Papal thriller Conclave and immigrant epic The Brutalist emerged neck-and-neck at the BAFTA Awards on Sunday, with each film taking home four coveted gongs.
Conclave, directed by German-born Edward Berger, won the BAFTA for Best Film with its tale of the intrigue and horse-trading behind the scenes during the election of a new pope.
Accepting the award, Berger recalled that the journey to make the film took seven years, paying tribute to British screenwriter Peter Straughan's "wonderful script" and lead actor Ralph Fiennes.
US filmmaker Brad Corby won the BAFTA for Best Director for "The Brutalist," while leading man Adrien Brody scooped up Best Actor for his portrayal of a Hungarian Holocaust survivor and architect who emigrates to the United States.
Veteran British actor Fiennes, who played a cardinal in Conclave, once again saw his hopes of winning a BAFTA dashed, losing out to Brody in the race for the honor.
Scandal-hit Emilia Perez, a surreal musical about a Mexican drug lord who transitions to a woman, was heavily favored at the beginning of the year. However, it only won two BAFTAs, including one for Zoe Saldana for Best Supporting Actress.
Until last month, French director Jacques Audiard's movie had been expected to be a frontrunner at the British film awards. But old racist and Islamophobic tweets by lead actor Karla Sofia Gascon surfaced at the end of January, shaking up the race just before the London ceremony and the Oscars on 2 March.
A surprise of the night was the BAFTA for Best Actress, which went to 25-year-old Mikey Madison for her portrayal of a sex worker in the black comedy Anora, about an erotic dancer's whirlwind romance gone wrong.
Accepting the award, Madison said she wanted to dedicate it to "the sex worker community, I see you, you deserve respect and human dignity."
Demi Moore, Timothée Chalamet, and Ariana Grande were also at the glitzy evening hosted by Doctor Who and Good Omens star David Tennant, but all emerged empty-handed.
Best Supporting Actor went to Kieran Culkin for his role in A Real Pain, a film about Jewish American cousins who tour Poland in honor of their grandmother.
Saldana, who won a Golden Globe last month for her role as the sassy lawyer in Emilia Perez, said she was dedicating her BAFTA award to her trans nephew.
"They are the reason I signed on to do the film in the first place," adding she would "always stand" with the LGBTQ community, which has come under attack under the new presidency of Donald Trump.
Conclave also picked up awards for Outstanding British Film, Editing, and Best Adapted Screenplay, while The Brutalist took awards for Cinematography and Original Score.
Wicked picked up two BAFTAs, including for Production Design, while Rich Peppiatt, who wrote Kneecap, a docudrama about an audacious trio of Northern Irish rappers, won for an Outstanding Debut by a British Writer.
Dune: Part Two won BAFTAs for both Special Visual Effects and Best Sound.
To huge cheers from the audience, Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl picked up two BAFTAs for Best Animated Feature and Best in the Children's and Family Film category.
Although they often set the tone for the Oscars, the BAFTAs — the biggest night of the year for the British film industry — regularly diverge from the films favored by the Academy Awards in Los Angeles, which holds its ceremony on 2 March.
France's Coralie Fargeat was the only woman nominated in the Directing category for The Substance.