Leeds Film Festival 2026 - Day 2

The Red Hangar (Chi/Arg/Ita) (wiki)

 

During the intense, paranoid period of civil unrest of 1970s Chile, Captain Jorge Silva, once a celebrated name in the chilian air force, now works a relatively quiet job in the senior ranks of a military flying school.  Things hot up as the coup looms over the horizon, when Colonel Jahn - a rough-nosed, menacing figure - appears and takes over the running of the school, repurposing it as a holding centre for captured uprisers, many of which would be tortured and killed for what information they had.  

 

Silva, the darker aspects of his shrouded past only hinted upon, clearly had a hand in stalling Jahn's progress through the military, having had him kicked out for misdemeanours in the past, now finds himself under Jahns command, who has not forgotten the past.  As Jahn's actions become increasingly reckless towards his prisoners, Silva must choose between his adherance to military hierarchy, or stand against it.

 

Shot in saturated black and white, accentuating every character expression; the slow twisting of the rope around the necks of the main characters is demonstrated largely with words not action, and is no less tense for it.  It could be seen as a good companion piece to Wild Horse Nine, coincidentally also showing but I didnt manage to get a ticket, which is also set with the Chilean coup as its backdrop. 7.5/10

Variations on a Theme (SA) (review)

During the second world war, allied Europe enlisted thousands of South-Africans onto the front line.  For their service, while the white man was paid well, each one of these men returned with a pair of leather boots and a bicycle.

 

In the present day, Hettie - a daughter of one such soldier, now about to turn 80 herself, tends her goats on the hills above her small, poor village.  She lives thriftily and alone, but comfortably enough and has become used to her empty nest after her husband passed and the children left for the city.  But now, supposed government officials have been handing out blue forms, offering at last, proper compensation for the sacrifice of their ancestors.  Naturally Hettie, and all her neighbours quickly copper up their significant administration fees, and post them off.  Only a week or so, they said, and the money would come back.

 

Operating somewhere in the area between documentary and fiction, the silent Hettie is given voice by the narrator who weaves stories around the scenes of the village and its enhabitants as the wait, and wait; and gives thoughts and complexity to Hettie's silent existence, showing as that this quiet old woman is full of thoughts and feelings behind her subdued expression and painted smile.

The cyclical nature of the film, as it repeats the same static scenes one by one with subtle differences, could have got annoying, but with its short run time (just over an hour), they become a lyrical rhythm of this old lady's stoic existance.  Initially it seemed to be about the ease with which a community such as this could be hoodwinked - as they are - out of what little cash they had; but it became little more than a background detail as the more important themes of family and community, repitition and foundation, took to the front.  It was warmed over with beautiful music seemingly from deep within Hettie's distant past, and was a lovely way to spend a little time with her.  8/10

Ultimate Thunder (UK) (film site)

Few bands command such warmth from their audience as these guys, a group of men with various learning disabilities who came together in a Leeds warehouse to become, 'the most punk-rock band in the world'

Quite the claim, but here they make their case. These guys dont have a set list, they just play, jazz-style, whatever comes to mind, and the audience has to take it.  No two gigs are ever the same, and front man Matthew's improvised lyrics jump the tracks continually, from random, bizarre outbursts to profound inner feelings.  In that respect, their musical output is perhaps the purest form of expression.

Filmmaker Ben Brown became an unofficial band member for three years and followed them from humble jam sessions to their first gigs. Their popularity went large when their funding was cut and fellow bands spread the word of their crowdfunder which spread through word of mouth.

An easy film to love and I spent most of it with a big smile on my face.  Hyde park was packed out, clearly with a number of locals who know and love the band; plus the director and band members were among them; they got up on stage afterwards for a long Q+A session that unfortunately I had to miss a lot of.  I'll be looking out for these guys on posters around Leeds in the future.  8/10

The Third Man (UK) (wiki)

To round off the night, we have a fresh 4K remaster of the 1949 classic, oft cited as the greatest British film of all time, but one I had yet to experience.  My first and second choices for this slot had all sold out (you have to be quick at Leeds) so this was an opportunity to see it where it was meant to be experienced.

 

Holly Martins, an American writer of some limited fame arrives in a wrecked post-war Vienna, occupied in zones by the British, the Americans, the Germans and the Russians who somehow have managed to work something out, and uneasy peace exists amongst the rubble between the factions, although crime is still rife.  Somewhere in the city, Holly's friend Harry Limes has said he might have some much needed work.  

 

But without even being able to meet, Harry is killed in a car accident, and all Holly can manage is to catch the tail end of the burial, attended by a handful of unfamiliar and shifty faces.  Idle questions give nonsensical answers and Holly is drawn deeper into a detective mystery of the kind only his books would go near.  With the police seemingly uninterested in pursuit of these new developments, and a distraction in the form of Anna, a tragic femme fetale who loved harry for all his faults, can he get to the bottom of the loss of his friend?

