'Carol' And 'Bridge Of Spies' Lead The 2016 BAFTA Nominations

For those who follow and obsess over the Hollywood awards season, the British Academy Film Awards are often a breath of fresh air. Or a surprising curveball. A bucket of water to face. Seeing how the film tastes across the Atlantic diverge and converge with American opinions is often fascinating. Plus, the BAFTAs set aside a few categories to focus exclusively on British films and filmmakers, which always allows for some very interesting, very surprising films to step into the spotlight.

And this year's nominations pretty good! While many of the nominations align with the current Oscar buzz, there are just enough surprises to make this interesting. You can peruse the complete list of the 2016 BAFTA nominations below.

As it has with more than several different voting bodies at this point, Todd Haynes' Carol received nine nominations, including Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress (Cate Blanchett) and Best Supporting Actress (Rooney Mara). Everyone likes Carol (it even made my top 10 of 2015) and everyone expects it to be a major contender at every film awards shindig moving forward. Nothing too shocking here.

Far more interesting is Steven Spielberg's Bridge of Spies, which also received nine nominations, including Best Film, Best Director and Best Supporting Actor for Mark Rylance. Although Bridge of Spies is an excellent, level-headed thriller that deserves to be seen for its wonderful performances and prescient themes, it has barely made a dent in the awards conversation stateside. Could this give it a little more momentum in the Oscar race?

The Revenant followed with eight nominations (will the British voters also be impressed that Leonardo DiCaprio suffered so much on that set?) and Mad Max: Fury Road with seven nominations (which was nominated in just about every technical category, but snubbed in Best Film and Best Director). Brooklyn and The Martian received six nods each while The Big Short, The Danish Girl, Ex Machina, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens each nabbed four nods.

If there's one individual who can walk away from this whole thing beaming, it's Alicia Vikander. Nominated for Best Actress for The Danish Girl and Best Supporting Actress for Ex Machina, these nominations acknowledge that 2015 was the year that one of the most exciting actresses of the past few years truly broke out. Could she repeat this at the Oscars?

Here is the complete list of nominations:

BEST FILM

THE BIG SHORT Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, Brad Pitt

BRIDGE OF SPIES Kristie Macosko Krieger, Marc Platt, Steven Spielberg

CAROL Elizabeth Karlsen, Christine Vachon, Stephen Woolley

THE REVENANT Steve Golin, Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Arnon Milchan, Mary Parent, Keith Redmon

SPOTLIGHT Steve Golin, Blye Pagon Faust, Nicole Rocklin, Michael Sugar

OUTSTANDING BRITISH FILM

45 YEARS Andrew Haigh, Tristan Goligher

AMY Asif Kapadia, James Gay-Rees

BROOKLYN John Crowley, Finola Dwyer, Amanda Posey, Nick Hornby

THE DANISH GIRL Tom Hooper, Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, Anne Harrison, Gail Mutrux, Lucinda Coxon

EX MACHINA Alex Garland, Andrew Macdonald, Allon Reich

THE LOBSTER Yorgos Lanthimos, Ceci Dempsey, Ed Guiney, Lee Magiday, Efthimis Filippou

OUTSTANDING DEBUT BY A BRITISH WRITER, DIRECTOR OR PRODUCER

ALEX GARLAND (Director) Ex Machina

DEBBIE TUCKER GREEN (Writer/Director) Second Coming

NAJI ABU NOWAR (Writer/Director) RUPERT LLOYD (Producer) Theeb

SEAN MCALLISTER (Director/Producer), ELHUM SHAKERIFAR (Producer) A Syrian Love Story

STEPHEN FINGLETON (Writer/Director) The Survivalist

FILM NOT IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE

THE ASSASSIN Hou Hsiao-Hsien

FORCE MAJEURE Ruben Östlund

THEEB Naji Abu Nowar, Rupert Lloyd

TIMBUKTU Abderrahmane Sissako

WILD TALES Damián Szifron

DOCUMENTARY

AMY Asif Kapadia, James Gay-Rees

CARTEL LAND Matthew Heineman, Tom Yellin

HE NAMED ME MALALA Davis Guggenheim, Walter Parkes, Laurie MacDonald

LISTEN TO ME MARLON Stevan Riley, John Battsek, George Chignell, R.J. Cutler

SHERPA Jennifer Peedom, Bridget Ikin, John Smithson

ANIMATED FILM

INSIDE OUT Pete Docter

MINIONS Pierre Coffin, Kyle Balda

SHAUN THE SHEEP MOVIE Mark Burton, Richard Starzak

DIRECTOR

THE BIG SHORT Adam McKay

BRIDGE OF SPIES Steven Spielberg

CAROL Todd Haynes

THE MARTIAN Ridley Scott

THE REVENANT Alejandro G. Iñárritu

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

BRIDGE OF SPIES Matthew Charman, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

