Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg

6.38pm: In a year when they gave us Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason and Shaun Of The Dead, to continue their wonderful habit of making British films that – shock! Horror! – entertain people and make money, Working Title rightly received an award for Outstanding Contribution To British Cinema. Head honchos Eric Fellner and Tim Bevan turned up to accept the award. "'Why?' is the question," laughed Fellner. "Because we keep taking risks, but you try to marry the risks with a sure thing, so you keep making a romantic comedy or a Rowan Atkinson movie or something like that but at the same time try and make something that you can take risks on. And the idea is that in each given year, hopefully something will work. And sometimes it's not the one you expect."

6.42pm: Bit of an upset, this. In the Best Scene category, British underdog Enduring Love knocked out the heavyweight likes of Kill Bill vol. 2, Spider-Man 2, and The Bourne Supremacy and that bit in Alexander where there was a lot of talking (kidding!) to win for the astonishing balloon sequence, which opened Roger Michell's film. But it was thoroughly deserved, nonetheless, and bully for British films once more! "We're in the business of trying to make films in this country and that's fucking hard to do," said Michell. "We really are trying to do it and we're going to keep trying to do it and we hope that other people will be encouraged by the fact that we can make those films. And magazines like yours recognise that effort." Aww, gawd bless yer, guv, we're close to tears here!

6.48pm: Up next was international bright young thing, Julie Delpy, who – despite her earlier comments on the red carpet – was delighted to win Best Actress for Before Sunset, beating off new Oscar winner Cate Blanchett (not literally, mind). For it was her first ever award. Ever. Previously, she'd had no luck at all – she once came second in a game of solitaire. "Very first time in my entire life, a 20-year career. It's great, it's great, it's so wonderful," she said. " I've always been the actress that people thought I didn't need an award in my life to continue working. Which is true. But it's nice to win something, especially from readers and people, so it means something."

Matt Damon

6.53pm: Mr. Matt Damon – 'Mattttt Daaaaamonnnnn' – who came in the back entrance (oo-er) to avoid the paparazzi throng (or is that thong? We're not sure; we're very tired), picked up his first award of the night, Best Actor for The Bourne Supremacy. Strangely enough, just like Mme. Delpy, it was his first ever acting award. Mind you, the Empire trophy will look lovely on the shelf next to his Best Original Screenplay Oscar. He couldn't stop to chat just now, though, as he had to be back in the room to see if The Bourne Supremacy would win Best Film. There was no tension for us, though – we'd seen the winners' list. It would.

6.57pm: Pixar bag a much-deserved Inspiration Award for being so damned bloody brilliant at everything. And so they hit us with a double whammy – a humorous video in which John Lasseter and his amazing technicolour dream shirt discovers secret passages and murky goings-on in Pixar HQ, and – in person himself – Brad Bird, to pick up the award. "I think it's more meaningful because it comes from people who love movies," he said. "The fact that they are considering a whole body of work and not just a film is also very touching and wonderful, so I'm happy to bring this home to Pixar."

7.03pm: Sam Raimi – the Nicest Man In Hollywood™ - wins Best Director for Spider-Man 2 (and much deserved it is, too, toady toady lick lick). Sadly, he can't be here tonight, but he sends along a very funny acceptance video in which he gets his award from Spidey himself (or a statue of; same diff), before dropping it, the accident-prone berk. "It's something I intended to treasure always," he deadpans. Incidentally, the skit was directed by none other than our very own West Coast Editor, Simon Braund, who emulated his hero Stanley Kubrick, by demanding 14 takes from Raimi, but who chose not to emulate Kubrick by being in no way dead.

7.09pm: Down to serious business: And the award for Best Film goes to… The Bourne Supremacy! Excellent! Matt Damon – 'Maaaaaat Daaaaamonnnnn' – and Paul Greengrass – 'Paaaaaaaulll Grrreeeeeeengrraaaaaaassssss' – were on hand to pick up the award. Damon spoke to Empire about the honour before breaking off to salute his good buddy, Kevin Smith, who was in the room having just won the Independent Spirit award. "We gotta listen to him," he says, and so we do. And we laugh. And then he praises the awards for being so goddamn cool. " It's a lot of fun, Johnny Vaughan's great and everybody's really loose," he said. "We were sitting next to Quentin Tarantino at the end of the Best Film category and Quentin turned to Paul and said 'that's the coolest fucking list of films in the Best Film category I've ever seen!'" Fuckin' A! Well said, Matty!

