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3 weeks ago 30th Oct 10:52
Last night The Times BFI 53rd London Film Festival rounded off another highly successful year with the world premiere of Sam Taylor-Wood’s Nowhere Boy. This year’s Festival hosted 193 feature films and 113 short films from 46 countries including 15 world premieres. There were 515 screenings and 553 filmmakers, with 277 of the filmmakers from outside the UK.
With 874 industry delegates accredited, the Festival exceeded last year’s figures and reports the highest ever audience attendance in excess of 124,000 filmgoers, compared to 115,000 in 2008.
High-profile international filmmakers and actors attended their film’s screenings over the 16 days. Opening the festivities was the world premiere screening of Fantastic Mr. Fox with director Wes Anderson in attendance alongside actors Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman and George Clooney, with Clooney also attending the UK premiere of The Men Who Stare At Goats with director Grant Heslov.
Julianne Moore and Amanda Seyfried graced the red carpet with director Atom Egoyan for Chloe and Viggo Mortensen and director John Hillcoat introduced The Road. In addition, Carey Mulligan, Dominic Cooper and Emma Thompson joined director Lone Scherfig for An Education and Scott Hicks and Clive Owen introduced The Boys Are Back.
Other Festival guests included Jane Campion who was joined by Ben Whishaw and Kerry Fox for Bright Star and director Jason Reitman attended the premiere of Up In The Air with actresses Vera Farmiga and Anna Kendrick.
A Serious Man was introduced by Joel and Ethan Coen and actor Michael Stuhlbarg whilst director Ang Lee alongside Imelda Staunton and Henry Goodman presented Taking Woodstock. Colin Firth, Matthew Goode and Nicholas Hoult joined director Tom Ford for A Single Man and directors Michael Haneke (The White Ribbon), Steven Soderbergh (The Informant!) and Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Micmacs) introduced their films respectively.
A Prophet was presented by director Jacques Audiard and finishing the Festival was the Closing Night Gala screening of Nowhere Boy attended by Sam Taylor-Wood, Aaron Johnson, David Morrissey, Anne-Marie Duff and Kristin Scott-Thomas.
British filmmaking and acting talent was once again well represented, as seen in J Blakeson’s The Disappearance of Alice Creed which was attended by the director alongside Gemma Arterton, Eddie Marsan and Martin Compston. Lindy Heymann, director of Kicks, was joined by cast members Kerrie Hayes, Nichola Burley and Jamie Doyle whilst director Jordan Scott presented her film Cracks with actresses Eva Green and Juno Temple.
Julian Fellowes attended the screening of his film From Time to Time accompanied by cast members Timothy Spall, Pauline Collins, Harriet Walter, Alex Etel and Eliza Bennett. Ben Freeth, one of the subjects of the documentary Mugabe and the White African accompanied directors Lucy Bailey and Andrew Thompson to their European premiere screening whilst David Morrissey was joined by Helen Elizabeth and James Brough for his directorial debut Don’t Worry About Me and Penny Woolcock introduced 1 DAY with the entire cast in attendance at the screening.
Stephen Poliakoff was present to introduce Glorious 39 with cast members Romola Garai, Bill Nighy, David Tennant and Hugh Bonneville whilst Thomas Turgoose, Holly Grainger, Susan Lynch and Steven Mackintosh all accompanied director Tom Harper for The Scouting Book for Boys.
Malcolm Venville introduced 44 Inch Chest with BFI Fellowship Award recipient John Hurt and Bunny and the Bull director Paul King presented the film with Edward Hogg, Simon Farnaby, Noel Fielding, Julian Barrett and Verónica Echegui. A strong selection of British documentaries were also presented by Julien Temple (Oil City Confidential), Jez Lewis (Shed Your Tears and Walk Away) Chris Atkins (Starsuckers) and Matt Harlock and Paul Thomas (American: The Bill Hicks Story).
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