA Games Awards. Both occasions ceased in 2006, and the Games Awards made a triumphant return the following year. Big winners there have included Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Half-Life 2, and Wii Sports.

The 1991 ceremony was mired in scandal.

In what became known as "Baftagate," a controversy occurred in which four out of the seven voting jurors cried foul when the television drama Prime Suspect defeated the favored G.B.H. for Best Drama Serial. All four claimed to have voted for G.B.H. asked to see the ballots, and the academy said they were destroyed. Convenient, indeed. Luckily, the reputation of implacable Prime Suspect star Helen Mirren was not tarnished.