London Film Festival

Latest reviews

• 
  I Wish

  Review preview for I Wish

  Hirokazu Koreeda's childhood adventure is a sweet and subtle tale of friendship, generosity of spirit and the triumph of hope over expectation.

  Two brothers hatch a plot to make their reunion wish come true.
• 
  Dreams Of A Life

  Review preview for Dreams Of A Life

  In a sense this is more about how people perceive the dead - or even the living - than about the realities of its ostensible subject's existence.

  The intriguing story of a woman discovered in a London flat three years after her death.
• 
  Otelo Burning

  Review preview for Otelo Burning

  Otelo Burning presents us with a world where a great deal depends on trust and goodwill, making its hero vulnerable.

  Three friends discover surfing as an escape from the violence of late-apartheid South Africa.
• 
  Let The Bullets Fly

  Review preview for Let The Bullets Fly

  Comedy aside, the story hinges on cunning plans and double bluffs that, when they work, are very effective indeed.

  Jiang Wen's rumbustious comedy-adventure, set in the 1920s, is an Eastern Western. Chow Yun-Fat, Ge You and Jiang himself star as the three unscrupulous men vying for control of Goose Town: fun performances, and lots of flying bullets.
• 
  The Snows Of Kilimanjaro

  Review preview for The Snows Of Kilimanjaro

  Guediguian takes a subtle and even-handed approach, well aware that the selflessness of the central characters will be construed as weakness and misplaced guilt.

  Director Robert Guediguian returns to his old Marseilles stamping ground for an entertaining, politically passionate drama starring the director's ensemble regulars.
• 
  Les Enfants du Paradis

  Review preview for Les Enfants du Paradis

  Breathtakingly ambitious, exquisitely realised and performed and made under extreme circumstances, Les Enfants Du Paradis is an absolute joy to behold and a monument to the power of the arts to transcend opressive social and political climates.

  Four men compete for the affections of Garance, a free spirited courtesan.
• 
  360

  Review preview for 360

  Two things that save this cowp of a film from utter banality are the cinematography, which is technically competent, and the quality of the actors and their performances.

  A dynamic, star-studded study of love in the 21st century.
• 
  The Forgiveness Of Blood

  Review preview for The Forgiveness Of Blood

  The screenplay deservedly won a Silver Bear at last year’s Berlin Film Festival, taking the audience to the heart of a culture at once markedly different and universally familiar.

  An Albanian family are caught in a blood feud.
• 
  A Simple Life

  Review preview for A Simple Life

  A Simple Life is a two-hour slice of profound wisdom that gently leads you down to a deep place then whispers helpful truths in your ear.

  An existential drama about how two people’s relationship survives after one of them has a stroke.
• 
  We Can't Go Home Again

  Review preview for We Can't Go Home Again

  Truth be told, it is annoying as hell and becomes very tired, very quickly.

  A companion piece to Don't Expect Too Much, We Can't Go Home Again is an experimental vision of disillusioned American youth in the Seventies.

A–Z of London Film Festival 2011 reviews →

Features

• Georgia on her mind
  Director Julia Loktev talks about shooting The Loneliest Planet
• Beauty and the bullet
  Gerardo Naranjo talks about crime thriller Miss Bala
• Was The Descendants fashion a Payne for Clooney?
  The director and star talk pants... and Hawaiian shirts.
• All about Kevin
  Lynne Ramsay and Ezra Miller on the film everybody's talking about.

News

• London Film Festival line-up announced
  55th edition to feature 13 world premieres.