BAFTA 2026: Women on the Longlist, the Nominees, and the Narrowing Path to Wins

Congratulations to all of this year’s BAFTA nominees and winners. We are especially pleased to see Hamnet - a #ReclaimTheFrame supported and title recognised across categories.

However, as in previous years, the 2026 nominations present a mixed picture for female filmmaking. While representation is visible in some categories, significant under-representation persists in others - particularly at the level of technical authority and top-tier recognition.

Across all 252 nominees, women account for approximately one third of the total (83/252).

It is worth noting that post-2020 reforms - including expanded and diversified voting membership, compulsory viewing requirements, and gender parity rules for director longlists - have increased women’s visibility at the longlist stage. These measures have been somewhat successful in ensuring women are considered, but as the process narrows to nominations and winners, representation continues to decline.

Director

At the highest levels of recognition, the imbalance remains stark. Despite the longlist nomination of five female directors, reflecting BAFTA’s parity rules, only Chloe Zhao (Hamnet) made the short list. This meant that women represented just 16.7% of Director nominees this year (1/6), the same as in 2025 (The Substance, Coralie Fargeat).

This figure is a direct reflection of the wider issue: in 2025, women and non-binary filmmakers directed only 16% of feature films released in the UK, a seven-year low, as reported in our collaborative Screen feature at the end of 2025.

Zhao was the first woman of colour to be nominated for this award, she won the Best Director award for Nomadland at the 2021 BAFTAs. Paul Thomas Anderson was the 2026 awardee for One Battle After Another.

Best Film

For the Best Film category, where the producer gets honoured, the picture is more layered.

For this award, representation improves. With the exception of Marty Supreme, every nominated film includes at least one woman among its credited nominees. However, there are distinctions to be made, with some films pointing to more clearly female-led production structures - Hamnet and Sentimental Value, for example - and others where women are part of a broader, male dominated team: One Battle After Another and Sinners. 

The narrowing effect is visible here too: all major contenders were longlisted, most included women at production level, but the Best Film award went to One Battle After Another, a male-led production.

So with Best Film awards we should always ask the question: who holds sustained production authority at this level and how often is that authority genuinely shared.

Outstanding Debut by a British Writer, Director or Producer

In Outstanding Debut, female representation is low with just three women out of the ten longlisted individuals or 30% overall or two out of five films in question: The Ceremony - Hollie Bryan (Producer), Lucy Meer (Producer) and A Want In Her - Myrid Carten (Director / Writer).

In previous years, women have tended to do well in this category - female nominations accounted for six out of nine films in 2025 - which suggests that women are gaining visibility at entry level within British filmmaking.

The open question is what happens next.

Does this early leadership translate into sustained access to larger budgets, bigger productions and long-term authority — or does representation narrow as films move up the prestige ladder? So far the evidence supports the latter. 

The winner for the category is - My Father’s Shadow

Outstanding British Film 

Outstanding British Film is similarly disheartening with women accounting for 35% of producers, directors and writers longlisted, down from 40% in 2025. However, amongst the nominations the female-led Hamnet was amongst the top contenders and went on to win the award.

Here, BAFTA’s reforms have had more tangible success: showing that parity rules and longlist visibility can translate into recognition under the right circumstances.

Documentary

Positively, four of the five shortlisted films involving women in key creative roles, including Reclaim The Frame supported titles, The Perfect Neighbor (with women producers Geeta Gandbhir and Alisa Payne) and Apocalypse in the Tropics (directed by Petra Costa and Alessandra Orofino). The winner - Mr. Nobody Against Putin - was male directed but credited women producers Helle Faber and Alžběta Karásková. 

Historically over the past five years, BAFTA’s documentary category has seen sporadic female representation - for example, 20 Days in Mariupol (2024) included women among its credited filmmakers and Reclaim The Frame supported, For Sama (2019), won with its Syrian co‑director Waad Al‑Kateab - but few winners have been led by women, making the 2026 slate stronger in terms of inclusion though still not yet parity.

Cinematography

Cinematography remains heavily male-dominated this year - and that is exactly why the single female nominee carries particular weight. The sole woman nominated is Autumn Durald Arkapaw for Sinners. 

Her nomination is historic: she is the first woman of colour ever nominated for Cinematography at the BAFTAs. 

This matters because cinematography sits at the core of film authorship. Recognition here signals access to one of the industry’s most powerful creative roles - yet the broader technical landscape still shows structural exclusion.

Despite longlist inclusion, the award went to a male cinematographer (One Battle After Another), again illustrating the narrowing of female representation from consideration to final award.

Casting and Costume Design

Historically, costume design and casting are two of the few areas in filmmaking that have been predominantly filled and led by women. While other key roles like directing and cinematography remained male-dominated, these two specialisms were considered "appropriate" areas for women to exercise creative control.

Casting is entirely female this year (6/6 nominees), demonstrating strong visibility for women in a key creative area. Likewise, Costume Design also shows strong representation, with women forming the majority of nominees (4/5 nominees). Both winners were female.

Technical authority and absence

In contrast, several major technical categories this year include no female nominees at all  - including Editing and  Original Score (both down from one nominee in 2025) and Special Visual Effects (same as 2025). Sound features just one woman (down from three last year -  F1 was the eventual winner  - the five person sound team included the sole female nominee in this category). These awards have been historically dominated by men, reflecting broader gender imbalances in film craft roles.

At the same time, Casting is entirely female.

The contrast is hard to ignore. Women are highly visible in roles linked to communication and relationship-building, but largely absent from areas seen as “technical” or tied to creative authority.

This isn’t simply about individual career choices. It reflects long-standing assumptions about who is considered technically skilled, who is trusted with big budgets, and who is positioned at the centre of authorship.

When an institution as influential as BAFTA presents this pattern year after year, it doesn’t just mirror inequality - it helps normalise it. That’s why ongoing scrutiny and follow-up matter.

Compared to other major awards such as the Oscars and Golden Globes, BAFTA’s longlist parity rules give women more visibility at early stages, but the narrowing from longlist to winner in 2026 shows that this structural advantage is only partially translating into final recognition in directing and technical categories.

Overall picture

Taken together, this year’s long list nominations reveal a familiar pattern rather than a single trend.

Across all categories, women make up 33% of nominees. At debut level, representation rises to 30%. . In directing, it falls to 16.7%. In several major technical fields, it remains at zero.

Women are entering the industry. They are visible in casting, costume design and debut production. In some cases - such as Hamnet - they are leading at scale.

But as prestige and budget increase, representation narrows. The 2026 winners underline this: while women were present on longlists and nominations, only Outstanding British Film (Hamnet) was won by a female-led project, with Best Director (One Battle After Another, Paul Thomas Anderson), Best Film (One Battle After Another), and technical awards going to male-led teams.

It is also clear that BAFTA has made sustained efforts in recent years to broaden representation across categories by expanding its voting membership. Progress is visible in certain areas, and that progress matters.

At the same time, visibility alone is not the endpoint. Representation and authority are not evenly distributed, and continued scrutiny remains necessary.

We will continue to track these patterns, amplify the work of women filmmakers, and advocate for pathways that support sustained leadership - not just entry.

Until representation and authority align more consistently, the conversation must continue.

Dohoi Kim is a cinematographer, photographer, and labour activist, currently pursuing an MA in Global Film at Newcastle University