Getting on now for 80 years old, The Third Man is still plenty watchable in its own right, and from a retrospective angle, represents an early example of what later thrillers would employ in terms of narrative twists and turns.  While I would not rush out to buy my own copy off the back of this, it was an entertaining, fascinating time capsule, both of the wreckage of a once beautiful city, and also a major milestone in film history. 7/10

Leeds Film Festival 2026 - Day 1

Its festival time once more!  

 

Love the new commissioned artwork. 

 

Before I start - go see Wildwood while you still can.  Its still on in the theatres and you need to see this on the big screen.  Show an original and genuinely astonishing film made painstakingly by hand some love, you wont regret it.  But.. don’t take little kids.. its not for kids.

 

Iron Boy (Fra) (wiki)

As the years pass, the feasibility of dragging the entire family along to the full bifta festival (no offence, LYFF) solidifies.  So it is that this year, with the lass and both seedlings in double figures, I tried to share with them some of the magic of the opening day experience.  Sure enough, an age appropriate family film was right there waiting for 4 seat reservations.  

 

Young Christophe learns he has a twisted spine at 10 years old, and we follow him through into his teens as he negotiates an unforgiving French landscape in the late 80s.  His father starts off aloof, and things don't improve when his son and aire dons the iron corset.  Feathers fly and Christoph starts to drift further from the family that already seems ambivalent towards him.   An unlikely distraction comes from a kindly organist at the church, who offers to channel his frustration with music, but with the farm in arrears and no money to fund his new hobby and little chance of Christoph helping on the farm any time soon with the corset on, there's little understanding from the head of the house.

It didn't sound great on paper. Young farmers boy wears an iron corset due to back problems and acquires a taste for church organ playing. Not a great premise, and less so when you factor in it's un-dubbed French language. It was, unfortunately, this or nothing. They aren't quite ready for Pans Labyrinth, which was playing on the other screen in an anniversary restoration. I booked my 4 expensive tickets and trusted my luck, that it's placement as an opening film meant it was something special.  

Iron Boy was indeed a good pick; the gorgeous loosely detailed style reminded me of the lovely Chicken for Linda, but detailed with a pastel watercolor style which suited the bawdy French summers during which most of the film is set, and the music, clearly a revelatory moment for Christophe who becomes entranced by this musical sensation, is equally so for the viewer, treated to the most beautiful of choir and organ music that only a spacious cathedral can provide.  Come for the story, stay for the experience.  9/10

Mouse (US) (wiki)

LIFF's official opening film was actually the second one.  As the century turns, Minnie is an ordinary teen, painfully so in her opinion.  A frustratingly average existence in a rural American town is made palatable by her best friend Callie, the prettier, more successful girl she has grown up with.  Minnie has been a satellite around her for years, and everything else in her life can be rubbish, so long as she is there.

A last sleepover before the end of term ends tragically, a car accident rips Callie from existence and throws everyone spinning and scrambling into orbit.  The shock is too much for her feeble social connections to handle and it's only Callies mother, Helen who seems able to understand the whirlwind of feelings inside.  Minnies birth mother by comparison is already out of touch and now feels like a stranger in her life, who as most mothers at this age can do nothing right, everything now feels amplified.

Mouse started out as a straightforward story of teenage friendships, but upon the tragedy matures nicely into a nuanced study of the different expressions grief and loss, how people adjust to fill the gaps and find new qualities in the people they thought they knew.  It never sank into the maudlin or became depressing, and was peppered with sly humour that didn't detract from the main theme.  The acting was heartfelt, especially Alex Thompson as Minnie who gave it her all, but also our own Sophie Okonedo as Helen, and David Hyde Pierce, a thousand leagues from Niles, as a care-worn drama teacher trying to get the best out of his students while doing his bit to stop them falling apart at the sight of an empty chair in class.  8.5/10

 

Rose (Aus/Ger) (wiki)

Sandra Hüller might not be a household name yet but soon could be.  Not long out of her woolly jumper kidnapping Eva Stratt in Project Hail Mary, and daughter Emma in the audience-splitting Digger, and the leading role in Fatherland, currently doing the rounds in the cinemas. and also this, as the titular Rose.  Mysteriously arriving in a poor and dilapidated Protestant village at the end of the Thirty Years War, under the identity as the benefactor of some of their farm houses and land, the simple folk are suspicious but eventually accepting of the new man and his claim.  Wanting only for peace from what was clearly a tough life, events work favourably to allow Rose to rise in their estimations.  But the comfortable existence brings a restlessness for more, and in doing so rose puts herself in harms way, especially as now she is expected to take a wife for land, and consummate the marriage.

