Angelina Jolie, Elton John Titles Among BFI London Film Fest Lineup

The 68th BFI London Film Festival has unveiled its star-studded 2024 lineup, featuring Angelina Jolie, Elton John, Daniel Craig, Florence Pugh, Andrew Garfield, Saoirse Ronan, and more in a program boasting 39 world premieres and 12 international premieres among its 253 feature, short, series and immersive works.

The festival’s headline gala screenings will showcase a range of high-profile films. The world premiere of Steve McQueen’s “Blitz” starring Ronan opens the festival, while Morgan Neville’s “Piece by Piece” closes it.

Other gala screenings include R.J. Cutler and David Furnish’s “Elton John: Never Too Late,” Sean Baker’s “Anora,” Ali Abbasi’s “The Apprentice” starring Sebastian Stan, Andrea Arnold’s “Bird,” Edward Berger’s “Conclave” with Ralph Fiennes, Jacques Audiard’s “Emilia Pérez,” Mike Leigh’s “Hard Truths,” Ben Taylor’s “Joy,” Pablo Larraín’s “Maria” featuring Jolie, Marielle Heller’s “Nightbitch” starring Amy Adams, Pedro Almodóvar’s “The Room Next Door” with Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton, Simon Otto’s “That Christmas” and John Crowley’s “We Live in Time” with Pugh and Garfield.

World premieres also include Darren Thornton’s Irish comedy “Four Mothers,” Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin’s documentary “Endurance,” Milko Lazarov’s Bulgarian drama “Tarika,” Laila Abbas’ “Thank You for Banking with Us,” Eloise King’s documentary “The Shadow Scholars,” Adam Wong Sau-Ping’s “The Way We Talk,” Gino Evans’ “Treading Water” and a restoration of Martin Rosen’s “Watership Down.”

International premieres include Roshan Sethi’s “A Nice Indian Boy” with Karan Soni and Jonathan Groff, Sadie Frost’s documentary “Twiggy,” Kimberly Reed’s “I’m Your Venus,” and Jane Mingay’s “Pauline Black: A 2-Tone Story.”

Special presentations at the festival include Payal Kapadia’s “All We Imagine as Light,” Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich’s “The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire,” Mati Diop’s “Dahomey,” Athina Rachel Tsangari’s “Harvest,” Walter Salles’ “I’m Still Here,” RaMell Ross’ “Nickel Boys,” Luca Guadagnino’s “Queer” with Craig, Jesse Eisenberg’s “A Real Pain” and Mohammad Rasoulof’s “The Seed of the Sacred Fig.”

The festival’s First Feature Competition showcases debut directors with films including Tumpal Tampubolon’s “Crocodile Tears,” Denise Fernandes’ “Hanami,” Neo Sora’s “Happyend,” Sasha Nathwani’s “Last Swim,” Sylvia Le Fanu’s “My Eternal Summer,” Tomás Pichardo Espaillat’s “Olivia & The Clouds,” Laura Carreira’s “On Falling,” Sandhya Suri’s “Santosh,” Ariane Labed’s “September Says,” Mahdi Fleifel’s “To A Land Unknown” and Meryam Joobeur’s “Who Do I Belong To.”

The festival will also feature Screen Talks, in-depth interviews with leaders in contemporary cinema including Andrea Arnold, Steve McQueen, Mike Leigh, Denis Villeneuve, Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, Lupita Nyong’o, Zoe Saldaña and Daniel Kaluuya.

The festival’s feature film program is organized into thematic strands to encourage discovery and open up the festival to new audiences. These strands include Love, Debate, Laugh, Dare, Thrill, Cult, Journey, Create, Experimenta, Family and Treasures.

LFF Expanded, the festival’s immersive art and extended reality program, returns with installations at Bargehouse at Oxo Tower Wharf, BFI Southbank, BFI IMAX and Outernet London. This year’s program features works from leading British and international artists, including Liam Young, Adrien M & Claire B, Anagram, Darkfield and Memo Akten & Katie Peyton Hofstadter. For the first time, LFF Expanded will also showcase video games in an interactive Games Lounge.

The festival, running from Oct. 9-20, will screen works from 79 countries in 63 languages, with 44% of the program made by female and non-binary filmmakers.

Kristy Matheson, BFI London Film Festival director, said: “Cinematic ideas materialize in many forms, and this year artists have taken us to some giddy highs and poked at our tender underbellies. Troubled histories linger close to the surface alongside optimistic futures, all explored in unique and creative ways.”

Ben Roberts, chief executive, BFI, added: “The real joy of LFF for me is seeing the hard work of so many talented filmmakers come to life and given the prominence and noise that they deserve.”