BFI London Film Festival Marks Its 70th Edition with Awards and Closing Gala

The 70th BFI London Film Festival drew to a close on Sunday 18 October 2026, celebrating its anniversary with the announcement of its Best Film Award, chosen by a jury led by American documentary filmmaker Sam Pollard. Ten films competed in the official competition, including Carol Morley's semi-autobiographical "7 Miles Out" (UK), Sergei Loznitsa's archival epic "Imperium" (Germany-France-Italy-Lithuania), Hirokazu Kore-eda's "Look Back" (Japan), Rubaiyat Hossain's co-production "The Difficult Bride" (France-Bangladesh and others), May el-Toukhy's "Woman Unknown" (Denmark-Latvia-Sweden), Benjamín Naishtat's "Glaxo" (Brazil-Argentina), and Małgorzata Szumowska and Michał Englert's "The Idiot(s)" (Germany-Poland, featuring Aimee Lou Wood), among others. The ten competing films represented ten countries spanning four continents. Additional awards announced on the day included the Sutherland Trophy for best debut feature and the Grierson Award for documentary. The festival's closing-night gala screened the UK premiere of Jesse Eisenberg's musical comedy "The Debut," starring Eisenberg, Julianne Moore and Paul Giamatti, at the Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank. The festival opened on 7 October with Simon Stone's "Elsinore" and featured its LFF Expanded strand of nine immersive-art, VR and gaming projects alongside the main competition.