Filmed in stark black and white to accentuate the harsh lives led in this place, Rose offers little comfort for the viewer and those hoping for a happy ending will find themselves badly out of pocket.  Rose, if nothing else is a bloodied eye staring into the wretched lives of those who lived during those times not that long ago, and a warning that intolerance is just below the surface, then and now.  8/10

Leeds Film Festival 2025 - Day 18

The Blue Trail (Bra/Mex/Ned/Chi) (wiki)

In a future Brazil, a decision was taken that the elderly have finished being useful to society and can be packed off to 'the colony', an obscure synthetic afterlife to which the film tells little.  Teresa, just hitting her late 70's and looking forward to a couple more years with her daughter is caught off guard as the qualifying age is dropped from 80 to 75.  No longer allowed to buy anything of substance without providing papers and getting content from her daughter, her attempts to flee rely on those willing to risk prosecution in giving her safe passage.  

Winning the Silver Bear grand jury prize at Berlin this year, and with similar themes to Calle Málaga, of the dehumanizing effect that the expectations of a younger generation on the elder; a disregarding of the possibility that the wrinkled exterior could hide a still beating heart full of expectation, anger and passion in the twilight years, The Blue Trail gives a voice to frustrations in the senior viewer, and a pause for thought in the rest of us. 7.5/10

The Love That Remains (Ice/Den/Swe/Fra) (wiki)

And so to the final film.  The Love that Remains was thought well enough of to have it playing simultaneously in three of the available screens.  A family living in a remote part of Iceland was once happy, but something has split Maggi, who works on an industrial fishing boat, and Anna, an artist struggling to find someone to buy her work.  What caused the rift is left as an exercise for the viewer, but sometimes these things just happen.  Maggi is clearly not over it, and Anna just wants to move on.  Not helping matters, is that Maggi regularly joins the family for meals and outdoor pursuits in the Icelandic countryside, so his heart, not to mention his groin, is constantly reminded of the life they used to have.  Anna, however is more annoyed that he thinks of his own woes and not how much work it is to run a house with three unruly kids and one less adult.

The director favours using symbolism over narrative to tell the story, and while this is quite benign at first, it becomes increasingly erratic as the film goes on, and unfortunately, it suffers as a result.  Characters seem dead, then living, on boats, then at home.  I'm certain there is a cohesive structure to what the director is trying to get across, and sometimes as with Blue Heron, this can work really well, and other times the film fails to provide the signposts for the viewer to navigate their way to a satisfying understanding.  For me at least, this film belongs in the latter camp.  

 

This made the final third difficult to pick apart, and assuming you can manage that in your head, I suspect you won't feel like it was worth the effort.  None of the characters particularly feel likeable, and things happen too randomly to allow the viewer to develop any sympathy towards them.  As the credits went up, I felt an uncomfortable silence in the audience - a perceptible difference that demarcates a group of people processing witness to work of art, from one where people were asking themselves, 'why did I come all the way here to see this?'

I enjoyed some of it; the framing shots highlighted the beautiful Icelandic vistas, along with the family dog, Panda, who made every scene his own, and the genuinely laugh-out-loud fever dream experienced by Maggi after killing a rooster almost made it worth the trip, but unfortunately, not quite.  5/10

Leeds Film Festival 2025 - Day 17

Rental Family (Jp/US) (wiki)

Getting an extra screening at LIFF usually means a film has been well received, and since I'd seen it advertised earlier in the festival but didn't manage to see it, I used up my Saturday morning spot.

Brendan Fraser, complete with a mawkish expression he can't seem to shift for the duration of the film, plays Phillip, a down on his luck actor scraping by in central Tokyo playing bit parts in advertisements and whatever else he can scavenge from his agent.  Luck, of sorts, comes his way when he lands an unusual job as a 'Sad American', playing a distant relation at a seizensō - an actual funeral for a person not actually dead.  Seeing potential, Shinji enlists Phillip in his company, Rental Family Inc, to play bit parts in the lives of those in need, often at the request of their nearest and dearest.  So one daughter hires him as a journalist to interview her elderly actor father to make him feel better about his acting legacy, while at the same time he's moonlighting as a found father to help a mother get 'his' daughter into a fancy school.

Predictably, Phillip gets too attached to the parts, and the well-meaning relatives end up getting more than what they wished for.  When Phillip is asked to back away and move onto the next job, he goes rogue.

Naturally, I was attracted to the film's location; the director clearly wanted to have the many sights and styles of Japanese culture to be one of the characters, and time was set aside to allow the viewer to appreciate the vibrant Tokyo landscape.  As a love letter to the country, it did elevate the film, although it had little in the way of surprises, and one of the two main plot-lines felt disappointing in it's resolution. 

