BFI Southbank Programme Notes

Mr. India

+ Q&A with producer Mr Boney Kapoor Mr. India is the only real ‘Bollywood’ film made by Shekhar Kapur, whose earlier film Masoom was more in the style of the parallel Hindi cinema, while his l...

December 17, 2023 | FILM WALLAHS

Tish

Paul Sng, the BIFA-winning director of Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché and Dispossession: The Great Social Housing Swindle, crafts an intimate portrait of Tish Murtha, a working-class photographer from...

December 15, 2023 | NEW RELEASES

The Shop around the Corner

Ernst Lubitsch grew up in Berlin as the son of the Russian Jewish émigré owner of a dressmaking company. He knew the world of shops and they feature often in his films. Perhaps witnessing the patte...

December 15, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

Poor Things

Unfortunately Yorgos Lanthimos has fallen ill and is no longer able to introduce this preview. However we are delighted to announce that Willem Dafoe will now join us to introduce the screening. F...

December 13, 2023 | PREVIEW

Michelle Williams Gamaker
and Powell + Pressburger

+ Michelle Williams Gamaker in conversation with Dr Kulraj Phullar Michelle Williams Gamaker’s stunning, beautifully-staged films trouble the too often overlooked political dynamics trapped in cla...

December 13, 2023 | CINEMA UNBOUND
THE CREATIVE WORLDS OF POWELL + PRESSBURGER

It's a Wonderful Life

Frank Capra cleared his throat, and began. The war was over and he was anxious to make another movie. In early October 1945, he approached Lew Wasserman, James Stewart’s agent at MCA, telling him t...

December 13, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

Queering Powell + Pressburger

A panel discussion exploring the special resonances Powell and Pressburger’s films have for queer cultures today. With the theatrical high style of The Red Shoes and The Tales of Hoffmann, queer pe...

December 12, 2023 | CINEMA UNBOUND
THE CREATIVE WORLDS OF POWELL + PRESSBURGER

Tim Burton's
The Nightmare before Christmas

Director Henry Selick on ‘The Nightmare before Christmas’ The film has been marketed as Tim Burton’s The Nightmare before Christmas , but you’re the director. What do you think is distinctively yo...

December 10, 2023 | CHRISTMAS FILMS

Buck and the Preacher

Black American history is presented through the prism of a Western. Sidney Poitier’s directorial debut, in which he stars opposite Belafonte, tells the story of a wagon master and con-man pastor wh...

December 10, 2023 | HARRY BELAFONTE
MOVIES RACE DEFIANCE

Kansas City

+intro by actor Miranda Richardson and season curator Burt Caesar (on Sunday 17 December only) Appearing in both The Player (1992) and Prêt-à-Porter (1994), Harry Belafonte was among the galaxy of...

December 9, 2023 | HARRY BELAFONTE
MOVIES RACE DEFIANCE

Sofia Coppola in Conversation

From her feature debut The Virgin Suicides through to latest film Priscilla, Sofia Coppola has established herself as one of the most distinctive voices in American cinema, with a compelling exqui...

December 9, 2023 | IN PERSON & PREVIEWS

Crown v. Stevens +
Behind the Mask

Crown v. Stevens was made by Michael Powell with an eye firmly set on the light at the end of the tunnel. In fact, Crown proved to be his penultimate ‘quota’ film and the last of these that survive...

December 9, 2023 | CINEMA UNBOUND
THE CREATIVE WORLDS OF POWELL + PRESSBURGER

Tangerine

It’s Christmas Eve and at a donut shop in Hollywood a couple of transgender sex workers meet up to discuss a problem one of them faces. Soon, questions of infidelity, the fine line between performa...

December 8, 2023 | CHRISTMAS FILMS

The Red Shoes

5 things to know about ‘The Red Shoes’ 1. It’s a spectacular rejection of realism The Red Shoes, which premiered on 6 September 1948, followed a tremendous run of films by Michael Powell and Emeri...

December 8, 2023 | RE-RELEASES

The Red Shoes in the Spotlight

Join us to dive deeper into the breathtaking world of Powell and Pressburger’s Technicolor masterpiece. Pamela Hutchinson, author of the recently published BFI Film Classics book on The Red Shoes, ...

December 8, 2023 | CINEMA UNBOUND
THE CREATIVE WORLDS OF POWELL + PRESSBURGER

Meet Me in St. Louis

The closer you look at most famous Hollywood productions, the harder it is to see how they turned out all right – let alone to believe that anyone was in charge. Just as on any set the crew trusts ...

December 8, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

Earth Mama

‘I don’t need a gold star to tell me I’m a good mom!’ Gia (Tia Nomore) snaps at her case worker, showing her frustration as she struggles to meet the seemingly impossible court-mandated conditions ...

December 8, 2023 | NEW RELEASES

Peeping Tom

Thelma Schoonmaker on ‘Peeping Tom’ What’s so powerful is that you care about this man who was a murderer – so beautifully portrayed by Carl Boehm – but who has been created by his father to be a m...

December 7, 2023 | CINEMA UNBOUND
THE CREATIVE WORLDS OF POWELL + PRESSBURGER

Boyz N the Hood

‘One out of every twenty-one Black American males will be murdered in their lifetime. Most will die at the hands of another Black male.’ These two stark statements trigger John Singleton’s 1991 fe...

December 7, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

White Material

Claire Denis’ films aspire to a crystalline purity. Even when packed with the stuff of social and political unrest – war, murder, racial tension, unemployment, refugees, families in crisis – they g...

December 6, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS