{"id":161396,"date":"2025-11-30T22:50:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-30T22:50:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/161396\/"},"modified":"2025-11-30T22:50:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-30T22:50:07","slug":"bifa-awards-2025-winners-list-pillion-sentimental-value","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/161396\/","title":{"rendered":"BIFA Awards 2025 Winners List: ‘Pillion,’ ‘Sentimental Value’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tWriter-director Harry Lighton<\/a>\u2018s feature debut Pillion<\/a><\/a>, a sub\/dom romance starring Alexander Skarsg\u00e5rd as a leather-clad biker and\u00a0Harry Melling<\/a>\u00a0as a suburban Londoner who starts a relationship with him and becomes his submissive, won four British Independent Film Awards<\/a>\u00a0(BIFAs<\/a>) statuettes, including two for best independent British film and best debut screenwriter in London on Sunday. Celia Imrie presented the best film award at the end of an evening full of love and appreciation for indie film.<\/p>\n

\n\tIncluding the recently unveiled BIFA craft awards<\/a>, Pillion ended up with a total of four BIFA wins, the same number as Ray Mendoza and Alex Garland\u2019s Navy SEALs platoon movie Warfare earned in the previously unveiled craft and ensemble cast categories.<\/p>\n

\n\tMyrid Carten\u2019s exploration of mental health and addiction within her family, A Want in Her, was honored with three BIFAs on Sunday, namely for best feature documentary, the best debut director \u2013 feature documentary, and The Raindance Maverick Award.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tEarly in the evening, Joachim Trier\u2019s Sentimental Value<\/a> was honored with the best\u00a0international<\/a>\u00a0indie film BIFA.<\/p>\n

\n\tAkinola Davies Jr.<\/a> won the best director honor for his Lagos, Nigeria-set debut feature My Father\u2019s Shadow<\/a>, a family drama starring Sop\u00e9 Dirisu (Slow Horses). The film, the U.K. submission for the best international feature film race at the Oscars, had led the BIFA nominations with 12<\/a>. Handing Davies his statuette was Billy Crudup.<\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, Tom Basden and Tim Key won BIFAs for the best joint lead performance, as well as best screenplay for their debut feature The Ballad of Wallis Island<\/a>, about a faded folk musician and his former partner reluctantly reuniting for an eccentric fan.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe BIFA acting trophies went to Robert Aramayo<\/a>, who received the best lead performance award for his role as a Tourette\u2019s campaigner in Kirk Jones\u2019 I Swear<\/a>, Posy Sterling for her best breakthrough performance-honored role as a mother fighting for the custody of her children in Daisy-May Hudson\u2019s debut feature Lollipop, and Jay Lycurgo for his best supporting performance-winning role in pressure-cooker school drama Steve, also starring Cillian Murphy. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe Douglas Hickox Award for best debut director went to Cal McMau for his prison drama Wasteman, tracing the tense bond between two men whose lives collide behind bars. The movie stars David Jonsson and Tom Blyth.\u00a0And the breakthrough producer honor was bestowed upon Dhiraj Mahey<\/a> for his work on the social-realist coming-of-age drama Ish, which was also produced by Bennett McGhee.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe best British short film award went to Magid \/ Zafar<\/a>, a dissection of the relationship between two men amid rising tensions in a British-Pakistani takeaway restaurant from director Lu\u00eds Hindman.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tA special jury prize went to Adolescence producer<\/a>
and This Is England producer Warp Films<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tDuring his acceptance speech, Lighton recalled being nominated for a BIFA with a short film in 2017. \u201cI didn\u2019t win, and I got incredibly drunk and spent the rest of the evening kind of burning industry bridges. I\u2019m going to start by saying thank you to BIFA for not blacklisting me,\u201d he quipped.<\/p>\n