It had some bits that skirted around something deep to say about the nature of relationships and the quirkiness of the Japanese way of dealing with mental health, but it didn't quite get to the point of actually having anything interesting to say on that subject.  It did however have just enough emotional pull to stop it sliding into the level of mawkishness written on Brendan Frasiers face,  7/10

Blue Heron (Hun/Can) (wiki) 

A Hungarian family with four children move house into a rural community in Vancouver Island, sometime in the nineties.  Most of the children seem well adjusted, but there is a source of disquiet.  Jeremy, the eldest and the child of a previous relationship, is beginning to show concerning behavioral problems.  The other kids are spooked when he does a turn, and the parents are quietly going out of their minds.  A lack of mental health support, apparently a feature of the time, means there is little hope for the family, and they clearly haven't acquired the skills from elsewhere.

Told with little exposition, requiring a little patience on the part of the viewer to get on the wavelength of the film.  To say much more would spoil the ingenuity in the approach to this film, so I won't. Blue Heron tells a familiar story from two perspectives and time periods in a way I haven't seen before, surprising the audience with a satisfying narrative that expects the viewers attention, and rewards it.  A surprisingly satisfactory film. 8/10

Calle Málaga (Mor/Fra/Spa/Ger/Bel) (wiki)

Maria Angeles, an elderly woman living on her own in the evening of her life, still maintains an active lifestyle in a market town in Tanzania, the street on which she lives gives the film its name.  Her daughter many years ago emigrated to Madrid, but suddenly returns after little in the way of contact.  Maria's joy is soon turned to devastated fury when she finds out why - Clara is broke from relationship troubles and needs money, and the apartment that Maria has lived in for 40-plus years - which her late father trustingly placed in Clara's name - needs to go up for sale to get her out of the hole.  A deep rift opens up between the two, but Maria has little say in the matter.  Faced with the choice between a care home and living in Spain with her now-horrible daughter, she opts for the former, though its not long before the bargain basement service provided makes Maria pine for her sumptuous apartment.

Horrible though Maria's situation is, the film is told with warmth and humour, a high point of the film has Maria sharing her woes with an old friend at the local convent.  Its message of finding perhaps something better when everything is seemingly lost is a positive one, although the film allows the viewer to decide for themselves what the resolution is, of which I was expecting one of a handful when the credits suddenly ran.  This abrupt ending may be a little disappointing for some who would wish for the resolution to be handed to them, but otherwise, it was clear why this got the audience award at Cannes this year. 8/10

Ghost Elephants (US) (wiki)

A new Werner Herzog documentary is almost a requirement to watch, although the last film of his I managed to catch (Cave of Forgotten Dreams from BIFF 2011) didn't set my hair as alight as I was hoping it would.

Ghost Elephants is a name used by the tribes-people of Angola to describe what may be a previously unrecorded species of Elephant, one which is significantly larger than the usual ones in Africa.  Thought to survive in the higher altitudes of the Angolan water tower - which feeds a good chunk of Africa from it's runoff - Dr. Steve Boyes has dedicated his life to finding and recording proof of these animals existence.  A single specimen, dubbed 'Henry' was shot in 1955 and brought to the Smithsonian institute where a model of him is on display to this day.

Herzog and crew accompany Boyes, along with a handful of others traveling into Africa, first to Namibia where they take on the talents of some of the last elephant trackers, and then a hundred or so miles into Angola; first with 4x4's, then when the tracks run out and it becomes too impassable, switching to bikes and finally on foot.  Along the way they contend with impassable terrain, poisonous snakes and spiders, and prey animals stalking them down.  

Whether they find the elephants is less the point than the journey and the subjects covered along the way.  Content warning: This is not a film for the squeamish.  Lots of animal carcases left from previous expeditions and hunts, and some of the stock footage from days when elephants and similar sized beasts were hunted for sport will not soon leave my mind.  If you can stomach it, Ghost Elephants is equal parts entertaining and sobering. 7.5/10

If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (US) (wiki)

To round out a busy day, here is an unusual one.  Therapist Linda is in way over her head.  Husband Charles (played randomly by Christian Slater who is for most of the film a disembodied voice on the phone) is not around, her daughter needs nightly care that involves pumping gunk into her stomach by drip tube, and a water leak from the apartment above has just broken through, leaving a massive, ominous hole and lots of damage.  Her fellow therapist (played even more randomly by Conan O'Brien) is little use and more interested in his own stories than hers, and a steady stream of half-witted patients darken her door at regular intervals to tell them how bad their life is.  At rock bottom, she moves into a motel room while she fights helplessly with the landlord to get things fixed.

