27 September 2022
Newsdesk
BFI Southbank highlights for October and November include IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS Blockbuster programme, GARY OLDMAN, PETER GREENAWAY, BFI’S 100 BBC TV GAMECHANGERS seasons and, ahead of the release of the much-anticipated BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER (2022) at BFI IMAX in November, a season celebrating the work of director RYAN COOGLER. BFI IMAX will be closed for an exciting refurbishment from 3 October until early November. The refurbishment will include a technology upgrade to IMAX with Laser projection, a new screen and 12-channel sound system. More details on the reopening programme will be coming soon.
This year’s BFI annual blockbuster returns to cinemas for IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS, a major two and a half month BFI UK-wide film and events season celebrating the horror genre on screen, from 17 October-31 December at BFI Southbank, BFI IMAX and UK-wide cinemas (from 1 October), a curated selection on BFI Player and a tie-in major BFI Blu-ray release. Supported by National Lottery, BFI Film Audience Network and the ICO, IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS is a fresh, inventive and inclusive take on the horror genre tracing how the imagery of nightmare has been created through film, and how stories of monsters have always been political. Through five mythical horror archetypes – the beast, ghost, vampire, witch and zombie the programme explores how these monstrous bodies have been represented on screen over the last hundred years and have been reclaimed by new voices in horror filmmaking. IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS promises something for everyone, the horror aficionado as well as the horror novice: tales of blood and seduction; of glorious, excessive gore; of teenagers turned monstrous and of the dead risen and angry.
October/November highlights include a double bill celebrating the work of Clive Barker on 30 October. His deliciously debauched directorial debut, HELLRAISER (1987) gave birth to one of cinema’s most iconic horror dignitaries, and one of its most unexpected pin-ups; the pansexual pleasure-pursuer Pinhead. A 35th anniversary screening is introduced by actors Nicholas Vince and Simon Bamford with BFI governor and curator of The Clive Barker Archive, Phil Stokes. Also screening is the director’s cut of Barker’s singular sophomore feature as director, NIGHTBREED (1990), starring David Cronenberg as a crazed serial killer hunting down a secret kingdom of monsters, AKA ‘the good guys’.
Oscar-winning director Danny Boyle will be on-stage for a Halloween Q&A following the 20th anniversary screening of 28 DAYS LATER (2002). Taking inspiration from DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS and George A Romero’s Dead trilogy, 28 DAYS LATER helped kick start a zombie revival in modern cinema. Twenty years after its original release, and coming to terms with a very real pandemic, scenes of an abandoned London and a rage-crazed infected population gain a terrifying new layer of meaning.
On Halloween night, 1992, 11 million viewers tuned into the BBC to watch GHOSTWATCH, what they believed to be a live broadcast from a haunted house in Northolt, London. The rest, as they say, is history. Resurrecting the original spirit of the broadcast director Lesley Manning and writer Stephen Volk will join the BFI Southbank audience for an on-stage Q&A following an immersive 30th anniversary screening presented by GHOSTWATCH superfans Celluloid Screams and Live Cinema UK.
Marking the 25th anniversary of his BAFTA-winning directorial debut NIL BY MOUTH (1997), BFI Southbank celebrates award-winning actor, writer and director GARY OLDMAN. Since first appearing on our screens in the early 1980s, Gary Oldman has established himself, across an impressive and prolific career, as one of the most successful film stars of the modern era, widely recognised as one of the finest actors of his generation. The season of Oldman’s work running from 18 October – 29 November features some of his career-best performances, including his Academy Award, Golden Globe and BAFTA-winning portrayal of Winston Churchill in DARKEST HOUR (Joe Wright, 2017), the season offers proof aplenty of the actor’s remarkable talents in creating vividly memorable characters. At the centre of this retrospective season, the BFI is delighted to welcome Oldman to BFI Southbank on 20 October for an IN CONVERSATION event where he will discuss his remarkable career with season programmer Geoff Andrew.
