London Film Festival

Latest reviews

• 
  Kim Novak's Vertigo

  Review preview for Kim Novak's Vertigo

  She clicks with Philippe, and there’s a wonderful openness about the film as she finds joy in being able to talk about everything with no fear anymore.

  The actor and painter reflects on Vertigo and her life.
• 
  & Sons

  Review preview for & Sons

  There are no weak links in the top-notch cast.

  A writer tries to reconnect with his sons.
• 
  Rose Of Nevada

  Review preview for Rose Of Nevada

  Jenkin’s style, impressionistic when it comes to places, is particular in regard to objects, the real anchors of our lives.

  A mysterious boat returns to a village 30 years after vanishing. Two men join its crew hoping for better fortune. After one voyage, they find themselves transported back in time, mistaken for the original crew.
• 
  The Stranger

  Review preview for The Stranger

  Ozon remains faithful to the source and keeps its sense of mystery but has strengthened the female characters

  Adaptation of Camus' classic.
• 
  A Pale View Of Hills

  Review preview for A Pale View Of Hills

  All of this fine work has potential, but too often the deeper ideas in the book are teased only to be abandoned.

  UK 1982. An young aspiring Japanese-British writer plans to write a book based on her mother Etsuko’s post-war experiences in Nagasaki. Haunted by the suicide of her older daughter, Etsuko begins to recount her memories from 1952 as a young mother-to-be. The writer begins to find troubling inconsistencies in the recollections.
• 
  Pillion

  Review preview for Pillion

  The constant contrast is the trick, which later extends to the emotional stakes.

  A man is taken on as a motorbike club's leader's submissive but begins to question that role.
• 
  100 Nights Of Hero

  Review preview for 100 Nights Of Hero

  Where the film succeeds is in the visual design of its world.

  A fairy tale about a maid who concocts a plan to help her mistress.
• 
  Train Dreams

  Review preview for Train Dreams

  There are no doubt those who would argue this magic-hour drenched vision of America through the 1900s is a bit too chocolate-boxy for their liking but the weight of tradition can exert an impressive pull and does so here.

  Robert Grainier is a day laborer building America’s railroads at the start of the 20th century as he experiences profound love, shocking defeat, and a world irrevocably transforming before his very eyes.
• 
  Rental Family

  Review preview for Rental Family

  It’s not a showy performance, but it’s a standout.

  A lonely American actor living in Tokyo starts working for a Japanese 'rental family' company to play stand-in roles in other people's lives. Along the way, he finds surprising connections and unexpected joys within his built-in family.
• 
  Orwell: 2+2=5

  Review preview for Orwell: 2+2=5

  Offers food for thought in the realm of a slightly ungainly and sprawling all-you-can-eat buffet rather than a satisfying sit-down feast.

  Delves deep into Orwell’s final months and visionary works to explore the roots of the vital and troubling concepts he revealed to the world in his dystopian masterpiece… Doublethink, Thoughtcrime, Newspeak, the omnipresent spectre of Big Brother… disturbing socio-political truths which resonate ever-more powerfully today.

A–Z of London Film Festival 2025 reviews →

Features

• A woman who didn't belong
  Anna Cazenave Cambet on working with Vicky Krieps in Love Me Tender
• Teenage dreams
  Fernando Eimbcke and Aivan Uttapa on creative insanity, on-set dynamics and Olmo
• Freedom fighter for the female gaze
  Love Me Tender director Anna Cazenave Cambet on sexuality, motherhood and gender balance
• Suspicious minds
  Rebecca Zlotowski on building past lives and working with Jodie Foster on A Private Life
• The ultimate act of friendship
  Robin Campillo on picking up the threads from the late Laurent Cantet
• 'If Visconti had done it how could I possibly do it any better?'
  Ozon on the challenges of tackling Camus' masterwork The Stranger
• The mighty Amazon
  Gabriel Mascaro on balancing beauty and identification in The Blue Trail
• Looking back
  Kei Ishikawa on memory, ambiguity and A Pale View Of Hills
• 'Children can understand a lot more than we think..'
  The makers of Little Amélie on why perceptions about animation are changing
• 'I don't like that feeling of things that look alike'
  The Love That Remains director Hlynur Pálmason on the idiosyncratic and personal
• The physicality of grief
  Claire Foy on truth, space, silence and H Is For Hawk
• 'I like putting incompatible stuff together and seeing how it works'
  Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke on mixing fantasy and reality in A Useful Ghost
• 'The important thing is to make films you believe in'
  Ben Rivers on myth adaptation and world creation in Mare's Nest
• Song of the desert
  Kangding Ray on changing attitudes to music in cinema, and scoring Sirât
• 'I think it completely changed my life'
  Aleksandre Koberidze on his love for the Sony Ericsson and using it to shoot Dry Leaf
• Ice cool
  Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani talk Reflection In A Dead Diamond
• The beauty of doubt
  Toni Servillo on costumes by Carlo Poggioli and working with Paolo Sorrentino on La Grazia
• It’s about re-enchantment
  Christian Petzold on cinema history, lullabies, Laura, Rebecca and Miroirs No. 3
• Existence and resistance
  Annemarie Jacir on history, poetic freedom and Palestine 36
• Images in conflict
  Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Lynsey Addario on Love+War
• 'I’m very happy to be trusted with characters of this calibre'
  Denis Lavant on the art of constructing personas in Redoubt and The Stranger
• 'Even though I'm 36, I still feel connected to the girl I was'
  Emilie Thalund on teen desire, body positivity and crossing boundaries in Weightless
• The man who prepared for war
  John Skoog on Karl-Göran Persson and Redoubt
• A new woman
  Majid Al Ansari on tradition, bad marital choices and The Vile
• Teen in a trap
  Paolo Strippoli on his coming-of-age horror The Holy Boy
• 'I didn't make this film myself. The Islamic Republic made it by putting me in prison'
  Jafar Panahi on the inspiration for It Was Just An Accident
• The Fool's journey
  Annapurna Sriram on psychic predictions, resisting censorship and making Fucktoys
• The double games
  Frédéric Hambalek on discovering hidden things and What Marielle Knows
• Warring parents sparked Ramsay’s Cannes entry
  Die, My Love stars Robert Pattinson and Jennifer Lawrence in fighting form
• Slice of life... and fable
  The President's Cake director Hasan Hadi on the challenges and craft behind his debut
• A test of love
  Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer on Honey Bunch
• Time for trans joy
  Siobhan McCarthy on reinventing the high school movie in She’s The He

News

• Martel's Landmarks takes top prize at LFF
  One Woman One Bra and The Travelers also among winners
• London Film Festival announces programme
  Films include six world premieres plus lates from Chloé Zhao and Bradley Cooper