A person at absolute rock bottom with the entire world seemingly against them is going to have their perception of reality warped; and we are along for the ride.  The endless days melt into one another, the hole begins to take on a life of its own, and how Linda avoids a complete nervous breakdown is beyond me.

A study into the mind of a woman on the edge; getting little or no support from the people in her life, the perils of being a mother to a child in need, and the effect that mental slide into madness, seen from the eyes of a victim.  It's an odd, disconcerting film with a dark streak of humour, but with powerful images and a lot to say. 7.5/10

Leeds Film Festival 2025 - Day 10

Follies (Ca) (wiki)

Francois and Julie have been coasting for a while now.  Sixteen pretty good years under their belt and two adorable daughters, but somewhere under the calm, day to day waters, dissatisfaction stirs.

The touch paper is lit during a conversation which can only be described as 'frank and liberated' during a dinner with Francoir's younger and less embaggaged friend and his partner.  Stirring something within him, he makes a pitch for a more open relationship to try and get back the spark.

 

But choices are many and varied in this new world, and the rules carefully laid down at the start may end up biting him in the backside, safe word or not.

Follies is not for the faint hearted, sexytime-wise.  A lot of bare flesh (and not just in pairs) is on show as these guys explore their kinks, and they're far from alone in what appears to be a super-liberal suburb somewhere in French Canadia.  It would seem that North (North) America is quite the hot bed of people getting it on in all sorts of ways behind closed doors through into the small hours.  

 

The film explores this and it's relation to polygamy, and asks the question, if you were to let it all go, to really see what there is out there, so see what it is that got your juices fizzing, would you go for it, and what happens to that which went before?  Now if you'll excuse me, I think I need to go into a darkened room.  7.5/10

A Poet (Col/Ger/Swe) (wiki)

Oscar Restrepo is a child, stunted from without and within by his mother's willingness to do everything for him, and Oscar's own inability to do more than the absolute minimum otherwise needed to live.  He drinks to a stupor, has no job, and his ex-wife and daughter want nothing to do with him.

 

Things were not always this way, as his two published poetry books attest, but they were a long time ago, and Oscar is a shadow of the man that wrote them.  The rut he comfortably resides in while he perpetually promises the waiting world a third tome is deep, with cushioned edges.

But his sister who puts him up in the spare room has had enough. Use what little talent you have to teach poetry, or find somewhere else.

Reluctantly he accepts, but discovers amongst the disinterested faces a kindred spirit in Yurlady, a quiet young student with an aptitude for poetry.  Fired by his discovery, Oscar makes it his goal to nurture the talent, but his immaturity and impulsiveness to skip doing things by the books is about to land him in hot water.

A Poet is a tragedy with a dark comic edge.  Amateur actor Ubeimar Rios, seemingly plucked off the street and stuck in front of the camera, is a perfect fit as a man-child barely in control of his existence, bringing a lonely fragility to the part that felt written for him.   

It is a bit heavy on subtitles, especially when Oscar is drunkenly arguing his point with anyone who will listen, so it's a good idea not to sit too close to the screen, but beyond that, it's a fascinating portrait of a good man limited by his own inadequacies. 7.5/10

Leeds Film Festival 2025 - Day 8

Short film day!

 

Louis le Prince International Short Film Competition 3

Garan (Tur) - A farmer waits patiently at the border between two bickering states, waiting for his precious cows to be delivered to him, but as the border closes and the trucks depart, his delivery, on which his families livelihood depends, is still missing.  Desperately, he scours the dangers of the border in search of answers. 7.5 

Malicia (Gra/Col) - In rural Columbia, two youngsters take a bike ride to the scene of a previous shooting, where their friend, El Mono, perished. Death is around each corner and mourning is a luxury. 7 

Crumb (Ru) - An orphaned teen with learning difficulties works at a bakery in the hopes of one day breaking into society, but for the moment, his meager wage is spent with friends, buying clothes and trading nudie pictures.   A chance encounter with a female co-worker awakes something in him and his innocent attempts to try and woo her can't go unpunished in a cruel world where only crumbs come within reach 7

 

The End of the World (Peru/UK) - A strange, allegorical tale; the elderly Epifanio buries himself at the foot of the mountain whose avalanche killed so many of his village so many years ago.  Suddenly a child and back in the time of his parents, he spends what little time he has been given to reconnect and remember. 6

Honey, My Love, So Sweet (Phi)  - Two children begin to explore love, gender and the wider world in the shadow of their parents crumbling cinema.  It was a bit too cryptic for me. 5

Louis le Prince International Short Film Competition 4

Blue Heart (Hair/Fra) - While their son chases the American Dream half a world away, his father struggles with the care of his frail wife, who is recovering from a stroke.  They await a phone call to pep their spirits, but rarely do they get it.  A little abstract, it swings wildly between absurd Avant Garde and the quiet contemplation of love enduring all hurdles.  6

