We're delighted to have four titles playing at this year's BFI London Film Festival, screening both in cinemas and on BFI Player from 6 to 17 October. Explore the programme and book your tickets.
BECOMING COUSTEAU
A film by Liz Garbus | Documentary Competition
Two-time Academy Award®-nominated filmmaker Liz Garbus takes an inside look at Jacques-Yves Cousteau’s life, iconic films, inventions, and the experiences that made him the 20th century’s most unique and renowned environmental voice — and the man who inspired generations to protect the Earth.
the story of film: a new generation
A film by Sally Aitken | Create Strand
Examining the most powerful movie images of the last decade, filmmaker Mark Cousins updates his classic The Story of Film with A New Generation. Spanning from 2010 to 2021, including the recent pandemic, Cousins spins an epic and hopeful tale of cinematic innovation from around the globe as he helps to uncover new ways of seeing and being in our eclectic and voluminous digital age.
CITIZEN ASHE is the story of sports legend and social activist Arthur Ashe. Known to most by his stellar sports career - Wimbledon, US Open and Australian Open winner and the first black player to be selected for the US Davis Cup Team - this film uncovers Ashe’s personal evolution; how his activism grew and embraced not only the Civil Right movement and African-Americans but all oppressed peoples throughout the world. Ashe died of AIDS-related complications in 1993 and was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom the same year.
With exclusive access to one of New York’s hardest hit hospital systems, Oscar-nominated and Emmy Award–winning director Matthew Heineman’s THE FIRST WAVE spotlights the everyday heroes at the epicentre of COVID-19 as they come together to fight one of the greatest threats the world has ever encountered. Leaving a devastating trail of death and despair, this once-in-a-century pandemic changed the very fabric of daily life and exposed long-standing inequities in our society. The “first wave” of COVID-19 ravaged New York from March through June 2020. With Heineman’s signature approach of character-driven cinema vérité, THE FIRST WAVE documents those harrowing first four months, embedding with a group of doctors, nurses, and patients on the frontlines as they all navigated the crisis. Their distinct storylines each serve as a microcosm through which we can view the emotional and societal impacts of the pandemic, and are a testament to the strength of the human spirit.