This is the point where the industry weighs in on the conversation that has been limited mainly to critics so far. Unsurprisingly, Carol and The Revenant feature heavily in the BAFTA race. But unlike the awards season to date, genre films like Mad Max: Fury Road and The Martian were virtually locked out of the major categories. (The Martian managed nods for actor Matt Damon and director Ridley Scott.)

Matt Damon in The Martian

Also unexpected for Bafta was the absence of local favourites like Tom Hardy, Charlotte Rampling and Carey Mulligan, and not even one craft nomination for Spectre. Bafta voters also failed to nominate two other current favourites: Creed and Joy.

By contrast, last weekend's People's Choice awards took an obviously more populist approach, as the voting public awarded Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum as Favourite Actress and Actor. And Vin Diesel fought back tears while accepting the Favourite Movie award for Furious 7 and his late friend Paul Walker.

More: Read our review of The Martian here

This weekend sees the Golden Globes, a tangential but closely watched awards ceremony voted on by 90 journalists in a seeming attempt to predict the Oscars. But they have double the nominees to work with, dividing films into drama and comedy/musical categories.

This means that the two favourites, Spotlight and The Big Short, can both win Best Picture awards, in drama and comedy respectively. Or if the voters feel like awarding action over dialogue, they may opt for Mad Max: Fury Road and The Martian (inexplicably in the comedy category). Meanwhile, the most likely winners of the acting awards are Saoirse Ronan, Matt Damon and Sylvester Stallone, plus hopefully another drunken acceptance speech from Jennifer Lawrence or her new best buddy Amy Schumer, both up for Best Actress in a Comedy.

And then there's the big one: Oscar announces its nominees early next Thursday morning in Los Angeles (lunchtime in London). And at this point no one seems to know whether the Academy Awards will tilt towards smart action epics or true speech-based dramas.