Ali (Ban/Phi) - A singing contest comes to a remote Bangladeshi town, and Ali can sing beautifully, but not in the 'right' way for his mother, whose imposed societal limitations force a perpetuation of in-grained self-persecution.  Ali wants to show the world who he is.  7

   

What if they Bomb Here Tonight? (Leb) - An unsettled night for a family in Lebanon; the father fixates on the glass in the windows above their bed, fearful of the planes overhead and the rolling news reports on the telly.  In the midst of this horrible situation, a darkly comedic tale appears. 8 

In Between Storms (PR) - Lost to a hurricane a year previous, Camplos lies in a coffin washed away by storms.  On the night before a new hurricane is about to hit Puerto Rico, Cheita, makes a desperate bid to retrieve the coffin from the rubble and bring it home safe.  A sobering tale of loss and resolution. 8

Cucumber (No/Jp) - A cute tale based upon a real Hikikomori - a term given to someone socially self-withdrawn - who on receiving a simple gift from a neighbour, spirals out of control thinking and overthinking about an appropriate response, armed with precisely zero social skills.  7.5

Dancing Pigeons (Swe/Fra) - Finally, a cautionary tale about a spiritualist, whose cocksure handling of a show at a local village goes out of control when a woman asks about a very specific person she lost.  Used to seeding the audience with vague hints to get a match, suddenly he needs to actually connect with a real soul or lose it all.  8

Fanomenon Short Film Competition 3

Grandma is Thirsty (UK) - Clearly channeling that episode of Don't Hug Me I'm Scared, a bullied boy is taken into a house by Bronte and Benny, two creepy kids who promise him they will stop the bullies.  I mean, they do... But... Ugh.  8

Em & Selma go Griffin Hunting (US) - Em and her mother live in an alternate America where the Griffin is a real creature, and the women of the community sanctify their womanhood by slaying one.  When Em has second thoughts at pulling the trigger, she is forced into a choice between tradition and ostracisation.  It was a little heavy handed with its points but nonetheless powerful. 7.5

Night Whispers (UK) - A man gets more than he bargained for when the woman he beds suddenly starts acting posessed.  A quick kip in the afterglow of a conquest starts to go horribly wrong.  7.5

Stomach Bug (UK) - A Cambodian father tries to stay connected to his distant daughter, whilst having to contend with a seriously distended stomach.  The docs seem disinterested, and then things start moving inside.  A bit of an icky one but very well done 7.5

Checkout (UK) - Agnes just wants a quiet life but her neighbour likes Martine McCutcheon just a bit too much for her thin walls to take.  But his music tastes will soon be the least of her problems when a trip to the shops turns into a fight for her life.  7.5

Plastic Surgery (UK) - Heavily pregnant surgeon Dr. Terra is seeing out her last days in the hospital before maternity leave, but a series of increasingly bizarre 'foreign object' emergencies, each involving plastic embedded in the body, spirals out of control.  A tense, uncomfortable thriller with a powerful message underneath. 8

Crowded Out (USA) - Stressed from work and trying to find a parking space remotely close to home, Owen ends up picking up a hitch-hiker who wastes no time picking apart his imperfections.  More and more hitch-hikers appear and things just turn into the weirdest way to die.  7

Leeds Music Video Competition

Despite the name, it contained videos from across the globe.  A quick rundown of the ones I managed to catch:

Check your Face - Okay Kaya - Smooth, sensual vocals overlay a very odd film depicting a body warped by film and cut in half.  7

A Little More Action - Yoann Roussin - A french version of the Elvis Presley classic, playing to an animated clash between rival police gangs, seeing who can abuse the most protesters, as the rest of us look the other way. 8

Heute Ist Mein Tag - Hanningbarna - A company mandated training course accompanied by some angry screaming metal went better than you might think. 7

Julie - Horsegirl -  A really nice indie song using animated scenes of nature, let down a little by the repetitiveness of the visuals. 7.5

Avalanche - Monolink - Two revellers retrieve their clothing on their separate walks home after what was clearly a wild night. 6

Buddha Was a Rich Boy - That Handsome Devil - madness and anarchy await a pair of young children as they gatecrash a gig in a pub toilet helmed by a madman.  Over the top but fun. 7

 

Lost in Space - Foster the People - My personal favourite, a very 80's feel with elements of The Human League and Bryan Ferry to it.  Gonna find out more about these guys. 8

GOD SAVE THE PONY - BIG SPECIAL - The band members are ponies in an office space setting, which predictably descends into chaos. 7