The season follows the premiere of NIL BY MOUTH at the BFI London Film Festival. Twenty-five years old and newly remastered in 4K by the BFI National Archive, supported by Simon and Harley Hassell, Oldman’s acclaimed debut as writer-director, starring Ray Winstone and Kathy Burke, remains a magnificent achievement. It shows at BFI Southbank from 4 November and is a dark but dazzling masterwork. Other films screening throughout the season will include PRICK UP YOUR EARS (Stephen Frears, 1987), THE FIRM (Alan Clarke, 1989), JFK (Oliver Stone, 1991), BRAM STOKER’S DRACULA (Francis Ford Coppola, 1992), TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY (Tomas Alfredson, 2011) and MANK (David Fincher, 2020).
A daring and stimulating innovator, Peter Greenaway is one of Britain’s most unique and esoteric visual artists working today. We celebrate PETER GREENAWAY at 80 with a major two and a half month retrospective season, FRAMES OF MIND THE FILMS OF PETER GREENAWAY, including the 40th anniversary re-release of THE DRAUGHTSMAN’S CONTRACT (1982), Peter Greenaway’s breakthrough feature which introduced worldwide audiences to Greenaway’s flamboyant, meticulous, singular artistic vision, and an intellectual rigor that is truly inimitable. Originally funded by and now beautifully remastered in 4K by the BFI, THE DRAUGHTSMAN’S CONTRACT recently premiered at Venice Classics as part of the Venice International Film Festival and is screening at BFI Southbank from 11 November.
An accomplished filmmaker, writer, artist and painter with a visual style that is unsurpassed, and an occasional appetite for the taboo, BFI Southbank reflects on a career that has embraced short film, television, pioneering technology and some of the most enthralling and challenging feature films ever made, including, A ZED & TWO NOUGHTS (1985), THE COOK, THE THIEF, HIS WIFE & HER LOVER (1989), PROSPERO’S BOOKS (1991) and THE PILLOW BOOK (1996). Saskia Boddeke, filmmaker and wife of Peter Greenaway, provides a unique insight into the great director with THE GREENAWAY ALPHABET (2017), screening at BFI Southbank from 11 November. Boddeke’s film is an exquisite, irreverent and intimate portrait of Greenaway at work and play constructing the alphabet of his life.
Drawing from the BFI’s 100 BBC TV Gamechangers curated list of innovative BBC programmes and talent that have had a significant impact on television and society (released earlier this year), the BFI’S 100 BBC TV GAMECHANGERS season celebrates the broadcaster’s centenary. Showcasing shows that have made and remade genres, shaped social attitudes and transformed television itself, the season demonstrates that the BBC has been a constant pioneer – from its inception to the present day. The selection of titles screening cover all genres, underlining the richness and diversity of BBC television and the significance of these programmes within their given genre. The season includes episodes of I, CLAUDIUS (Q&A with cast members Sir Derek Jacobi and Dame Sian Phillips on 13 November), PLAY TODAY: LICKING HITLER (panel Q&A with writer David Hare on 12 November), panel discussions with creative teams for THE ROYLE FAMILY, GOODNESS GRACIOUS ME, THE REAL MCCOY and EMPIRE ROAD plus a double-bill of Ken Russell’s ground-breaking, experimental film essays on composers, MONITOR: ELGAR (1962), and Richard Strauss, OMNIBUS: DANCE OF THE SEVEN VEILS (1970) on 3 November and a special archival event celebrating the unstoppable, sometimes controversial but always entertaining EUROVISION SONG CONTEST on 22 October.
In less than a decade, RYAN COOGLER has become one of the world’s most sought-after filmmakers. Ahead of the much-anticipated release of BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER (2022) which reopens BFI IMAX in November, we take a look at the director’s body of work with BFI Southbank screenings of FRUITVALE STATION (2013), CREED (2015) and BLACK PANTHER (2018), allowing us to appreciate a true auteur with a unique voice. With each release, Coogler’s scope expands, creating narratives and images that remain with you long after the final frame.
A preview of A BUNCH OF AMATEURS (Kim Hopkins, 2022), including a Q&A with director Kim Hopkins and other special guests, plays on 2 November. This hilarious and heart-warming observational documentary follows the Bradford Movie Makers club’s ups and downs, while exploring the enduring power of friendship and film. Winner of the Audience Award at this year’s Sheffield Doc/Fest, it’s a special and essential film for film-lovers everywhere. Other previews include LIVING (Oliver Hermanus, 2022) on 7 November, followed by a Q&A with director Oliver Hermanus, producer Stephen Woolley and further guests to be announced. Beautiful and elegantly crafted, with a heart-breaking, career best performance from Bill Nighy, this reimagining of Akira Kurosawa’s IKURU moves the story to 1950s London, where a civil servant’s monotonous life is irreversibly shaken once he receives a shocking diagnosis.
