Bafta 2025 longlist: Dev Patel and Payal Kapadia make a strong showing

🎥 British star Dev Patel’s first film ‘Monkey Man’ appears in two categories

🎥 India’s Payal Kapadia’s Cannes Grand Prix prize film, ‘All We Imagine as Light’ gets three nominations

🎥 Both British Asian directors Sandhya Suri and Karan Kandhari films, ‘Santosh’ and ‘Sister Midnight’ which premiered in Cannes last year are in Outstanding debut by a British writer, director or producer category

🎥 Chloe Abrahams’ documentary release ‘The Taste of Mango’ makes same category as Suri and Kandhari

A CLUTCH and new vanguard of South Asian talent has made onto the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (Bafta) Film awards Longlists for 2025.

Leading the way is British actor and now director Dev Patel and India’s new writer-director star Payal Kapadia.

Patel’s debut film ‘Monkey Man’ appears in two separate categories – both Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer and in the Leading Actor category for Patel himself.

His film is an exhilarating and pulsating revenge drama centred around the orphan character ‘Kid’, played by Patel himself. Something of an ode to Bruce Lee, the film has a lot of fight action sequences with high body count and is set in India. It premiered in theatres in the UK in the Spring to much acclaim.

Patel talked to us about the challenges of making the film and the pressures of being the director and lead actor.

Payal Kapadia, the writer-director behind ‘All We Imagine As Light’ features in three separate categories: Best Director, Original Screenplay and Film not in the English language.

Only her second film, but her first narrative feature, it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May last year and has gone onto to gathering laurels and prizes ever since. At Cannes, not only was she the first Indian director to have a film in Official Competition for 30 years, but the first Indian filmmaker ever to win the Grand Prix prize outright there*. As well as being critically acclaimed, it had strong box office numbers in France and continues to screen in India in the big cities following an initial release in November and a premiere at the Mumbai film festival, better known as Mami (Mumbai Academy of Moving Image) in October.

The film set in Mumbai charts the journey of three women of different generations – two migrant hospital nurses from Kerala and a hospital cook who are friends and bond over their experiences and the challenges of life in the city. It is when they take a trip to the seaside that much changes and provides a new perspective on life at home in the city.

We have covered the title ever since it released in Cannes – being on the red carpet for its world premiere there and reviewing it both to camera and in print. We also have interviews with Kapadia and lead actor Kani Kusruti from its UK premiere at the London Film Festival in October.

Cannes also premiered two other films cited in the Outstanding Debut category for British writer, director or producer.

Sandhya Suri’s first narrative feature ‘Santosh’ is another film set in India and is a crime thriller. A procedural drama, it follows the investigation as carried out by new cop Santosh in Lucknow, India (Shahana Goswami) and has lots to say about women in the workplace, minority rights and discrimination.

It has just released in the US (December 27) and will enjoy a UK release on March 21. An Indian release date is yet to be confirmed. It was also popular in France with more than 100,000 people going to see it.

Suri whose previous background in film was in documentaries has spoken about the transition and the film premiered in the UK at the LFF (October 9-20) where we caught up with her.

Karan Kandhari’s debut feature ‘Sister Midnight’ also enjoyed a world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival last year. Featuring in the Directors Fortnight section, it is a hugely creative, macabre and darkly funny film centred around the newly wed Uma (Radhika Apte) and just like ‘All We Imagine as Light’ is also set in Mumbai.

Writer-director Kandhari is definitely a talent to track and www.asianculturevulture.com reviewed the movie and selected the film as one of the watches and surprises of Cannes 2024.

It premiered in the UK at LFF where we were finally able to catch up with Kandhari, both at the launch event and then during LFF itself – and also with his star actor Apte.

‘The Taste of Mango’ is Chloe Abrahams very personal story – about her grandmother and mother and is a tale of survival and strength. Abrahams, who has Sri Lankan heritage, goes where few would dare – and in doing so uncovers uncomfortable family truths. It released in the UK in late November.

Here’s Abrahams talking about the making of ‘The Taste of Mango’

Steve McQueen’s Second World War film ‘Blitz’ as seen through the eyes of a boy, George (Elliott Heffernan) features in the Outstanding British Film as does ‘Wicked Little Letters’, which includes actor Anjana Vasan.

The makers of ‘Grand Theft Hamlet’ – a documentary film set within a video game also make the Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer section.

Filmmakers Pinny Grylls and Sam Crane talked to us about their very original film at LFF last year. It was released in cinemas in the UK in November.

Anna Higgis, Bafta Film Committee chair, said about the release of the longlist yesterday (January 3) : “It’s been an exceptional year for filmmaking featuring bold creative voices and inspiring stories from independent films to global blockbusters, highlighting the incredible breadth of talent working in our industry today. What I love about the Film Awards season is that it generates real excitement and passion for film and filmmaking.”

These longlisted titles and talent now progress to round two of voting before a final shortlist will be announced on January 15 by Bafta Rising Star winner Mia-McKenna Bruce (‘How to Have Sex’) and Bafta winner Will Sharpe (‘A Real Pain’). The winners will be announced at the EE Bafta awards ceremony on Sunday, February 16 at the Royal Festival Hall at the Southbank Centre. Actor David Tennant will host. For the full list, see below…

Longlists, 2025 EE BAFTA Film Awards

* In 1946 the Indian film, ‘Neecha Nagar’ by Chetan Anand won the Grand Prix along with 11 other films that screened that year. More here