At Dawn - Pit Pony - Irish rockers Pit Pony give us a fast-paced ballad about being the odd one out in a relationship. 7

Ruth - Nick Leng - A nice, slow ode to a love of a life with a nostalgic feel.  I can find the tune, but not the video. 7.5

 

Panic Shack - Girl Band Starter Pack - The band swap with a quartet of drag queens for a romp around the city streets. 7

Invincibility - Alabaster DePlume - Bit of a weepie as a dog is fatally injured and both mum and distraught daughter take it to the vet for the last time.  A melancholy tune accompanies the sad event.  7

ITS JUST LIFE - GANS - The humdrum of the daily work trudge.  Wake, work, repeat, played as a trippy hallucination and a nod to the post-punk of the early 80's. 7

Company Culture - Lambrini Girls - As with GANS, the Labbrini Girls are channeling The Divine Comedy's Office Politics, but with more chaos and destruction.  The girls let loose with anger at the abuse and perpetual glass ceilings all too familiar to women up and down the country. 7

The Deep Blue Okay - Self Esteem - Done in a single take, one woman describes passionately what it is to be a complicated, stressed, overworked woman in todays society, and how she manages to try again the next day.  Powerful.  8

That Summer In Paris (Fr) (wiki)

My only full-length film of the day.  Blandine, a thirty-something has taken time out from her quiet, seaside setting in Normandy, to travel to bustling, noisy Paris.  Bustlingier and noisier than usual, she is here to see the 2024 Olympics.  The plan was to see it with her girlfriend, but they split up just before, and she didn't want to waste the ticket, so here she is, with an oversized backpack for company.

It wouldn't be a film about finding ones self if there wasn't a cluster of mishaps, and poor Blandine can't catch a break.  Barred from using her swimming ticket due to her backpack, and kicked out of her 18-30 hostel for being a day too old, she finds herself at the doorstep of Julie, her half-sister.  They haven't seen each other for a long time, before their father died in fact, but taking pity on Blandine, Julie allows her to kip on the sofa rather than leave home early.

The film tells a warm-hearted story of one person's personal discovery about themselves, but not in the ways you might expect from such a film, which I found refreshing.  Blandine finds not companionship, but an understanding of herself and where she wants to be in the lives of others; an angle to this sort of film I haven't really seen before, and I found it satisfying that Blandine found what made her content. 7.5/10 

Leeds Film Festival 2025 - Day 4

Our Land (UK) (site)

The subject matter of Our Land is not something I had paid much attention to.  There is a movement in the England called Right to Roam, and it concerns the rights, or lack thereof, in this country for people to basically walk anywhere in the countryside, with a focus on the massive country estates, the properties owned for generations by families whose ancestors paid for the land using the wealth generated by colonial acquisitions centuries prior.  When the film began, this main argument I found a little weak - we have public footpaths, bridleways and rights of way criss-crossing the countryside; you can barely go five minutes down a road without seeing a public footpath sign - so why do we need to be able to tramp across bramble filled fields deep inside country estates risking being shot when we're 'mistaken' for a pheasant?

But the beauty of this film is that it has a slow, persuasive push towards a change of mind, or at least an openness to see the argument.  A tiny fraction - 8% - of land is publicly accessible in England and Wales, and 1% of the population owns a staggering half of the land.  This has been brewing for a thousand years or more, going back to William the Conqueror times, when the common land was carved up and attributed to the wealthier parts of society, giving us the patchwork quilt of walled property we have today.  But why does property ownership mean a right to exclude people from that land?  From experiencing the beauty and the calm, the nature and the restorative qualities therein that a single person owning many hectares has decided it is for his enjoyment alone?

I did not know for instance that in Scotland, the 2003 Land Reform Act among other things underlined the basic right for people to not be excluded from the land.  This right goes hand in hand with the requirement that people do so responsibly - close gates, pick up litter, dogs on leads etc as you might expect, and Right to Roam has campaigned for the same in England and Wales.

Our Land provides both sides with the opportunity to make their points, and I found myself sympathising with aspects of both the right to roam movement, and the owners of the estates that commendably agreed to be part of the film.  One in particular was almost comical in his caricature of an upper class twit looking down his nose at the prolls, coming onto his land and dropping litter, but even he was given the room to show a side for which I had some sympathy; indeed the landowners generally made a sensible enough point that some middle ground can be achieved.  However you interpret the argument, Our Land leaves the camera on the subjects to make, or fail to make their point, and the audience is left largely to decide. If nothing else, it is a celebration of something this country still can be proud of - it's beauty.  8/10

Dragonfly (UK) (wiki)

Out on a lonely council estate somewhere in Yorkshire, widowed pensioner Elsie (played by Brenda Blethyn, gaining a BAFTA for her part) sits quietly as the nurses come and go to her bungalow.  Next door, Colleen (a seriously chavved-up Andrea Riseborough) sits aimlessly watching the TV.  Jobless and on benefits, her oversized dog brings her what little meaning her life has, as she scours the internet for images of a better life.