On 11 November, we celebrate the launch of LIFE MOVES PRETTY FAST – THE JOHN HUGHES MIXTAPES with a screening of FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF (John Hughes, 1986) followed by a panel discussing the music supervision featured in John Hughes definitive 80s movies. The classic comedy, set in Hughes’s fictional Shermer and beloved Chicago, follows the titular hero who bunks off high school with his girlfriend and hypochondriac best friend for an epic day off.
Our television events this month include a preview of SAS ROGUE HEROES (Tom Shankland, 2022), plus a Q&A with PEAKY BLINDERS writer Steven Knight and further guests to be announced, on 24 October at BFI Southbank. The dramatised account depicts how the SAS was formed, under extraordinary circumstances, in the darkest days of the Second World War. On 29 October, DOCTOR WHO: THE TIME MEDDLER (Douglas Camfield, 1965) finds the Doctor in a battle of wits against a mischievous adversary who is a clearly a long way from home. Dennis Spooner’s fine script for this final story of Season 2 combined the historical with the futuristic and features a standout performance by Peter Butterworth as The Monk.
On 20 October BFI Southbank hosts the global premiere of STRAIGHT 8 2022, the Super-8 in-camera filmmaking competition. Since 1999, the annual premieres have excited audiences worldwide, in part because the filmmakers are present in the auditorium, watching their work for the first time. Despite the challenge of editing in-camera without re-takes, the quality is, more often than not, exceptional. The jury, which includes Asif Kapadia and Mark Jenkin, sees to that.
Fresh from its BFI LFF Expanded world premiere, BFI Southbank will present Guy Maddin’s HAUNTED HOTEL – A MELODRAMA IN AUGMENTED REALITY (2022) from 17 – 30 October. This immersive exhibition unravels across eight three-dimensional collages, enveloping the audience in surreal paper worlds, exploring the hidden layers of human nature. Embracing an eclectic selection of clippings from his personal archive, Maddin’s Hotel hosts familiar pop culture figures alongside ecstatic 1960s nudists and frightened film noir actors, all set to an intricate soundscape by acclaimed composer Magnus Fiennes. Guy Maddin’s first immersive project is accompanied by three of his most beloved works screening at BFI Southbank. MY WINNIPEG (Guy Maddin, 2007) plays on 17 and 25 October, with DRACULA: PAGES FROM A VIRGIN’S DIARY (Guy Maddin, 2002) on 18 and 29 October and THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD (Guy Maddin, 2003) on 21 October and 3 November.
Mark Kermode, one of the nation’s most respected film critics, returns with MARK KERMODE LIVE IN 3D AT THE BFI on 17 October and 7 November. Joined by surprise industry guests, Kermode explores, critiques and dissects new and upcoming releases, film news, cinematic treasures and guilty pleasures. October’s event will explore the worlds presented in our IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS season.
FURTHER PROGRAMME INFORMATION FOR OCTOBER – NOVEMBER
OCTOBER/NOVEMBER SEASONS AT BFI SOUTHBANK
Complete details of the BFI’s autumn blockbuster season IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS are available in a dedicated press release on the BFI Website. Complete details of the GARY OLDMAN season are also available in a dedicated press release.
Complete details of PETER GREENAWAY and BBC 100 GAMECHANGERS will be announced in dedicated press releases soon.
NEW RELEASES AND REISSUES AT BFI SOUTHBANK AND BFI IMAX
New releases this month include DECISION TO LEAVE (Park Chan-Wook, 2022). Nothing is as it appears in this deliciously nuanced, edge of your seat suspense thriller from Korean master Park-Chan Wook, who has established himself as a master filmmaker creating dramas with rare precision, finesse and elegance. Opening at BFI Southbank from 17 October, DECISION TO LEAVE weaves a typically elaborate web of a story, all told through the lens of an immaculately constructed police procedural.
