The Belfast Film Festival (BFF) has launched its full 2023 programme, which will take place in November.
The line-up will include the biggest films from both the Cannes and Venice film festivals as well as seven Best International Feature Oscar selections.
The festival will open on November 2 with a screening of Andrew Haigh’s highly anticipated romantic drama All of Us Strangers starring Irish actors Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal.
Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things, produced by Ireland’s Element Pictures and starring Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe and Mark Ruffalo, will close the festival on November 11.
This will also be the second year of BFF’s International Competition, which will show six debut features and two accomplished second features. These will include Molly Manning Walker’s Cannes award winning film How To Have Sex and the winner of the Camera D’Or, Pham Thien An’s Inside The Yellow Cocoon Shell.
Jess Kiang, international programmer for the festival, said: “After the roaring success of our inaugural International Competition last year I am excited to return with another showcase of eight stunning films made by emerging filmmakers from around the world.”
The New Cinema strand of the festival will showcase the best new cinema both in Ireland and internationally, including William Oldroyd’s Eileen starring Anne Hathaway and Thomas McKenzie and Christos Nikou’s dystopian romance Fingernails starring Jessie Buckley and Riz Ahmed.
It will also show Cannes award winning films such as Justine Triet’s Anatomy Of A Fall and Jonthan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest. As well as Northern Ireland Screen funded thriller Lie Of The Land and Scottish feature Silent Roar with a debut feature performance from Belfast actor Louis McCartney.
To mark the end of the recent Writer’s Guild of America strikes, BFF will screen a selection of films about screenwriters as well as host world-renowned writer-director John Sayles and producer Maggie Renzi for a chat about their lives and work. The pair will also receive the festival's Réalta award for Outstanding Contribution to Film. Accompanying the talk will be a retrospective showcasing some of their finest films.
Additionally, BFF 2023 will host a series of unique special events including a look back at the history of 16mm with the 16mm Century featuring a live DJ afterparty plus two work-in-progress screenings: Aislinn Clarke’s newest Irish language horror Fréamhaca and the eagerly awaited Belfast-set movie, Kneecap.
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New to BFF this year is the Long Short Weekend, bringing together shorts, filmmakers and audiences for a weekend of short film screenings, including the Shorts Competition sponsored by Screenskills and the Northern Ireland Screen Showcase.
“This programme is so packed that it is difficult to pick just a few highlights. The 16mm Century celebrates the centenary year of the 16mm format. We are also very proud to have two amazing work-in-progress events which showcase some of the best and most original work happening in film in Northern Ireland, with Aislinn Clarke’s Fréamhaca and Fine Point’s Kneecap. We’re also working on archive film events which will be very special, thanks to amazing support from Northern Ireland Screen’s Digital Film Archive and BBC NI. It is an exceptional programme, and we can’t wait for people to experience it," added UK and Ireland programmer Rose Baker.
The full BFF programme as well as tickets for all events are available from belfastfilmfestival.org .
