The Revenant proved as tough to beat as its hero at this year's EE British Academy Film Awards, taking home five prizes including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor for star Leonardo DiCaprio.
The film also won prizes for its sound, and for cinematographer Emmanuel 'Chivo' Lubezki, who has now won that prize three years in a row.
Mad Max: Fury Road, however, chased The Revenant through the wilderness, taking home four prizes for its good looks: costume design, editing, make-up & hair and production design.
Stephen Fry presented the bash at the Royal Opera House in London, where no other film won more than one award. Brie Larson won Best Actress for her extraordinary work in Room, while Kate Winslet took Best Supporting Actress for Steve Jobs.
Mark Rylance was Best Supporting Actor for Bridge Of Spies, and the Outstanding British Film prize went to Brooklyn. The Big Short and Spotlight took the Screenplay prizes (adapted and original respectively), while Amy won Best Documentary.
BAFTAs 2016 winners: Find out who triumphed at the annual film awards ceremony
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It was a relatively quick ceremony, since several winners could not attend. Larson is currently filming Kong: Skull Island in Australia, while Rylance is on stage on Broadway in a play called Nice Fish. Their directors, Lenny Abrahamson and Steven Spielberg respectively, collected those prizes with a brief message.
Best Animated Film, in perhaps the least surprising win of the night (even less surprising than DiCaprio), went to Inside Out and the Rising Star went to firm favourite John Boyega.
There were small flashes of the sort of politics that has run through awards season this year. Protesters outside called for quotas for minority nominees, while Sacha Baron Cohen, presenting Best Actress, quipped: "And the nominations for Best White Actress are..."
But for the most part, the Valentine's Day setting meant there was a lot of love in the room. Iñárritu paid tribute to his wife, since it's their 24th wedding anniversary tomorrow, while DiCaprio thanked his mother in an emotional speech, and wished her a happy birthday for today! Sir Sidney Poitier, accepting the Fellowship award from his home because of ill health, said that his "cup runeth over" to celebrate "this beautiful art form".
The obituaries offered an emotional moment of reflection, remembering the contributions of Alan Rickman, Melissa Mathison, Andrew Lesnie, Maureen O'Hara, Omar Sharif, Gayle Griffiths, Haskell Wexler, Colin Welland, James Horner, David Bowie, Ron Moody, June Randall, Julie Harris, Frank Finlay, Philip French, Vilmos Zsigmond, Albert Maysles, Richard Johnson, Wes Craven, Jacques Rivette, Penelope Houston, Tammie Manderson, Christopher Wood, Saeed Jaffrey, Sheila Sim Lady Attenborough and Sir Christoper Lee .
The evening was a fitting celebration of this year's films. Now it's just two weeks until the climax of awards season with the Oscars on February 28. Join us back here for that coverage soon!