TRIANGLE OF SADNESS (Ruben Östlund, 2022), the Palme d’Or-winning, darkly hilarious, chaotic cruise from Hell plays from 28 October. Östlund’s first English-language feature is another satirical knock-out. It’s an extremely satisfying take down of the rich and the beautiful, which deliriously escalates with gross-out humour and genuine laugh-out-loud moments. A riotous film to experience at the cinema with a big crowd.
THE GREENAWAY ALPHABET (Saskia Boddeke, 2017), which provides a unique insight into Peter Greenaway, the subject of this month’s BFI retrospective, follows him at work and play constructing the alphabet of his life, working with his daughter to create an alphabet that catalogues moments of his life and career. A fascinating portrait of one of our most accomplished artists, the film shows at BFI Southbank from 11 November, in a double-bill with H IS FOR HOME (Peter Greenaway, 1973).
Possibly the year’s most anticipated film, BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER (Ryan Coogler, 2022) screens at BFI IMAX from 11 November. Queen Ramonda, Shuri, M’Baku, Okoye, and the Dora Milaje fight to protect their nation from intervening world powers in the wake of King T’Challa’s death. As the Wakandans strive to embrace their next chapter, the heroes must band together with the help of War Dog Nakia and Everett Ross to forge a new path for the kingdom of Wakanda.
Idiosyncratic, endlessly inventive and full of surprises, WHAT DO WE SEE WHEN WE LOOK AT THE SKY? (Aleksandre Koberidze, 2021) offers a positive affirmation of the pleasures of life, and of living in the moment. The winner of the FIPRESCI prize at the Berlin Film Festival, this joyous present-day Georgian fable arrives at BFI Southbank on 25 November. Shooting partly on 16mm, director Aleksandre Koberidze offers up an engaging and romantic flight of fancy, while also pushing the envelope of film form.
IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS coincides with two big screen horror re-releases, both of which will be screening at the BFI Southbank. The American dream turns into a nightmare for a young family in POLTERGEIST (Tobe Hooper, 1982) playing from 21 October. A fascinating contrast of director Tobe Hooper’s freewheeling anarchism and producer Steven Spielberg’s more palatable optimism, this 40th anniversary of Tobe Hooper’s all-time horror classic is at once a delightfully extravagant thrill ride and a scathing attack on conformity and capitalism in Reagan’s America. Celebrating its 20th anniversary, Alejandro Amenábar’s double BAFTA nominated THE OTHERS (2002), plays at BFI Southbank from 17 October. Nicole Kidman is superb as a mother unable to counter the threat facing her family, delivering one of her most powerful performances as the family hears otherworldly voices and witnesses eerie apparitions. Two decades on, it remains one of the most chilling horror films of recent memory.
An exciting range of films celebrating contemporary African cinema, film festival FILM AFRICA presents the world premiere of INSIDE LIFE (Clarence A Peters, 2022) on 29 October including a Q&A with the award-winning director and cinematographer. Screening also as part of IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS, BFI Southbank will screen two episodes from Clarence A Peters’ thrilling new Nigerian drama series following an assembly of characters whose worlds collide due to a series of unfortunate life-changing events. On 30 October the world premiere of RETURN TO CHIBOK (Branwen Okpako, 2022) is followed with a Q&A. Adapting Helon Habila’s The Chibok Girls, this experimental documentary re-enacts his journey to Chibok to visit those left behind after the shocking kidnapping of 276 girls from Chibok Girls school in 2014.
Documentary, drama and animation make a compelling new cross-genre shorts programme, WAHALA DEY – THERE’S A PROBLEM followed by a Q&A on 29 October, with a selection of shorts reflecting life’s troubles through a modern West African lens. Film Africa’s closing film on 6 November is the UK premiere of VUTA N’KUVUTE (TUG OF WAR) (Amil Shivji, 2021), a period drama set in 1950s Zanzibar during the tense build-up to revolution. This elegant adaptation of the eponymous award-winning Swahili novel by Shafi Adam Shafi is inspired by Wong Kar-Wai’s IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE.
REGULAR BFI SOUTHBANK PROGRAMME STRANDS
BFI Southbank’s regular programme strands have something for everyone – whether audiences are looking for silent treasures, experimental works or archive rarities.
