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London Film Festival · 2014

London Film Festival 2014

Debate

Will also feature the short film programme, Let's Talk About Sex.

Programme

24 films · 6 reviews

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August Winds (Ventos De Agosto)

Review preview for August Winds

Through an intimate story of a close-knit community, Mascaro takes on wider themes of global warming in a subtle way.

Richard Mowe · 3 out of 5
A teenager finds adventure when she leaves the city to look after her grandmother.

(Country: Brazil; Year: 2014; Director: Gabriel Mascaro; Writer: Gabriel Mascaro; Stars: Dandara de Morais, Geová Manoel Dos Santos)

Full review

The Bride (Gelin)

A young mother is forced to take desperate measures when her son becomes seriously ill.

(Country: Turkey; Year: 1973; Director: Lutfi Akad; Writer: Lutfi Akad; Stars: Hülya Koçyigit, Kerem Yilmazer, Ali Sen, Nazan Adali, Orhan Aydinbas, Günay Güner, Nilgün Kasapbasoglu, Kahraman Kiral, Seden Kiziltunç, Abdurrahman Palay, Aliye Rona, Jeyan Mahfi Tözüm, Riza Tüzün, Kamran Usluer, Nermin Özses)

Camp X-Ray

A young woman is stationed as a guard in Guantanamo Bay, where she forms an unlikely friendship with one of the detainees.

(Country: US; Year: 2014; Director: Peter Sattler; Writer: Peter Sattler; Stars: Kristen Stewart, Julia Duffy, Lane Garrison, Tara Holt, Yousuf Azami, Peyman Moaadi, Joseph Julian Soria, Ser'Darius Blain, Marco Khan, Anoop Simon, Jian, Nawal Bengholam, Cory Michael Smith, Richard Serio, Robert Tarpinian)

CAPTIVATED The Trials of Pamela Smart

In an extraordinary and tragic American story, a small town murder becomes one of the highest profile cases of all time. From its historic role as the first televised trial to the many books and movies made about it, the film looks at the media’s enduring impact on the case.

(Country: US, UK; Year: 2014; Director: Jeremiah Zagar)

Citizenfour

Review preview for Citizenfour

This is the first essential film about the post-Snowden era, made by one of the key figures who helped usher that era into being.

Owen Van Spall · 5 out of 5
Documentary about Edward Snowden.

(Year: 2014; Director: Laura Poitras)

Full review

Court

A folk singer is charged on dubious grounds after a man's body is found inside a manhole.

(Country: India; Year: 2014; Director: Chaitanya Tamhane; Writer: Chaitanya Tamhane; Stars: Vivek Gomber, Geetanjali Kulkarni, Pradeep Joshi, Shirish Pawar, Usha Bane, Vira Sathidar)

The Creator Of The Jungle (Sobre la marxa: The Creator of the Jungle)

Review preview for The Creator Of The Jungle

Arguably, the film feels the absence of the broader context of Garrell's life.

Rebecca Naughten · 3.5 out of 5
The story of a man who built his own jungle by the side of a highway, and how he rebuilt and destroyed it three times.

(Country: Spain; Year: 2014; Director: Jordi Morató; Writer: Jordi Morató; Stars: Josep Pijiula "Garrell", Ricard Ayats, Ivó Pijiula, Aleix Oliveras, Josep M.Costa, Albert Pujolar, Jordi Pujolar, David Fernández, Miquel Masdevall, Isaac Merino, Joel Vila)

Full review

Damn The War (Maudite soit la guerre, War Is Hell, War Be Damned, Accursed Be War)

Two friends find themselves on opposite sides of the First World War conflict.

(Country: Belgium; Year: 1914; Director: Alfred Machin; Writer: Alfred Machin; Stars: Baert, Suzanne Berni, Fernand Crommelynck, Nadia D'Angely, Henri Goidsen, Albert Hendrickx, Maurice Auzat, Renée Bailly, Georges Etienne, Zizi Festerat, Lucien Mussière, Réginald, Jane Tony)

Dancing Arabs (A Borrowed Identity)

Review preview for Dancing Arabs

The narrative, based on a novel by co-screenwriter Sayed Kashua, veers off course only in the final scenes and an implausible resolution.

Richard Mowe · 4 out of 5
A boy from an Arab Israeli city is sent to a prestigious Jerusalem boarding school.

(Country: Israel; Year: 2014; Director: Eran Riklis; Writer: Sayed Kashua; Stars: Tawfeek Barhom, Ali Suliman, Yaël Abecassis, Marlene Bajali, Laëtitia Eïdo, Razi Gabareen, Norman Issa, Daniel Kitsis, Michael Moshonov, Loai Nofi)

Full review

The Face Of An Angel

A filmmaker struggles to turn a notorious real-life crime into a feature film.

(Country: UK, Italy, Spain; Year: 2014; Director: Michael Winterbottom; Writer: Barbie Latza Nadeau, Paul Viragh; Stars: Kate Beckinsale, Daniel Brühl, Cara Delevingne, Ava Acres, Rosie Fellner, John Hopkins, Alistair Petrie, Genevieve Gaunt, Peter Sullivan, Sai Bennett, Valerio Mastandrea, Corrado Invernizzi, Austin Spangler, Ranieri Menicori)

Fishing Without Nets

A story of pirates in Somalia told from the perspective of a struggling, young Somali fisherman.

