BFI Southbank Programme Notes

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

Disney turned to the Brothers Grimm for its first animated feature. It’s the classic fairy-tale of a Princess who runs away from her vain and wicked stepmother, deep into a forest where she encount...

July 2, 2023 | MAKING MAGIC
100 YEARS OF DISNEY

Amar Akbar Anthony

Addressing the press after the success of his recent blockbuster Pathaan (2023), Shah Rukh Khan referred to the movie’s female lead, Deepika Padukone, himself and his co-star, John Abraham, as ‘Ama...

July 2, 2023 | FILM WALLAHS
RESTORATION UK PREMIERE

El sur

It is virtually impossible to write about El sur, the second feature in Spanish director Víctor Erice’s highly acclaimed if small body of work –The Spirit of the Beehive was made ten years earlier ...

July 1, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

Disney's Silly Symphonies

Carl Stalling, a musician whom Walt Disney had known in Kansas City, and who came to Hollywood in 1928 to become the studio’s first official music director, reportedly became involved in heated dis...

July 1, 2023 | MAKING MAGIC
100 YEARS OF DISNEY

Shabu

+ Q&A with director Shamira Raphaëla Join us in the BFI Bar after the screening for a DJ set from LAJ and more summer treats. Fourteen-year-old Shabu has crashed his absent grandmother’s car...

July 1, 2023 | PREVIEW

Hannah Takes the Stairs

Joe Swanberg’s Hannah Takes the Stairs stands as a key moment in the career trajectory of Greta Gerwig, who co-wrote the film and delivered a memorable performance as the eponymous twentysomething ...

July 1, 2023 | FEEL ALL THE FEELINGS
THE FILMS OF GRETA GERWIG

The Wicker Man

We celebrate the 50th anniversary of this chilling British horror, which only gets better with age. When a schoolgirl is reported missing, Police Sergeant Neil Howie flies to the Hebridean island o...

June 30, 2023 | RE-RELEASES

To Kill a Tiger

+ Q&A with director Nisha Pahuja and guests Director’s Statement To Kill a Tiger actually started off as an entirely different film. That film, called Send Us Your Brother, was a more pointed...

June 29, 2023 | LONDON INDIAN FILM FESTIVAL

The Effects of Lying

+ Q&A with director Isher Sahota, producer Jon Tarcy and cast members Director’s statement This is a universal story that has nothing to do with the ethnicity of these characters. That’s why w...

June 28, 2023 | LONDON INDIAN FILM FESTIVAL

Under the Skin

+ intro and discussion In this loose adaptation of Michel Faber’s acclaimed 2000 novel, Scarlett Johansson’s character expropriates the body of a young woman and prowls Scotland’s winding back r...

June 26, 2023 | RELAXED SCREENING

Puss in Boots
The Last Wish

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish What’s it about? Puss in Boots is back. His nine lives are fast running out and his ex, Kitty Softpaws is back in his life as they both search for a map that has the ...

June 25, 2023 | BFI FAMILIES

Habemus Papam - We Have a Pope

‘My heart is blighted, and withered like grass; I forget to eat my food. I lie awake; I have become like a bird alone on a roof.’ With these words, taken from Psalm 102, Nanni Moretti’s erudite psy...

June 25, 2023 | MICHEL PICCOLI
A FEARLESS TALENT

Don't Look Now

Nicolas Roeg on ‘Don’t Look Now’ To what extent was Don’t Look Now your own choice? A publicity handout says it was Peter Katz, the producer, who thought Daphne du Maurier’s story would make a good...

June 24, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

La Belle Noiseuse

The success of La Belle Noiseuse makes it plausible that audiences see in it a qualified but nonetheless comforting reaffirmation of the values not only of Art, but also of European art cinema. Ind...

June 24, 2023 | MICHEL PICCOLI
A FEARLESS TALENT

La Haine

Mathieu Kassovitz on ‘La Haine’ La Haine is 25 years old. Since Mathieu Kassovitz’s debut first screened there’s arguably not been another French film that has had as significant an impact. In the...

June 21, 2023 | BIG SCREEN CLASSICS

The Big Sleep

As the epitome of a Howard Hawks movie, The Big Sleep exhibited all the varied facets of his technical dramatic skill. Scenes are edited sharply and economically, designed to give viewers all the n...

June 21, 2023 | RAZOR SHARP
THE FABULOUS WOMEN OF HOWARD HAWKS

Belle toujours

I wasn’t expecting all that much from this follow-up to Buñuel’s 1967 masterpiece Belle de Jour, but any reservations disappeared the moment Michel Piccoli appeared on screen, twinkling with the ki...

June 21, 2023 | MICHEL PICCOLI
A FEARLESS TALENT

Asteroid City

+ Q&A with director Wes Anderson A one-car pioneer town, somewhere in the parched wilds of the California-Nevada desert, in the fresh-faced post-war years of the expanding American empire, on ...

June 21, 2023 | PREVIEW

The Return of the Frog

Introduction by film historian Jonathan Rigby SPOILER WARNING The following notes give away some of the plot. Despite being defeated by Inspector Elk (Harker) in The Frog (1937), the infamous und...

June 20, 2023 | PROJECTING THE ARCHIVE

Champion

+ Q&A with Candice Carty-Williams, Déja J Bowens, Malcolm Kamulete, Ray BLK and John Ogunmuyiwa Champion is the first TV project from Candice Carty-Williams, author of the Sunday Times bestse...

June 19, 2023 | TV PREVIEW