BFI Southbank Programme Notes

Doctor Who - The Five Doctors

+ Q&A with actors Peter Davison, Janet Fielding, Sarah Sutton, David Banks and Mark Hardy Making ‘The Five Doctors’ In 1981, producer John Nathan-Turner was very aware that a significant date ...

September 16, 2023 | EVENTS

The Anatomy of Ozu

An afternoon of illustrated talks and discussions exploring some of the elements that make the world of Ozu’s films so rich and distinctive, including his meticulous style, recurring use of domesti...

September 16, 2023 | A FAMILY AFFAIR
THE FILMS OF YASUJIRO OZU

Ama - An African Voyage of Discovery

+ intro by His Excellency Papa Owusu-Ankomah, Ghana’s High Commissioner and Q&A with actor Georgina Ackerman and director Kwesi Owusu hosted by film lecturer, Imruh Bakari On its first release...

September 16, 2023 | AFRICAN ODYSSEYS

Love Life

Kōji Fukada on ‘Love Life’ Across the past 15 years, Kōji Fukada has steadily become one of the most celebrated independent filmmakers working in Japan. Many of his films are characterised by a fam...

September 15, 2023 | KOJI FUKADA

Early Spring

SPOILER WARNING The following notes give away some of the plot. After the domestic critical and box office success of Tokyo Story in late 1953, Ozu found himself taking an uncharacteristic break ...

September 14, 2023 | A FAMILY AFFAIR
THE FILMS OF YASUJIRO OZU

Boiling Point

+ Q&A with actors Vinette Robinson, Stephen Graham, Hannah Walters, Stephen Odubola, director Philip Barantini and writer James Cummings. Chaired by critic Rhianna Dhillon. Eight months after ...

September 14, 2023 | TV PREVIEW

Blue Story

Contains strong violence. With the recent return of lauded inner-city drama Top Boy to our screens, this energetic debut feature from filmmaker and grime artist Andrew ‘Rapman’ Onwubolu appears we...

September 14, 2023 | ACTING HARD
WORKING CLASS MASCULINITY IN BRITISH CINEMA

Together with Lorenza Mazzetti

SPOILER WARNING The following content may reveal plot details Together with Lorenza Mazzetti was directed by Brighid Lowe. Interviews with Lorenza Mazzetti were filmed in London (2013) and Rome (2...

September 13, 2023 | TOGETHER
THE LONDON FILMS OF LORENZA MAZZETTI

Sweet Sixteen

SPOILER WARNING The following notes give away some of the plot. Contains strong violence. Sweet Sixteen is sure to be written off in some quarters as Ken Loach beating the same old drum, and that...

September 13, 2023 | ACTING HARD
WORKING CLASS MASCULINITY IN BRITISH CINEMA

K
Together

+ intro discussing the Mazzetti film restorations by William Fowler, Curator, and Elena Nepoti, Film Conservation Manager, BFI National Archive The Slade School of Fine Art, where Lorenza Mazzetti...

September 13, 2023 | TOGETHER
THE LONDON FILMS OF LORENZA MAZZETTI

F for Fake

In 1970 François Reichenbach, with the British journalist Richard Drewett, made Elmyr: The True Picture?, a 40-minute BBC documentary about Elmyr de Hory, the Hungarian faker of 20th-century master...

September 13, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

Punch and Judy. Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy

+ intro by Jez Stewart, BFI National Archive Curator If the image of independent British cinema given to the world is that of a rather downbeat, grey-edged, political artform, sustained by its vir...

September 12, 2023 | ART IN THE MAKING

Dead Man's Shoes

+ Q&A with Shane Meadows and producer Mark Herbert Contains strong violence and sexual violence. Nineteen years since its original release, Shane Meadows’ startling fourth feature has lost no...

September 12, 2023 | ACTING HARD
WORKING CLASS MASCULINITY IN BRITISH CINEMA

There Was a Father

SPOILER WARNING The following notes give away some of the plot. Widely acknowledged as the first great performance in an Ozu film by the director’s regular on-screen collaborator Chishū Ryū, There...

September 11, 2023 | A FAMILY AFFAIR
THE FILMS OF YASUJIRO OZU

My Little Loves

French artists seem peculiarly attracted to the mysteries of childhood and adolescence. In literature one thinks immediately of the luscious worlds conjured up by Proust and Alain-Fournier, in whic...

September 11, 2023 | LOVE, PAIN AND CINEMA
THE FILMS OF JEAN EUSTACHE

Bronco Bullfrog

+ intro and Q&A with Ian O’Sullivan, BFI Library and actor Roy Haywood Barney Platts-Mills’ debut feature stars an entirely non-professional cast of local teenagers from Stratford, East London...

September 11, 2023 | SENIORS

La Maman et la putain

SPOILER WARNING The following notes give away the film’s ending. Try to imagine a film set in early 70s Paris which definitively distils the emotional changes wrought by the May 1968 events, while...

September 10, 2023 | LOVE, PAIN AND CINEMA
THE FILMS OF JEAN EUSTACHE

The Maltese Falcon

John Huston’s career started erratically; the son of Walter Huston, he began as an actor himself. After several false starts it was not until 1938 that his career in films got under way. For the ne...

September 10, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

Late Spring

SPOILER WARNING The following notes give away the film’s ending. A widowed professor lives harmoniously with his grown-up daughter until a meddling aunt intervenes and suggests that it is time for...

September 10, 2023 | A FAMILY AFFAIR
THE FILMS OF YASUJIRO OZU

Beautiful Thing

The mid-1990s was a watershed period for independent gay and lesbian film, not only because of the number of feature and short films being made, but because of the critical interest which accompani...

September 10, 2023 | ACTING HARD
WORKING CLASS MASCULINITY IN BRITISH CINEMA