The British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) is an organisation that celebrates, supports and promotes British independent cinema and filmmaking talent in United Kingdom. Nominations for the annual awards ceremony are announced in early November, with the ceremony itself taking place in early December.
Shirley Henderson is a Scottish actress. Her accolades include two Scottish BAFTAs, a VFCC Award and an Olivier Award, as well as BAFTA, BIFA, London Critics' Circle, Chlotrudis, Gotham, and Canadian Screen Award nominations.
David Mackenzie is a Scottish film director and co-founder of the Glasgow-based production company Sigma Films. He has made ten feature films including Young Adam (2003), Hallam Foe (2007), Perfect Sense (2011) and Starred Up (2013). In 2016, Mackenzie's film Hell or High Water premiered at Cannes and was theatrically released in the United States in August. The same year he executive produced Damnation, a TV pilot for Universal and USA Network. Mackenzie also directed Outlaw King (2018), a historical film for Netflix. Mackenzie and his films have been described as not fitting neatly into any particular genre or type.
Dawn Shadforth is a British director of music videos, TV, and film and a visual artist. She was originally a fine artist making work with objects, light, video and sound. She won the Whitworth Young Contemporaries Award for the installation "Sweet Dreams" in 1991 which was exhibited in Manchester and Sheffield. Shadforth later became a music-video and television director, receiving many awards for her work in music video including: Best New Director at The 1998 CAD Awards, Best Director at the 2001 CAD Awards. Visionary Video at the VH1/Vogue Fashion Awards. The Icon Award at the 2010 UK Music Video Awards. And for dramatic work she won a BIFA for Best British Short Film at the 2018 British Independent Film Awards for the short film The Big Day, and subsequently nominated for two BAFTAs in 2019 for Breakthrough talent for Trust episode "Silenzio" and in 2021 for Best Mini-Series for Adult Material.
Asa Bopp Farr Butterfield is an English actor. He has received nominations for three British Independent Film Awards, two Critics' Choice Awards, two Saturn Awards, and three Young Artist Awards.
Sally El-Hosaini is a Welsh-Egyptian film director and screenwriter.
Joanna Hogg is a British film director and screenwriter. She made her directorial and screenwriting feature film debut in 2007 with Unrelated followed by Archipelago (2010), Exhibition (2013), The Souvenir (2019), The Souvenir Part II (2021), and The Eternal Daughter (2022). Two of her films topped the Sight & Sound annual poll for best film in their respective years, receiving nominations at the British Independent Film Awards, the Independent Spirit Awards and at the Berlin International Film Festival.
My Brother the Devil is a 2012 British crime drama film written and directed by Sally El Hosaini. It stars James Floyd, Fady Elsayed and Saïd Taghmaoui. It tells the story of two sons of Egyptian immigrants coming of age in east London. It was released in the UK on 9 November 2012 and debuted in US cinemas on 22 March 2013. It was also released in Canada, Germany, Australia and New Zealand.
Vita & Virginia is a 2018 biographical romantic drama film directed by Chanya Button. The screenplay, written by Button and Eileen Atkins, is adapted from the 1992 play Vita & Virginia by Atkins. The film stars Gemma Arterton, Elizabeth Debicki, and Isabella Rossellini. Set in the 1920s, Vita & Virginia tells the story of the love affair between Vita Sackville-West and Virginia Woolf.
Cathy Brady is a Northern-Ireland born film director and screenwriter. After directing several award-winning short films and some television episodes in the 2010s, she wrote and directed her first feature film, Wildfire in 2020.
Charlotte Colbert is a Franco-British film director and a moving image and multi-media artist.
Dirty God is a 2019 internationally co-produced drama film, directed and co-written by Sacha Polak. The film marks the English language debut by Polak, and also marks the feature film debut of actress Vicky Knight. Actress Vicky Knight was chosen to play the lead role from auditions of burn survivors. It was selected to be screened in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition section at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival on 26 January 2019. The film also won three Golden Calves for best film, best director (Polak) and best music.
Mahalia Belo is an English film and television director.
Children of the Snow Land is a 2019 Nepalese English feature documentary film written and directed by Zara Balfour, and Marcus Stephenson. The film is produced by Zara Balfour and Marcus Stephenson, and Executive Produced by Christopher Hird. The documentary stars Nima Gurung, Sangpo Lama, Tsering Deki Lama, and Jeewan Mahatara in the lead roles. The documentary is about education in Nepal. The film premiered at the Kathmandu International Mountain Film Festival (KIMFF). It was released in UK cinemas with over 60 screenings nationwide, was shown on TV channels worldwide including Arte, BBC, Nippon and more, it won the BIFA Raindance Discovery Award, and 25 awards at film festivals worldwide, including Best Documentary at the Victoria Film Festival and London Independent Film Festival. It is available to stream on Curzon Home Cinema.
Rocks is a 2019 British coming-of-age drama film directed by Sarah Gavron. The film stars Bukky Bakray as Olushola, nicknamed "Rocks", a Black British teenage girl living in Hackney, London, whose single mother abandons her and her younger brother Emmanuel, forcing them to try to avoid being taken into social services.
Limbo is a 2020 British comedy-drama film, directed by Ben Sharrock. The film centres on four asylum seekers who are staying on a remote island in Scotland, and taking cultural awareness classes, while awaiting the processing of their refugee claims.
The Devil's Harmony is a live action short film directed by Dylan Holmes Williams in 2019.
Kosar Ali is a British actress. Her debut role in the 2019 film Rocks leading her with a nomination at only 17 for Best Supporting Actress at the 74th British Academy Film Awards whilst also being the youngest recipient to win two British Independent Film Awards. She plays Victoire in Dangerous Liaisons on Starz.
The Toll, released in the US with the title Tollbooth, is a 2021 Welsh black comedy film directed by Ryan Andrew Hooper and written by Matt Redd. The film stars Michael Smiley, Annes Elwy, Iwan Rheon and Paul Kaye. It premiered at the Official Selection of the 2021 Glasgow Film Festival.
Lucy Pardee is a British casting director, who is an exponent of street casting. Pardee used this to great effect in her work on Rocks, for which she was awarded a BAFTA for Casting Direction in 2021. She was the second person to receive the accolade since its introduction in 2019, when it was awarded to Shayna Markowitz. Pardee was nominated for second BAFTA award in 2022 for her work on the film Aftersun. She has spoken out about how the Academy Awards should also introduce an award for casting direction.
