IFFR 2022: Return of the Tiger (14–16/10/22)

International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) has announced the full programme for its return to cinemas from October 14 to 16. Cinerama Filmtheater and LantarenVenster will host screenings of films selected for the festival's three competitions, which were previously only made available to press and industry online from 26 January to 6 February. Filmmakers and special guests will be in attendance to introduce their work and take part in Q&A sessions at the event. Ticket sales begin on 28 September for Tiger Members and 29 September for the general public. 

 

Festival director Vanja Kaludjercic: "We’re extending a warm welcome to our 2022 edition competition filmmakers to join us in Rotterdam, where they’ll introduce their remarkable work to audiences and press alike. Reuniting with attending filmmakers, including names like Mabrouk El Mechri, Morgane Dziurla-Petit and Yamasaki Juichiro, will be a very special moment, and we hope you can join us for this festive weekend."

Tiger Competition

IFFR’s flagship Tiger Competition is the festival’s platform for emerging film talent. 13 titles will screen over the weekend from the 2022 selection, including EAMI by Paraguayan filmmaker Paz Encina which received the Tiger Award in February. Special Jury Award winner Excess Will Save Us also screens, with its maker Morgane Dziurla-Petit in attendance, alongside a number of others including Indian director of The Cloud Messenger, Rahat Mahajan, and Australian director of The Plains, David Easteal. 

Big Screen Competition 

The Big Screen Competition offers a wide-ranging selection, bridging the gap between popular, classic and arthouse cinema. Eight titles from the IFFR 2022 selection will screen. An audience jury granted the VPRO Big Screen Award to Kung Fu Zohra by Mabrouk El Mechri, who will be present in Rotterdam. Romanian director Anca Damian of The Island, and Polish-Dutch director Urszula Antoniak of Splendid Isolation, are also amongst the attending filmmakers from the Big Screen Competition selection.

 

Ammodo Tiger Short Competition

14 short films will screen from the 2022 Ammodo Tiger Short Competition. Taiwanese artist Hsu Che-yu will present The Making of Crime Scenes, with other attending filmmakers including the Colombian Juanita Onzaga of Tomorrow Is a Water Palace and the Portuguese Leonor Noivo of Dawn.

Source/image: IFFR

London Film Festival 2022 Preview: Glass Onion

The 66th BFI London Film Festival has announced that this year’s Closing Night Gala will be filmmaker Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, starring Daniel Craig, Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr., Jessica Henwick and Madelyn Cline with Kate Hudson and Dave Bautista. The film will receive its European Premiere on Sunday 16 October at the Southbank Centre in the Royal Festival Hall, ahead of its release into UK cinemas and subsequent launch on Netflix. Rian Johnson, Daniel Craig, Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Leslie Odom Jr., Kate Hudson and Madelyn Cline will be in attendance with other names soon to be confirmed. There will also be simultaneous preview screenings of the film taking place at additional cinemas across the UK. 

In the follow-up to Rian Johnson's 2018 Knives Out, Daniel Craig reprises the role of master sleuth, Detective Benoit Blanc, travelling to Greece to peel back the layers of a mystery involving a new cast of colourful suspects. Both films were produced by Johnson and Ram Bergman, who will also be in attendance, under their T-Street banner, and the previous film earned Johnson an Academy Award nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay. Writer/Director/Producer of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, Rian Johnson, said: “I’m thrilled to be back at LFF with Glass Onion, and it’s an honour to be closing the festival. A proper whodunnit really does belong in London, so it feels a bit like coming home!” 

Tricia Tuttle, BFI London Film Festival Director, said: “Rian Johnson’s Knives Out was a major hit when we hosted the European Premiere at the Festival in 2019. Our audiences adored the film’s wit and that it tipped its very stylish hat to the wonderful tradition of British onscreen sleuths. And here, Rian Johnson strikes gold again with the help of the year’s hottest ensemble cast. Like its predecessor, Glass Onion is entertaining and culturally literate in equal measure, making some hilarious, razor sharp observations about the world we live in. The European Premiere of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery will bring the house down as the Closing Gala of the 66th BFI London Film Festival!” 

The BFI London Film Festival hosted the European Premiere of Knives Out at the Festival in 2019 as the American Express Gala with Rian Johnson and his cast on the red carpet in London’s Leicester Square to the delight of UK audiences. The 66th BFI London Film Festival in partnership with American Express takes place from Wednesday 5 October – Sunday 16 October, 2022. The BFI LFF Programme Launch took place on Thursday 1 September, 2022.

Source: BFI

Images: Gareth Cattermole / Getty Images for BFI

End of Cinema

London Film Festival 2022: Programme Launch

The 66th BFI London Film Festival (LFF) in partnership with American Express on Thursday announced the full programme line-up, which will be presented in cinemas and online, across the UK. Over twelve days from 5–16 October, the LFF will return to its fantastic flagship venues in the heart of London – BFI Southbank and the Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall, which between them host Galas, Special Presentations and the Official Competition. Films and series from all strands of the Festival screen in many of central London’s iconic cinemas with a curated selection of features showcased at 10 partner venues across the UK. The full programme features films, series and immersive art works from over 63 countries with 41% of the programme made by female and non-binary directors/creators or co-directors/creators and 34% made by ethnically diverse directors/creators. 

Every feature and series screens to audiences in the UK for the very first time, with many shown publicly to for the first time ever anywhere in the world. Premieres include 23 feature film and 3 series World Premieres, 6 feature film International Premieres and 15 feature film and 2 series European Premieres. As previously announced the LFF Expanded programme of Immersive Art features 6 World Premieres. World Premieres from filmmakers and artists include: GUILLERMO DEL TORO’S PINOCCHIO; a new series from television auteur Hugo Blick, THE ENGLISH, starring Emily Blunt and a brand new commission AR from acclaimed filmmaker Guy Maddin, HAUNTED HOTEL: A MELODRAMA IN AUGMENTED REALITY. International Premieres include SHE SAID, starring Carey Mulligan and Zoe Kazan and based on the booked from New York Times journalists Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, and award-winning documentary filmmaker Ondi Timoner’s LAST FLIGHT HOME. 

 Major European Premieres include: EMPIRE OF LIGHT from Sam Mendes; GLASS ONION: A KNIVES OUT MYSTERY from Rian Johnson; MY POLICEMAN, directed by Michael Grandage and starring Emma Corrin, Harry Styles and Rupert Everett; Chinonye Chukwu’s TILL, starring Danielle Deadwyler and Whoopi Goldberg; ALLELUJAH, directed by Richard Eyre adapted from Alan Bennett’s play, with stars including Judi Dench and Jennifer Saunders; Frank Berry’s AISHA starring Letitia Wright and Josh O’Connor, and LADY CHATTERLEY’S LOVER, directed by Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre and also starring Emma Corrin alongside Jack O’Connell. LFF will host the European Premieres of several major new filmmaking voices: Sundance award-winner Nikyatu Jusu with NANNY; acclaimed theatre director Lila Neugebauer’s CAUSEWAY starring Jennifer Lawrence and Brian Tyree Henry and photographer and documentarian Elegance Bratton’s THE INSPECTION.

 

Audiences will enjoy a rich programme of fiction, documentary, animation, artists’ moving image, short film, newly restored classics from the world’s archives, and exciting international works made in immersive and episodic forms. LFF for Free will return to BFI Southbank with a programme of in-person events and screenings as well as a programme of free short films and events that will be available across the UK virtually. The Festival will also be accessible UK-wide via a specially curated programme of feature and short films on BFI Player, which viewers will be able to enjoy for a full week after the Festival (from 14–23 October). 

Source/image: BFI