The science-fiction sensation 'Avatar' and the Iraq war thriller 'The Hurt Locker' lead the Academy Awards with nine nominations each, including best picture and director for James Cameron and ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow.

Jim Sheridan's drama of guilt and forgiveness reworks the Danish director Susanne Bier's 2005 film, adding an extra polish to the story of US Army captain Sam Cahill (Tobey Maguire), who's missing presumed dead after his helicopter is shot down in the mountains of Afghanistan.

British film matches $300m Avatar with eight nominations for Bafta awards

Nominations for the Orange British Academy Film Awards, as the Baftas are formally known:

Blockbuster sci-fi spectacle Avatar, coming-of-age movie An Education and Iraq war drama The Hurt Locker lead this year's film Bafta nominations with eight nods apiece.

It's that time of year again, and I don't mean the time when the Christmas lights are prematurely lit. Early December is fine. No, it's that time when you have to make your annual trip to the Post Office to buy stamps for the cards you want to dispatch to far-flung parts of the globe.

The actress Katie Jarvis, who was spotted by a casting agent at Tilbury Town railway station in Essex and went on to be the toast of last year's Cannes Film Festival, was last night named most Promising Newcomer at the British Independent Film Awards.

Carey Mulligan received rave reviews for her role in An Education. Next up is Wall Street 2 for Oliver Stone, and Jim Sheridan's Brothers. James Mottram talks to Britain's fastest-rising star

Have women ever had a better year behind the camera? As Jane Campion releases 'Bright Star', she and three other leading female film-makers discuss the view from the director's chair

A 16-year-old's crush on a man twice her age with a taste for Ravel and fine art inspires a brilliant evocation of 1961 and a world The Beatles would make disappear overnight

Too cool for school

Hollywood star Daniel Day-Lewis is to receive an honour from the British Independent Film Awards.

Few Jane Austen enthusiasts will not have realised what a delicate business it was to be a lady or gentleman of standing in Regency England.

The UK premiere of An Education – based on the childhood memoirs of journalist Lynn Barber with a screenplay by Nick Hornby – was a highlight of the London Film Festival this week.