EX MACHINA Alex Garland

THE HATEFUL EIGHT Quentin Tarantino

INSIDE OUT Josh Cooley, Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve

SPOTLIGHT Tom McCarthy, Josh Singer

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

THE BIG SHORT Adam McKay, Charles Randolph

BROOKLYN Nick Hornby

CAROL Phyllis Nagy

ROOM Emma Donoghue

STEVE JOBS Aaron Sorkin

LEADING ACTOR

BRYAN CRANSTON Trumbo

EDDIE REDMAYNE The Danish Girl

LEONARDO DICAPRIO The Revenant

MATT DAMON The Martian

MICHAEL FASSBENDER Steve Jobs

LEADING ACTRESS

ALICIA VIKANDER The Danish Girl

BRIE LARSON Room

CATE BLANCHETT Carol

MAGGIE SMITH The Lady in the Van

SAOIRSE RONAN Brooklyn

SUPPORTING ACTOR

BENICIO DEL TORO Sicario

CHRISTIAN BALE The Big Short

IDRIS ELBA Beasts of No Nation

MARK RUFFALO Spotlight

MARK RYLANCE Bridge of Spies

SUPPORTING ACTRESS

ALICIA VIKANDER Ex Machina

JENNIFER JASON LEIGH The Hateful Eight

JULIE WALTERS Brooklyn

KATE WINSLET Steve Jobs

ROONEY MARA Carol

ORIGINAL MUSIC

BRIDGE OF SPIES Thomas Newman

THE HATEFUL EIGHT Ennio Morricone

THE REVENANT Ryuichi Sakamoto, Carsten Nicolai

SICARIO Jóhann Jóhannsson

STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS John Williams

CINEMATOGRAPHY

BRIDGE OF SPIES Janusz Kami?ski

CAROL Ed Lachman

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD John Seale

THE REVENANT Emmanuel Lubezki

SICARIO Roger Deakins

EDITING

THE BIG SHORT Hank Corwin

BRIDGE OF SPIES Michael Kahn

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Margaret Sixel

THE MARTIAN Pietro Scalia

THE REVENANT Stephen Mirrione

PRODUCTION DESIGN

BRIDGE OF SPIES Adam Stockhausen, Rena DeAngelo

CAROL Judy Becker, Heather Loeffler

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Colin Gibson, Lisa Thompson

THE MARTIAN Arthur Max, Celia Bobak

STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS Rick Carter, Darren Gilford, Lee Sandales

COSTUME DESIGN

BROOKLYN Odile Dicks-Mireaux

CAROL Sandy Powell

CINDERELLA Sandy Powell

THE DANISH GIRL Paco Delgado

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Jenny Beavan

MAKE UP & HAIR

BROOKLYN Morna Ferguson, Lorraine Glynn

CAROL Jerry DeCarlo, Patricia Regan

THE DANISH GIRL Jan Sewell

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Lesley Vanderwalt, Damian Martin

THE REVENANT Sian Grigg, Duncan Jarman, Robert Pandini

SOUND

BRIDGE OF SPIES Drew Kunin, Richard Hymns, Andy Nelson, Gary Rydstrom

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Scott Hecker, Chris Jenkins, Mark Mangini, Ben Osmo, Gregg Rudloff, David White

THE MARTIAN Paul Massey, Mac Ruth, Oliver Tarney, Mark Taylor

THE REVENANT Lon Bender, Chris Duesterdiek, Martin Hernandez, Frank A. Montaño, Jon Taylor, Randy Thom

STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS David Acord, Andy Nelson, Christopher Scarabosio, Matthew Wood, Stuart Wilson

SPECIAL VISUAL EFFECTS

ANT-MAN Jake Morrison, Greg Steele, Dan Sudick, Alex Wuttke

EX MACHINA Mark Ardington, Sara Bennett, Paul Norris, Andrew Whitehurst

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD Andrew Jackson, Dan Oliver, Tom Wood, Andy Williams

THE MARTIAN Chris Lawrence, Tim Ledbury, Richard Stammers, Steven Warner

STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS Chris Corbould, Roger Guyett, Paul Kavanagh, Neal Scanlan

BRITISH SHORT ANIMATION

EDMOND Nina Gantz, Emilie Jouffroy

MANOMAN Simon Cartwright, Kamilla Kristiane Hodol

PROLOGUE Richard Williams, Imogen Sutton

BRITISH SHORT FILM

ELEPHANT Nick Helm, Alex Moody, Esther Smith

MINING POEMS OR ODES Callum Rice, Jack Cocker

OPERATOR Caroline Bartleet, Rebecca Morgan

OVER Jörn Threlfall, Jeremy Bannister

SAMUEL-613 Billy Lumby, Cheyenne Conway

THE EE RISING STAR AWARD (voted for by the public)

BEL POWLEY

BRIE LARSON

DAKOTA JOHNSON

JOHN BOYEGA

TARON EGERTON