Director Mike Leigh has been awarded with the Bafta Fellowship at tonight’s annual celebration of moving making in the UK.
Each year, Bafta awards one person its highest accolade – awarded in recognition of outstanding and exceptional contribution to film, television or games. And the hirsute director definitely fits the bill.
Other people to receive the Bafta fellowship are Charlie Chaplin, Alfred Hitchcock, Steven Spielberg, Dame Judi Dench and Dame Helen Mirren.
Leigh has been an ever-present at Bafta award ceremonies and in 1996 he picked up the Outstanding Contribution to British Cinema award. This year, his film Mr Turner, which he wrote and directed, received four nominations.
1. Here he is in 1997 with two Baftas, awarded for outstanding British Film and Original Screenplay, for his 1996 film Secrets And Lies.
2. Feature-length film Topsy Turvy won Mike the best film award in 2001 at the Evening Standard Film Awards.
3. With Imelda Staunton in 2004 at the close of the 61st annual Venice Film Festival.
4. Laden with awards, for his film Vera Drake at the London Film Critics Circle Awards in 2005.
5. Vera Drake also won Mike Leigh and Imelda Staunton Bafta awards in the same year.
6. Celebrating Happy Go Lucky at the 58th annual Berlin Film Festival.
7. Shooting a documentary at the Sarajevo Film Festival in 2008.
8. With Tilda Swinton and Pat Shortt with their awards during the Evening Standards British Film Awards.
9. With Ruth Sheen, Lesley Manville and Jim Broadbent at the 63rd Cannes Film Festival.
10. Mike Leigh turns out for 2011 Critics Circle Theatre Awards with Danny Boyle.
11. As president of the jury during the Berlin International Film Festival in 2012 with Jake Gyllenhaal and Charlotte Gainsbourg.
12. Actor Timothy Spall joins Mike Leigh for the Mr Turner photocall at the 67th Cannes Film Festival in 2014.
13. Collecting the Stockholm Film Festival Lifetime Achievement Award in November 2014.
14. The director is joined by his wife Charlotte Holdich for the Bafta nominees party at Kensington Palace.
15. Arriving at tonight’s Bafta ceremony in London.
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