8 Jan 2009

BAFTA nominations process begins

12:59 pm on 8 January 2009

Nominations for the annual BAFTA awards will be announced on 15 January in London.

The awards are Britain's equivalent of the Oscars. They will be held in London on 8 February in the run up to the Oscars, on 22 February in Los Angeles.

However, nominations for the foreign language BAFTA award have already been announced to give voting members of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts more time to view them. They are:

Waltz With Bashir, an Israeli animated war film about the 1982 massacre of Palestinians in Beirut.

Persepolis, an animated adaptation of a popular comic book telling of life growing up in Iran.

Gomorrah, a film about the Naples mafia.

The Baader Meinhof Complex, about left-wing gang members suspected of killing dozens of prominent Germans,

and I've Loved You So Long, a family saga starring Kristin Scott Thomas.

The 2008 winner of the foreign language film award was German entry The Lives of Others.