london film festival

Review: Phyllida Lloyd Just Can’t Help HERSELF

Phyllida Lloyd’s Herself is a film which doesn’t quite know what it wants to be. On one hand it would like to be a gritty Ken Loach-style drama about surviving domestic abuse and on the other it wants to be an uplifting quasi-comedy littered [...]

September 6, 2021

2020 BFI London Film Festival Winners

Movies In Focus had a great time covering the 2020 BFI London Film Festival. I didn’t quite get to see as many titles as I would have liked, but the festival featured a wonderful selection of films. This year, the Festival Awards were chosen [...]

October 19, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: AMMONITE

Despite dedicated performances from Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan, Francis Lee’s Ammonite is as bleak and dour as the film’s wintry Lyme Regis setting.  Named after a coiled shell fossil, Ammonite centres on the 19th Century romance [...]

October 19, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: POSSESSOR

Written and directed by Brandon Cronenberg, Possessor is a tricksy and complex thriller which takes a potentially commercial concept and gives it an arthouse spin. At times it’s a little too convoluted for its own good, but this sci-fi [...]

October 18, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI

A powerhouse performance piece, Regina King’s One Night In Miami is a near flawless adaptation of Kemp Powers’ (fictional) play which sees Malcolm X, Cassius Clay, Jim Brown and Sam Cooke gathered together in a Miami hotel room to celebrate [...]

October 14, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: SUPERNOVA

Supenova is a rich character drama with a pair of wonderfully emotive performances from Colin Firth and Stanley Tucci. The pair really impress in this exceptionally well-honed drama from writer-director Harry Maqueen (Hinterland). The plot of [...]

October 13, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: SIBERIA

There’s a fine line between great art and pretension and Abel Ferrara’s Sibera walks it, often stumbling between the two like a snow-blind traveller navigating an unknown terrain. As you would expect from Ferrara, Siberia is a bold and [...]

October 11, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: RELIC

On the surface, Natalie Erika James’ Relic is a horror film – and for all intents and purposes it is. But there’s much more to unpack in this richly layered piece of genre cinema. Horror films always work best when they’re using the [...]

October 10, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: HERSELF

Phyllida Lloyd’s Herself is a film which doesn’t quite know what it wants to be. On one hand it would like to be a gritty Ken Loach-style drama about surviving domestic abuse and on the other it wants to be an uplifting quasi-comedy littered [...]

October 9, 2020

2020 BFI London Film Festival Review: MANGROVE

Director Steve McQueen delivers another piece of powerhouse cinema with Mangrove, the first of five works from his Small Axe film collection. Chosen to open the 2020 BFI London Film Festival, Mangrove is front and centre at the festival, something [...]

October 8, 2020

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