What To Watch at the 60th BFI London Film Festival
Boar Film Writer Eddie Charles attended the programme launch of the 60th BFI London Film Festival as student press and gives us some exclusive on what films to watch out for:
With seventy-four countries being represented across three-hundred-and-eighty features and shorts; this year’s London Film Festival looks set to be a diverse and exciting event.
This was my first press launch and attending this enormously formal event as a student was beyond exhilarating. However, there was no time for nerves with excitement soon prevailing! Free chocolate, croissants and other freebies aside, the launch was a treasure trove for any film lover.
2016 marks the sixtieth year of the festival, and this year’s schedule boasts some impressive cinematic treats. As there are hundreds of features and shorts being screened, it’s impossible to mention and discuss all of them. Check out the festival website for the complete schedule. However, here are some personal highlights.
Rosamund Pike and David Oyelowo in A UNITED KINGDOM/ Pathe UK
Prior to the launch, the opening and closing films had already been announced. British director Amma Asante will kick off the twelve-day festival with her new drama A United Kingdom. The film stars David Oyelowo (Selma) and Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl) and documents the powerful true love story between Botswanan royalty and a London office worker. Asante is the first black female director to open the festival and this is her third film, coming after her 2013 critical success, Belle.
Another British director will close proceedings; with Ben Wheatley, director of last year’s JG Ballard adaptation High-Rise, closing the festival on October 16th with the European premiere of Free Fire. The drama stars Brie Larson, Cillian Murphy, and Armie Hammer, and sees two Irishmen attempting to buy a stash of guns from two sleazy gangsters. I was lucky enough to see an exclusive trailer for the film, and it looks set to be a high-adrenaline, arse-kicking, gun-shooting, comic thrill ride. The film will undoubtedly close the festival in an explosive style.
Both directors attended the launch, with Asante giving a motivational, inspiring talk on her sense of pride in opening a festival in her home town with a film that brings together two very personal aspects of her life. Wheatley opted for a more amusing speech, discussing his trepidation at closing the festival, while emphasising his excitement at being asked to close proceedings.
Another film announced for the festival, and a personal highlight of mine, is Damien Chazelle’s La La Land. The director follows up the terrific Whiplash with a musical set in contemporary LA.
Paying homage to the MGM musicals from Hollywood’s golden age and films such as Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, the film reunites Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling, and has received unanimous praise since its debut. The film continues its journey around the festival circuit after Venice, Telluride, and Toronto, by showing in London on October 7th, 8th, and 16th. Seeing this trailer on the big screen was a delight and is a real catch for the festival.
The festival will also screen Nate Parker’s period drama The Birth of a Nation; a film following Nat Turner, a slave who led a rebellion in Virginia in the nineteenth-century.
Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Shannon star as Tony Hastings and Bobby Andes in romantic thriller NOCTURNAL ANIMALS/Universal Pictures International
Other highlights include Arrival, the new science-fiction film by Canadian director Denis Villeneuve (Sicario, Prisoners). Starring Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner, Arrival follows a team of people set up by the US government to investigate several mysterious spacecrafts which have appeared all around the globe.
Adams also heads up another film at the festival; Nocturnal Animals, the second film by US fashion designer-cum-director Tom Ford. Based on Austin Wright’s novel Tony and Susan, Adams is an art collector whose ex-husband (Jake Gyllenhaal) writes a novel which she takes as a threat and believes is a form of revenge. After his stunningly stylish, 2009 film debut A Single Man, as well as being described as a “fusing colour-saturated melodrama with overheated neo-noir”; Tom Ford’s latest marks an exciting addition to the festival.
These are just a select few of the hundreds of films being screened at the festival throughout its duration, and I urge everyone to check out the full schedule online. Tickets will go on sale to the public on September 15th for what looks set to be a truly fantastic event celebrating the medium of film.
Buy tickets to the BFI London Film Festival here
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