LONDON - Sci-fi epic Dune, which boasts an all-star cast including Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya, leads the nominations for this year’s Bafta Film Awards with 11. The Power of the Dog, a gothic Western starring Benedict Cumberbatch as a menacing cowboy, received eight nods. Sir Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast, a black-and-white retelling of his childhood in Northern Ireland got six nominations. Daniel Craig’s final Bond outing No Time To Die has five nominations, including outstanding British film. Dune’s high number of nominations on Thursday, including for best film, reflects its recognition in many categories, including technical ones such as cinematography, visual effects, costume design and make-up and hair, as well as original score. It is a sprawling story of power, betrayal and murder set in the distant future, and was a box office hit when it came out last year in the UK, making more than £20m. Critics largely lavished praise on director Denis Villeneuve’s movie, which was based on Herbert’s 1965 classic sci-fi book. It was also made into a film in 1984 by David Lynch.

The other best film nominees are Belfast, Leonardo DiCaprio’s disaster comedy Don’t Look Up, coming-of-age comedy-drama Licorice Pizza, starring pop/rock star Alana Haim and Cooper Hoffman, and The Power of the Dog. But No Time to Die, along with Steven Spielberg’s big-screen adaptation of the musical West Side Story, were overlooked for best film. Sir Kenneth said Bafta’s recognition for Belfast was “an amazing tribute to a remarkable part of the world”, adding: “We are humbly and delightfully gobsmacked!” Cumberbatch was nominated in the leading actor category and afterwards told the PA news agency he was “deeply humbled and grateful”. “The journey to play Phil Burbank took me a long way from anything familiar to me and this recognition of that work feels like completing the circle and coming home,” he said. The UK actor will go head-to-head with DiCaprio and King Richard star Will Smith for the leading actor gong, as well as another Brit Stephen Graham- who played an under pressure chef in Boiling Point. 

This is Smith’s first Bafta nomination, for his role as Richard Williams, in the biographical drama about the father and coach of tennis players Venus and Serena Williams.

Among the nominees for best actress are House of Gucci’s Lady Gaga, fellow musician Alana Haim for Licorice Pizza, Tessa Thompson for Passing and Emilia Jones - Aled Jones’s daughter - for Coda.

Joanna Scanlan, who is nominated for After Love, a film about a 60-year-old Muslim convert who suffers an identity crisis following the sudden death of her husband.

She told the BBC: “I’m shaking, I’m literally shaking my knees are buckling underneath. I feel really in shock. I was lucky as a 60-year-old woman to play a character who, in real life would be quite an invisible person.

“It’s a fantastic role - I often play support roles, that’s been the majority of my career. I really enjoyed playing a leading role and stepping into that kind of emotional complexity.”