Last week we were given a chance to see what the 54th BFI London Film Festival has in store, and kicking aside the disparaging comments about the lack of world premieres, a complaint which misses the point completely, there’s a real sense of excitement and discovery about the festival this year.
Mark Romanek’s Never Let Me Go will open the festival and there are other high profile films on offer in the capital this October. Of chief interest are Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan and Tom Hooper’s The King’s Speech with Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush. Whether it is a deliberate choice to wait for an English Language version, or for the curiousity value alone there will be a keen audience for Let Me In, Matt Reeves’ take on Let The Right One In, which is playing in the festival and hopefully surpassing expectations.
Mike Leigh returns to the festival with his latest, Another Year, which did well at Cannes and from the clip we were shown is looking like typical Leigh, which is a very good thing. Hilary Swank and Sam Rockwell will be seen in Conviction and Julianne Moore, Annette Bening and Mark Ruffalo looked good in the clip we were shown for The Kids Are All Right.
Casting the net wider Justin Chadwick’s The First Grader and Debs Gardner-Paterson’s Africa United both look intriguing, along with Benedek Fliegauf’s Womb, with Matt Smith and Eva Green. The clips we saw for Ken Loach’s Route Irish and Richard Ayoade’s Submarine were well chosen and Joanna Hogg’s Archipelago will certainly be on my list to see when it comes to the festival.
These are just a few of the films which caught my eye, and when you see the full line up there will undoubtedly be many more you will want to check out. It’s worth looking at the events the BFI are putting on, with Darren Aronofsky’s talking over his career to date, as will Mark Romanek – both events too good to miss. There are short films, animation, archive screenings including Louise Brooks in a new restoration of G W Pabst’s Pandora’s Box, and there’s a celebration of British cinema with Breaking with Convention, an event taking a look at the contemporary narrative and documentary forms.
To steal a PR line, there is something for everyone this year, and the films on offer this year should make for an eclectic and inspiring festival, with surprises and some unmissable events. The restoration of Herbert Ponting’s The Great White Silence is the festival’s Archive Gala screening, and the print will be shown with a new score, played live by Simon Fisher Turner. What we saw in the collection of clips looked breathtaking, and this is easily a highlight of the festival for me. I’m sure tickets will be snapped up so if you’re interested, for this or any other film, please do click here and get booking as soon as possible.
Introducing the line up Artistic Director Sandra Hebron and the Director of the British Film Institute Amanda Nevill made much of the diversity at the festival, and championed the British talent on display here, both of which were in full force when the roster of films was announced. While much of the news surrounding British film has been of abolishment and cutbacks, both Nevill and Hebron were keen for the London Film Festival to be a celebration, to bring some amazing films to London.
Here’s the video, which came from the BFI’s London Film Festival Facebook page, and shows off a few of the films on offer. It’s going to be a very good October in London.
