London Film Festival Unveils Works-in-Progress Showcase

The strengths and possibilities of cinematic language were heavy on Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s mind as he sat down for a keynote ‘screen talk’ at the London Film Festival on Sunday afternoon.

A beloved children’s novel is turned into a charming animation in My Father’s Dragon, which is world premiering at the BFI London Film Festival. Oscar-nominated director Nora Twomey (The Breadwinner) helms a story of childhood friendship based on the 1948 novel by Ruth Stiles Gannett, with animation from Cartoon Saloon (The Secret of Kells, Song of the Sea, Wolfwalkers) and a screenplay by Meg LeFauve (Inside Out). It’s a sweet adventure with appeal for young kids and a starry voice cast including Jacob Tremblay as hero Elmer, and – in one of the film’s more amusing moments – Whoopi Goldberg as a cat. 

Jennifer Lawrence wears a sheer dress covered in pearls for the 2022 BFI London Film Festival premiere of her new movie Causeway.

“Franchises are so fun,” said Jennifer Lawrence today at the BFI London Film Festival. The 32-year-old X-Men and Hunger Games alum then drew a big laugh, interjecting, “I could never do one now cause I’m just too old and brittle.” 

The Highlands of Scotland are the perfect backdrop for Andrew Cumming’s prehistoric genre piece The Origin, a survivalist horror that also works as a thoughtful human drama as its core cast of six fight for their lives against a violent, unseen creature. The Origin had its world premiere at the BFI London Film Festival.

K.J. Yossman “White Noise” director Noah Baumbach spoke about his career highlights – and low points – as well as his creative partnership with Greta Gerwig during the BFI London Film Festival on Friday afternoon (Oct. 7). Asked about the eight-year gap between making “Mr. Jealousy” and “The Squid and the Whale,” Baumbach quipped: “I thought, you know what? I really needed about eight years off.” “No, it wasn’t by design, it was by accident,” he quickly clarified. “I sort of had two careers in a way. I had this early career very quickly and I was really figuring it all out as I was doing it. I had never really been on a movie set before I made ‘Kicking and Screaming.’ But I had this sense of how a movie should be and what I wanted a movie to be. And then after ‘Mr. Jealousy’ [the way] I experienced it at the time is that I was having trouble getting things made. I think, also, I didn’t really know what I wanted to make. And I think maybe, in some ways, my ambitions sort of exceeded my ability.”

Manori Ravindran International Editor Musicals aren’t for everyone, but “Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical” seemed to be right on tune for the BFI London Film Festival. The Netflix movie adaptation of the stage musical, which debuted in the West End in 2012, opened the 66th edition of the festival on Wednesday night, where despite starting 45 minutes late, it found an appreciative audience in the Royal Festival Hall crowd, which included a number of revolting children. The Netflix and TriStar Pictures pic stars Emma Thompson as psychotic headmistress Miss Trunchbull, Lashana Lynch as Miss Honey, Stephen Graham and Andrea Riseborough as Matilda’s parents and Sindhu Vee as confidante Mrs. Phelps.

There are stories so good they can withstand any amount of retelling. Matilda began life as Roald Dahl’s rollicking tale of an outrageously spirited, clever little girl who defeats the bullying headmistress whose vocation is to make children miserable. The Royal Shakespeare Company turned it into a Christmas musical that burst the banks of the festive season, running for years and winning seven Olivier Awards in 2012 in London, then five Tonys the following year in New York. Now, director Matthew Warchus, along with writer Dennis Kelly and songwriter Tim Minchin, has directed the London Film Festival opener Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical for the screen. And once again, it is an absolute blast.

Emma Thompson, Stephen Graham, and Lashana Lynch passed through the London Film Festival on Wednesday, where they discussed their new film Matilda The Musical, directed by Matthew Warchus.

Manori Ravindran International Editor The London Film Festival has revealed its jury line-up for this year’s awards. The Official Competition jury is led by “Power of the Dog” and “Cold War” producer Tanya Seghatchian (pictured), while the First Feature Competition (Sutherland Award) jury will be headed up by director and actor Nana Mensah whose directorial debut “Queen of Glory” won the Best New Narrative Director prize at the 2021 Tribeca Film Festival. Elsewhere, Italian filmmaker Roberto Minervini will lead the jury selecting the winner of the Grierson Award for Best Documentary after winning the award in 2018 for his film “What You Gonna Do When the World’s On Fire.”

