David Farnor | On 01, Nov 2016

I, Daniel Blake is leading this year’s British Independent Film Awards, which highlight the growing importance of VOD to indie filmmakers.

Ken Loach’s film, which is nominated for Best British Independent Film, Best Director and Best Screenplay, is up for seven BIFA awards in total, including stars Hayley Squires and Dave Johns, who are each nominated twice – for Best Actress and Best Actor, and (competing against each other) for Most Promising Newcomer.

Hot on Loach’s heels are American Honey, Adult Life Skills, Notes on Blindness and Under the Shadow (pictured), each of whom have six nominations each.

In the Best Actress category, Jodie Whitaker (Adult Life Skills) and Kate Dickie (Couple in a Hole) receive their second BIFA nominations, with other nominees Hayley Squires (I, Daniel Blake), Narges Rashidi (Under the Shadow) and Sasha Lane (American Honey) nominated for the first time.

For Best Actor, Dave Johns (I, Daniel Blake), Max Records (I Am Not a Serial Killer), Shia LaBeouf (American Honey) and Steve Brandon (My Feral Heart) are all first-time nominees. Michael Fassbender (Trespass Against Us) rounds off the Best Actor category, nominated for the third consecutive year with his sixth nomination, having previously won Best Actor for Hunger (2008) and Shame (2011).

All those in the Best Supporting Actress and Best Supporting Actor categories are first time nominees with the exception of Sean Harris (Trespass Against Us) who is nominated in this category for the third consecutive year.

In the Best Director category, American Honey Director Andrea Arnold receives her fourth BIFA nomination, having won in the same category for Fish Tank in 2009. Loach is on his fifth BIFA nomination, as is Ben Wheatley, who is nominated for Free Fire. Babak Anvari is nominated for the first time for Under The Shadow for which he is also nominated for The Douglas Hickox Award for Best Debut Director. Directing partners Peter Middleton and James Spinney also receive their first BIFA nominations for both Best Director and The Douglas Hickox Award for their debut Notes on Blindness.

A total 32 different British feature films have been nominated across the awards, with a large number of them already available to watch online on VOD. Indeed, The Greasy Strangler, Notes on Blindness, Under the Shadow, Couple in a Hole, The Confession, Adult Life Skills and The Hard Stop all received simultaneous day-and-date releases in the UK, as digital distribution continues to help the top indie talent in the British film industry reach wider audiences. Amazon, meanwhile, is also up for its first BIFA, as its original film Manchester by the Sea is up for Best International Independent Film. The Confession: Living the War on Terror, which is part of the BBC’s Storyville strand, is also on BBC iPlayer until 15th November.

The winners will be announced on Sunday 4th December at Old Billingsgate.

Here’s the full list of nominees. Click on any film listed in bold to see where you can watch it online in the UK:

Best British Independent Film

American Honey
Couple in a Hole
I, Daniel Blake
Notes on Blindness
Under the Shadow

Best Director

Andrea Arnold – American Honey
Ben Wheatley – Free Fire
Ken Loach – I, Daniel Blake
James Spinney & Pete Middleton – Notes on Blindness
Babak Anvari – Under the Shadow

Best Screenplay

Adult Life Skills
American Honey
I Am Not A Serial Killer
I, Daniel Blake
Under the Shadow

Best Actor

Shia LaBeouf – American Honey
Max Records – I Am Not A Serial Killer
Dave Johns – I, Daniel Blake
Steve Brandon – My Feral Heart
Michael Fassbender – Trespass Against Us

Best Actress

Jodie Whittaker – Adult Life Skills
Sasha Lane – American Honey
Kate Dickie – Couple in a Hole
Hayley Squires – I, Daniel Blake
Narges Rashidi – Under the Shadow

Best Supporting Actor

Brett Goldstein – Adult Life Skills
Jamie Dornan – Anthropoid
Christopher Lloyd – I Am Not A Serial Killer
Arinzé Kene – The Pass
Sean Harris – Trespass Against Us

Best Supporting Actress

Gemma Arterton – The Girl With All the Gifts
Shana Swash – My Feral Heart
Naomie Harris – Our Kind of Traitor
Avin Manshadi – Under the Shadow
Terry Pheto – A United Kingdom

Most Promising Newcomer

Sennia Nanua – The Girl With All the Gifts
Hayley Squires – I, Daniel Blake
Dave Johns – I, Daniel Blake
Steve Brandon – My Feral Heart
Letitia Wright – Urban Hymn

The Douglas Hickox Award (Debut Director)

Rachel Tunnard – Adult Life Skills
Pete Middleton & James Spinney – Notes on Blindness
Alice Lowe – Prevenge
Adam Smith – Trespass Against Us
Babak Anvari – Under the Shadow

Outstanding Achievement in Craft

Robbie Ryan – American Honey
Shaheen Baig – Free Fire
Seb Barker – The Girl With All the Gifts
Joakim Sundström – Notes on Blindness
Paul Monaghan & Mat Whitecross – Supersonic

Best Documentary

The Confession: Living the War on Terror
Dancer
The Hard Stop
Notes on Blindness
Versus: The Life and Films of Ken Loach

Best International Independent Film

Hunt for the Wilderpeople
Manchester by the Sea
Moonlight
Mustang
Toni Erdmann

Best British Short

Jacked
Mother
Over
Rate Me
The Wrong End of the Stick

The Discovery Award (Sponsored by Raindance)

Black Mountain Poets
The Darkest Universe
The Ghoul
Gozo
The Greasy Strangler

Breakthrough Producer

Michael Berliner – Adult Life Skills
Camille Gatin – The Girl With All the Gifts
Dionne Walker – The Hard Stop
Mike Brett & Jo Jo Ellison & Steve Jamison – Notes on Blindness
Paul Fegan – Where You’re Meant To Be

Debut Screenwriter

Rachel Tunnard – Adult Life Skills
Hope Dickson Leach – The Levelling
Simon Farnaby & Julian Barratt – Mindhorn
John Cairns & Michael McCartney – A Patch of Fog

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