Kevin Smith

7.14pm: Empire attempts to speak to Kevin Smith after his press conference ends. Being a bit noisy in the press room, we head out into the corridor for some peace and qui… oh no! What's this! A phalanx of paparazzi descend upon us as, simultaneously, Quentin Tarantino and host Johnny Vaughan arrive in the corridor and pose for pictures with Kevin and his good chum Matty Damon, amidst scenes of bedlam that make the siege of Troy look like an enormous siege with thousands of men and boats and weapons. Strangely, Empire is shunted to the side and does not appear in the morning papers. Paparazzi scum, you will pay! Pay in blood! Or, preferably, cash. But we also take Switch.

7.17pm: At last, peace and quiet, and we can talk to Wor Kevin. Snoogans. After, bizarrely, offering to enlist Michael Madsen and Matt Damon to beat the shit out of an errant journalist ("If you guys can pull that off, that would be the award. Never mind this, that would be the award!"), Smith talks about his pride and joy at receiving the award. "This will go right next to my Indie Spirit award, in my office," he said. "Behind my desk, I've got a bunch of shelves with books and pornography and one of the shelves is the awards, the tin I've collected. So this goes right up there."

7.21pm: QT – the last award winner of the night – holds court at the press conference and talks. And talks. And talks… for a good fifteen minutes. We'll bring you the highlights later on. But it's all good stuff. Then he bounds off the stage and heads past Empire in search of food, and the toilet. Can't blame him, really.

7.23pm: The winners' photo – see the next issue of Empire for it in all its glory – is taken, featuring Pegg, QT, Smith, Ashfield, Wright, Considine, Bird, Delpy, Highmore, Fellner, Bevan, Damon, Frost, Park, Greengrass, Michell, Loder, Schiffer (Matthew Vaughn at this point had not yet arrived) and some people we've probably forgotten. 'Who's got an award?' yelled the photographer. 'USSSSSS!' came back the unanimous reply, proving that – no matter how famous or intelligent the subject, when in a group photo, the urge to yell strange words in unison, like 'cheese!' or 'hornswaggler!' is irresistible.

Quentin Tarantino

7.25-7.45pm: Food is served. Empire, despite it being our party, is reduced to eating in the room where the food is being prepared by the caterers, and not in the main hall with the celebs. Bah humbug. However, this paves the way for the inarguable highlight of the evening when, halfway through a lovely salmon/rice combo, we look up to see Alan Rickman himself walk in and grab some food. Readers, let Empire confirm that there is nothing on this planet more fun than quoting Die Hard lines to Alan Rickman. Mind you, we were quoting them under our breath and only after we were fairly certain he couldn't hear. Still… 'you ask for miracles, Theo, I give you the F… B… I….', 'Shoot! The! Glass!' and our favourite 'Yippee-kay-yay, motherfucker!' all got good airings.

7.45pm-11pm – mingling with the stars. So we spoke to the likes of Quentin Tarantino – "Any award ceremony where you can go and you can cuss and let it out all hang out, is always fun" – Watchmen producer, Lloyd Levin, and a very happy Paul Greengrass who, inbetween calling James Bond "an imperialist right-wing fuckface who worships at the altar of technology" and calling for him to retire, also showered Empire with praise, which we're more than happy to accept. "Listen, it's the best awards ceremony by far, because it's full of movie people," he said. "And everybody's very relaxed and it's a laugh, and it's not too long. I know everybody said it who got every single award, but it's true – if you get voted for by real cinemagoers and readers of the magazine, it's great because you're actually connecting with the readers of the magazine and the people who go to see the films." Paul, we loves you, we does! You're our beshtesht mate!

You want more sleb spots? OK… try the cast of BBC TV's classy conmen drama Hustle, including Adrian Lester, Marc Warren and the BEAUTIFUL (underline, bold, italicise) Jaime Murray. Or Jason Isaacs, being as gregarious and downright nice as always. Then there's the dashing Damian Lewis, or Ashley Walters – formerly of the So Solid Crew parish. Colin Salmon came over to us with his lovely lady wife, and chatted to us for a good ten minutes without realising, apparently, that we were journalist scum and therefore totally unimportant. But fair play to you, Col! And then there was just time to squeeze in a long and very funny chat with Paddy Considine, before we hit the dance floor.

And, as we left the Guildhall at 11pm to come back to the office and write this up for you, guess who was still throwing some shapes on the dancefloor? Why, 'twas Emma Watson, aka Her Out Of That Harry Potter! With school in the morning? Tsk! What would Dumbledore say??

He'd probably say 'can I come next year?' Because, make no mistake, the Sony Ericsson Empire Awards are the funniest, finest, biggest and best awards on this, or any side, of the Pond. Roll on 2006!