(Country: US, Kenya, Somalia; Year: 2014; Director: Cutter Hodierne; Writer: David Burkman, John Hibey, Cutter Hodierne; Stars: Abdikani Muktar, Abdi Siad, Abduwhali Faarah, Abdikhadir Hassan, Reda Kateb, Idil Ibrahim)

German Concentration Camps Factual Survey

This milestone in documentary film has been reconstructed and extended and can now finally be viewed in its intended form.

(Country: UK; Year: 2014; Director: tbc)

A Girl At My Door (Dohee-ya)

Review preview for A Girl At My Door

This film includes a lot of material that will make viewers uncomfortable, but never gratuitously.

Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
A policewoman tries to help a young girl who is being abused by her violent stepdad.

(Country: South Korea; Year: 2014; Director: July Jung; Writer: July Jung; Stars: Bae Doona, Jang Hie-jin, Kim Sae-ron, Mun Seong-kun, Song Sae-Byeok)

Full review See: Interview with Bae Doona about A Girl At My Door

The Great Invisible

Documentary about the Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster.

(Country: US; Year: 2014; Director: Margaret Brown; Stars: Meccah Boynton-Brown, Doug Brown, Bob Cavnar, Brent Coon, Roosevelt Harris, Keith Jones, Sara Lattis Stone, Latham Smith, Stephen Stone)

Hoop Dreams

Documentary charts the fortunes of two boys hoping to make it as basketball stars.

(Country: US; Year: 1994; Director: Steve James; Writer: Steve James, Frederick Marx; Stars: William Gates, Arthur Agee, Emma Gates, Curtis Gates, Sheila Agee, Arthur 'Bo' Agee, Earl Smith, Gene Pingatore, Isiah Thomas, Marlyn Hopewell, Bill Gleason, Patricia Weir, Marjorie Heard, Luther Bedford, Aretha Mitchell)

Horse Money (Cavalo Dinheiro)

While the young captains lead the revolution in the streets, the people of Fontainhas search for Ventura, lost in the woods.

(Country: Portugal; Year: 2014; Director: Pedro Costa)

I, Afrikaner

Account of the life of a family of Afrikaners who are attempting to cope with the dramatic changes that have taken place in their country over the last 20 years.

(Country: South Africa; Year: 2013; Director: Annalet Steenkamp; Writer: Emma Bestall)

National Diploma (Examen d'état)

The lives of children who face challenges to complete their schooling.

(Country: Congo, France; Year: 2014; Director: Dieudo Hamadi; Writer: Dieudo Hamadi)

Rosewater

Review preview for Rosewater

A solid, and certainly heartfelt effort.

Owen Van Spall · 3 out of 5
The story of Maziar Bahari, the journalist who was detained for 188 days in Iran.

(Country: US; Year: 2014; Director: Jon Stewart; Writer: Jon Stewart, Maziar Bahari, Aimee Molloy; Stars: Gael García Bernal, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Golshifteh Farahani, Kim Bodnia, Dimitri Leonidas, Jason Jones, Andrew Gower, Haluk Bilginer, Nasser Faris, Nazanin Nour, Numan Acar, Arian Moayed, Amir El-Masry, Zarif Kabier, Arash Mokhtar)

Full review

Debate gala

Self Made

Amnesia leads to a confusion of identities, with an Israeli woman discovering life in a refugee camp whilst a Palestinian woman finds herself in a middle class Jerusalem home.

(Country: Israel; Year: 2014; Director: Shira Geffen; Stars: Sarah Adler, Samira Saraya)

Tales (Ghesse-ha)

Journey through a twilight modern-day Iran replete with drug addicts, prostitutes and poverty.

(Country: Iran; Year: 2014; Director: Rakhshan Bani-Etemad; Writer: Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, Farid Mostafavi; Stars: Habib Rezaei, Mohammad Reza Forutan, Mehraveh Sharifinia, Golab Adineh, Mehdi Hashemi, Hassan Majooni, Babak Hamidian, Negar Javaherian, Shahrokh Foroutanian, Rima Raminfar, Atefeh Razavi, Peyman Moaadi, Baran Kosari, Khosrow Shahraz, Fatemah Motamed-Aria)

War Book

Political drama about a secret nuclear protocol from the 50s that’s put through its paces in the back rooms of Parliament to test real-world scenarios.

(Country: UK; Year: 2014; Director: Tom Harper; Writer: Jack Thorne; Stars: Sophie Okonedo, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, Shaun Evans, Ben Chaplin, Adeel Akhtar, Kerry Fox, Phoebe Fox, Antony Sher, Nicholas Burns, Morgan Walters)

The Way Out (Cesta Ven)

Žaneta wants her young daughter to receive an education, she hankers after peaceful summer holidays and hopes that her partner David will stop looking at other women.

(Country: Czech Republic, France; Year: 2014; Director: Petr Václav)

We Come As Friends

We Come as Friends views colonisation as a human phenomenon through both explicit and metaphoric lenses without oversimplified accusations or political theorising. Alarmingly, It is not a historical film since colonisation and the slave trade still exist.

(Country: France; Year: 2014; Director: Hubert Sauper)