‘Power Of The Dog’ Producer Tanya Seghatchian To Lead London Film Festival Jury

Manori Ravindran International Editor BFI festivals director Tricia Tuttle is stepping down from the role after 10 years. This month’s edition of the London Film Festival will be her last in the post. Tuttle has, for the last five years, led as director the BFI London Film Festival as well as BFI Flare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival. She was previously deputy head of festivals from 2013 to 2017. She will remain in the role through to early 2023, while the BFI recruits for a new festivals leader. Tuttle leaves the festival during what’s shaping up to be one of its strongest editions yet: the festival has more world premieres than ever this year, with headline films including Matthew Warchus’ “Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical,” Guillermo del Toro’s “Pinocchio” and Asif Kapadia’s “Creature.”

Tricia Tuttle will step down as BFI Festivals Director following this year’s London Film Festival, the BFI announced today. She will remain in post through to early 2023 while the BFI recruits a replacement. 

Guy Lodge Film Critic A total of 164 feature films will play at this year’s London Film Festival, alongside an abundance of shorts, TV series and an expanded program of XR (extended reality) works — and that’s in a comparatively slimmed-down era of curation for a public-facing festival that has long aimed to bring the best of the global festival circuit to non-traveling cinephiles. What has definitely grown is the LFF’s national reach: In what fest director Tricia Tuttle terms the festival’s “new normal” format after a few years of structural shifts and COVID-era adjustments, the capital-centered event will also be hosting screenings in 10 other cities around the U.K., from Manchester to Edinburgh to Belfast — sealing its status as the country’s preeminent film festival. A digital program of up to 20 titles will also be made available for online viewing, while short films and screen talks will be free to stream on the BFI Player platform: “It’s really important to us to get to those places we can’t reach with our venue partnerships,” says Tuttle, adding that their priority is “to give new audiences a taste of what the festival is like.”

It looks like Lily James and Matt Smith are friendly exes!

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor In contemporary British drama “Pretty Red Dress,” which has its world premiere on Oct. 9 at the BFI London Film Festival, Dionne Edwards delivers a portrait of London life that embraces both its “grit and glamour.” It was a look and feel that was inspired by “Saturday Night Fever,” says the writer-director. The film kicks off with Travis, a tough, black guy from South London with a gangland past, being released from prison, to be met by his partner Candice. We learn that their daughter, Kenisha, is in trouble at school for fighting, and that Candice, who works in a grocery store, has a thwarted ambition: she wants to be a professional singer. We discover too that both Travis and Kenisha have aspects of their personalities that they keep hidden.

Naman Ramachandran Neil Maskell, whose acting credits include “Kill List” and “Peaky Blinders,” makes his feature directorial debut with “Klokkenluider,” which is playing at the BFI London Film Festival. A dark comic thriller, the film revolves around a hapless government whistleblower and his partner who hide out in a remote Belgian cottage, accompanied by two eccentric bodyguards. “‘Klokkenluider’ came out of a combination of circumstances. I was on holiday in East Flanders and the atmosphere of the house we were staying in set off some voices in my head. There were four characters and they were trapped there but it took me a while to work out who they were” Maskell told Variety.

K.J. Yossman Jennifer Lawrence will participate in the BFI’s series of Screen Talks at the London Film Festival next month.

The BFI London Film Festival has unveiled its full industry lineup, which will include keynote conversations with the Italian producer and CEO of Apartment Pictures Lorenzo Mieli and Fionnuala Jamison of MK2 Films.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Iranian action drama “World War III,” which won two awards at the recent Venice festival, will feature among the main competition titles at next month’s Tokyo International Film Festival. The festival will operate as an in-person event with foreign filmmakers, media and other guests in attendance from Oct. 24-Nov. 2, 2022. “World War III” is joined in the competition section by the world premiere of Milcho Manchevski’s “Kaymak,” Spanish director Carlos Vermut’s “Manticore” and Roberta Torre’s “The Fabulous Ones,” Michale Boganim’s “Tel Aviv Beirut,” and Youssef Chebbi’s debut film “Ashkal.”