Screening as part of IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS, PONTYPOOL (Bruce McDonald, 2008) is the first of two RELAXED SCREENINGS for those in the neurodiverse community, including an introduction and discussion on 31 October. McDonald’s terrifying horror offers a new twist on the zombie formula by exploring the nightmarish qualities of language and the dangers of uncontrolled repetition. THE FLY (David Cronenberg, 1986) follows on 28 November, also with an introduction and discussion. This heart-breaking horror is a dark dissection of scientific optimism and the limits of the human body, with the titular transformation becoming the perfect vessel to talk about the pleasurable terrors of bodily experience.
Also chiming in with the BFI’s major horror season the team at BUG are presenting a special programme of music videos that will shock, thrill, astound and terrify in BUG: VIDEO NASTIES on 4 and 18 November. Steered by the steady hand of the inimitable Dr Buckles, what better way to see these gut-wrenching, spinetingling music videos than on the big screen.
On 22 October, the BFI’s AFRICAN ODYSSEYS strand presents the World Premiere of WALTER RODNEY: ‘WHAT THEY DON’T WANT YOU TO KNOW’ (Daniyal Harris-Vajda, Arlen Harris, 2022) including a Q&A. This documentary explores the life of historian and civil rights campaigner Dr Walter Rodney. Featuring revelatory interviews, it examines the life of a man who sought unity in the face of division and whose ideals lie at the heart of global struggles today.
A preview of CETTE MAISON (Miryam Charles, 2022), including a panel discussion, is this month’s WOMAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA offering on 31 October. In 2008 Bridgeport, Connecticut a teenage girl is found hanging in her bedroom, but an autopsy reveals her death was not the result of a suicide. Her mother is left to process her immense grief, while also reconciling the impact that leaving Haiti has had on her life. An entanglement of fractured memories and imagined realities exquisitely shot on 16mm, this personal, experimental documentary is a poignant ghost story quite unlike anything else.
Our SENIOR offering this month is MANDY (Alexander Mackendrick, 1952), on 31 October. A young couple find themselves increasingly isolated as they struggle to educate their daughter, Mandy. This tense and deeply emotional drama is one of the high points of post-war British film and a powerful reminder of the extraordinary potential of cinema.
Celebrating diverse artistic forms, movements and makers, ART IN THE MAKING presents I IS A LONG-MEMORIED WOMAN (Frances-Anne Solomon, 1990) on 20 October, a drama/dance adaptation of a collection of poems by Grace Nichols. By drawing on elements of African culture, it tells of a spiritual journey of an African woman taken in captivity to the Caribbean, her experiences as a slave, and how she survives being uprooted from her native land. The screening also includes CAN I TOUCH IT? (Tanya Read, 1994), a partly dramatised examination of the origins and influences of Black hair.
On 26 October, for one night only, EXPERIMENTA presents QUEER HORROR AND EXPERIMENTAL MAGIC FILMS – three strange, otherworldly horror artefacts from the BFI National Archive. Screening as part of IN DREAMS ARE MONSTERS, these films powerfully illustrate the subversive, political possibilities of horror when working outside the industry and traditional modes of practice.
PROJECTING THE ARCHIVE presents on 25 October THE DECKS RAN RED aka INFAMY AT SEA (Andrew L. Stone, 1958) with a pre-recorded intro by Mia Mask, author of ‘Divas on Screen: Black Women in American Film.’ Dorothy Dandridge, whose centenary is this November, holds her own among a testosterone-fuelled cast, giving a compelling performance that takes her character from femme fatale to action hero. With implausible plotting and over-the-top dialogue, the film is a rollercoaster ride of melodrama.
To celebrate its 20th Anniversary, HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS (Chris Columbus, 2002) is the month’s FAMILIES strand FUNDAY offering on 23 November. After the film, come and join our Harry Potter themed drop-in workshop and have a go at animating your own characters, as well as drawing and making your own Harry Potter-inspired treats - free to ticket holders of the screening.
Other FAMILY features include: a 10th Anniversary screening of PARANORMAN (Chris Butler, 2012) on 22 October, TIM BURTON’S CORPSE BRIDE (Tim Burton, 2005) on 19 and 20 November, and FRANKENWEENIE (Tim Burton, 2012) on 6 November, a joyful homage to an earlier era of horror films.