 

Spotting an in, Colleen sees an opening to get closer to Elsie, who is less than attached to the rolling carousel of faces that come to make her tea and give her a shower; Colleen, once only a noise next door becomes a much needed constant in Elsie's life, perhaps even a replacement for her distant son.  But is Colleen purely there to lend a hand and be a good neighbour?

Dragonfly keeps things purposefully ambiguous, subverting the expectations we place on the character of Colleen and playing on the viewers' preconceptions of someone who 'looks like that'.  Colleen is no angel for sure, but is her malevolent intention clear cut?  The strength of the film is in this ambiguity which lasts in the mind long past the credits, leaving the viewer with questions of their own about how they see others. 8/10

The Thing With Feathers (UK) (wiki)

As we join Dad, an unnamed father to two young boys, he has returned from the cremation of his wife, who died suddenly and without warning.  It quickly becomes clear that while he was an artist and author, she was the mother and took care of the house.  Predictably, this results in a deterioration of the family routine.

But Dad also starts experiencing strange, malevolent things; crows crashing into the window, ominous messages on his phone.  Someone out there does not take pity on him, and wants him to know.  

 

This film had me pretty much from the start.  Having two sons of my own made me realize what I have and how much could be lost in an instant; and as a study in grief, despair and eventual acceptance, The Thing With Feathers takes you on an emotional hollowing out and reconstruction with some of the best film-making I've seen in a long time.  Benedict Cumberbatch (who plays Dad) should be on for some awards here, as he embodies the part of the troubled father struggling with the breakdown of his own mind, the viewer never quite sure where the reality ends and the hallucinations begin.  

Hands down the best film of the festival so far. 8.5/10

One of Us (FR) (leedsfilm)

Lille, France is the location of an unassuming little building.  Inside, a handful of volunteers from disparate backgrounds help with the asylum claims of LGBT people, fleeing persecution in any one of the many countries that still, explicitly or not, permit and even endorse the persecution and even execution of such people.

Gaining asylum isn't easy.  First you need to apply to OFPRA (the Office for Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons), telling them via interview your experiences of persecution, the consequences you would face if you returned, and to prove to them, somehow, that your sexuality is what you claim it to be.  Should they be unconvinced, a second chance appeal with the CNDA (National Court of Asylum) provides a lifeline.  But all this is a challenge to someone who has just arrived often with minimal possessions and sometimes unable to speak French, which the application must be in.  These volunteers help to coach the applicants to give them the best chance at passing these tests.  As the film shows, they also provide a place of solace and safety, perhaps hitherto missing from their life.

Watching silently, this documentary follows several brave applicants who, after fleeing persecution and making it to France, agree to have their experiences laid out, not just for the OFPRA examiner, but for the film as well, many in the hope that they will help others by doing so.  Not all are successful in their application.

In an ideal world, this sort of film should be accessible to show people on the fence about asylum seekers, or gay people, to watch, and see, and put a human face to the faceless numbers we see in the news.  This film could do an awful lot of good if the right eyes saw it. 7.5/10

Dead Lover (CA/US) (wiki)

In a strange, dark nether-verse, a lonely gravedigger shovels the soil, and since she picks up the stink of every body she buries, she ain't so hot with the guys.  That is until a poet with a bit of a kink for that sort of thing comes along, and they fall in love; one that is tragically cut short by his drowning at sea, leaving her with only a severed finger to remember him by.  Cue a comedic variation on the Frankenstein story, where she uses her knowledge of plants and bodies to bring him back to life, of a sort.  

By coincidence, the two main leads of this ultra low-budget film are Grace Glowicki and Ben Petri, who also starred in Honey Bunch, a much more enjoyable experience which benefits from the extra time and money clearly missing from this one.  All parts are played by four actors, and everything is shot as if it were a Hammer knock-off from fifty years ago.  Garth Meringhi did it 20 years ago, and better.

That feels cruel.  The players put their all into the film, and it is clearly a passion project, albeit existing as it does on a shoestring that uses whatever props they could find (the moon is a piece of paper that retains the crease from where it was clearly folded to cut a semicircle for heavens sake).  I wanted to like it, and I did chuckle in a couple of places - Glowicki stands out with a committed if not especially funny turn as the gravedigger - but it just seemed to run out of steam as the third act kicked off and it kind of stumbled with little sense towards an unsatisfying conclusion.  Its a shame that the day that was full of cracking films, ended on one that was so fair-to-middling. 6/10