\n\tHe thanked a range of collaborators, including the film\u2019s stars, \u201cHarry and Alex. What a hot couple!\u201d Concluded Lighton: \u201cI remember it kind of blew my mind that I sent both of you a script about butt plugs, and you both said yes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn another highlight of Sunday evening, the 2025 Richard Harris Award for Outstanding Contribution by an Actor to British Film was handed to Emily Watson<\/a> by her two-time co-star and friend Paul Mescal.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tWatson, during her acceptance speech, addressed the audience as \u201cyou lot \u2013 independent, creative critical thinkers. You are actually going to save us when the stories that are being told to us, about us, or by us, are all driven by a rapacious, hungry algorithm. The awkward truth of the stories that you tell, they are our life support.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tLater in her speech, Watson said: \u201cSo what you have to do is you have to reach out to those coming behind you, and you have to build relationships with younger colleagues, less certain of their path than you are. And that is actually the most rewarding part of the job, and it will ensure that we can help keep holding the algorithm to the fire.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tCheck out the full list of winners at the British Independent Film Awards 2025 below.<\/p>\n

\n\tBest British Independent Film
Pillion<\/p>\n

\n\tBest British Short Film
Magid \/ Zafar<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Casting
Lauren Evans,\u00a0I Swear<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Cinematography
Seamus McGarvey,\u00a0Die My Love<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Costume Design
Grace Snell, Pillion <\/p>\n

\n\tBest Debut Screenwriter
Harry Lighton, Pillion<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Debut Director
Cal McMau, Wasteman<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Debut Director \u2013 Feature Documentary
Myrid Carten, A Want in Her<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Director
Akinola Davies Jr.<\/a>, My Father\u2019s Shadow<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Editing
Fin Oates, Warfare<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Effects
Simon Stanley-Clamp and Ryan Conder, Warfare<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Ensemble Performance
Joseph Quinn, D\u2019Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Will Poulter, Cosmo Jarvis, Finn Bennett, Charles Melton, and Kit Connor, Warfare<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Feature Documentary
A Want in Her<\/p>\n

\n\tBest International Independent Film
Sentimental Value<\/a><\/p>\n

\n\tBest Joint Lead
Tom Basden and Tim Key, The Ballad of Wallis Island<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Lead Performance
Robert Aramayo, I Swear<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Breakthrough Performance
Posy Sterling, Lollipop<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Breakthrough Producer
Dhiraj <\/a>Mahey, Ish<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Make-Up and Hair Design
Diandra Ferreira, Pillion<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Music Supervision
Raife Burchell and Ian Neil, Die My Love<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Original Music
Tom Basden and Adem Ilhan,\u00a0The Ballad of Wallis Island<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Production Design
Nathan Parker,\u00a0Harvest<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Screenplay
Tom Basden and Tim Key, The Ballad of Wallis Island<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Sound
Glenn Freemantle, Mitch Low, Howard Bargroff, Ben Barker and Richard Spooner, Warfare<\/p>\n

\n\tBest Supporting Performance
Jay Lycurgo, Steve<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Raindance Maverick Award
Myrid Carten, A Want in Her<\/p>\n

\n\tSpecial Jury Prize
Warp Films<\/p>\n

\n\tBIFA Cinema of the Year Award
The Magic Lantern Cinema in Tywyn<\/p>\n

\n\tRichard Harris Award for Outstanding Contribution by an Actor to British Film
Emily Watson<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Writer-director Harry Lighton\u2018s feature debut Pillion, a sub\/dom romance starring Alexander Skarsg\u00e5rd as a leather-clad biker and\u00a0Harry Melling\u00a0as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":161397,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[97114,97115,97116,146,43933,2990,85,399,46,97117,97118,3120,39750,97119],"class_list":["post-161396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-akinola-davies-jr","tag-bifas","tag-british-independent-film-awards","tag-entertainment","tag-harry-lighton","tag-i-swear","tag-il","tag-international","tag-israel","tag-my-fathers-shadow","tag-pillion","tag-robert-aramayo","tag-sentimental-value","tag-the-ballad-of-wallis-island"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}