The 2025 BFI London Film Festival opened on Wednesday night with Rian Johnson’s Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, setting a lively start to this year’s edition. The red carpet at London’s Royal Festival Hall was a scene of glamour as Daniel Craig returned as detective Benoit Blanc, joined by an ensemble cast including Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Cailee Spaeny, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, and Daryl McCormack.
Festival director Kristy Matheson introduced the film before Johnson and his cast took the stage. When asked whether he digs deeper into Blanc with each installment, Craig replied with trademark wit: “No is the answer,” drawing laughter from the audience.
Brolin, who plays the film’s antagonist — a morally corrupt priest named Monsignor Jefferson Wicks — called his role “a thrill,” adding, “Rian is an amazing writer and an amazing director, so when you get the call to play the worst person cinema has ever seen, you say yes.”
The star-studded screening drew names like Greta Gerwig and Andrew Lloyd Webber, as the audience responded warmly to Johnson’s two-hour murder-mystery comedy.
Daniel Craig’s A Knives Out Mystery’ Wins Over London Audience
Following its earlier world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, the London crowd echoed the same enthusiasm. Variety’s Owen Gleiberman praised the film as “an enticingly clever and droll, nearly pitch-perfect piece of murder-mystery fun,” calling it the sharpest entry since the 2019 original Knives Out.
The film follows Blanc as he investigates a power-hungry priest and his devout congregation — a setup that allows Johnson to blend satire, suspense, and dark humor. Wake Up Dead Man releases in theatres on November 26, before streaming on Netflix from December 12.
LFF 2025 Showcases Global Cinema and New Experiments
Running from October 8 to 19, the 69th BFI London Film Festival features 247 films from 79 countries, balancing major premieres with bold international works. While Knives Out 3 delivered the opening-night buzz, much of the festival’s texture comes from its diversity — from acclaimed auteurs to first-time directors exploring new cinematic forms.
Among the most talked-about titles is Park Chan-Wook’s No Other Choice, a satire on corporate life that fuses slapstick absurdity with biting social critique. Shot by longtime collaborator Kim Woo-hyung, the film has already earned acclaim at Venice and Toronto.
Equally anticipated is Kristen Stewart’s directorial debut, The Chronology of Water — an adaptation of Lidia Yuknavitch’s addiction memoir. Stewart’s shift behind the camera signals a raw, personal approach to filmmaking that’s generating strong early buzz.
From China, Bi Gan’s Resurrection offers a cinematic experiment told across six chapters, each representing a different era of film history. Meanwhile, Tsou Shih-Ching’s Left-Handed Girl — co-written by Sean Baker — uses an iPhone camera to tell a multigenerational story of three women reconnecting in Taipei.
Social Realities Take Center Stage
A handful of films at this year’s festival turn a direct gaze toward real-world crises. Kaouther Ben Hania’s The Voice of Hind Rajab, based on a true story from Gaza, documents the killing of a five-year-old Palestinian girl amid the ongoing war. The Tunisian filmmaker, twice nominated for an Oscar, uses the docudrama format to capture both the horror and helplessness of modern conflict.
These politically charged stories sit alongside more commercial offerings, creating a lineup that reflects the range and contradictions of global cinema today.
Closing Film: 100 Nights of Hero Brings a Poetic End
The 2025 BFI London Film Festival will conclude with Julia Jackman’s 100 Nights of Hero, a feminist fantasy adaptation of Isabel Greenberg’s acclaimed graphic novel. The closing film’s imaginative tone offers a reflective counterpart to the festival’s wide thematic range — from Hollywood spectacle to experimental narratives and political realism.
A Broader Picture of Contemporary Cinema
The 2025 edition of the London Film Festival captures a wide spectrum of filmmaking — from Rian Johnson’s sharp franchise sequel Wake Up Dead Man to Park Chan-Wook’s genre-blending satire and Kristen Stewart’s introspective debut.
Rather than emphasizing a single artistic vision, this year’s lineup underlines how cinema continues to evolve — through a mix of star-driven entertainment, boundary-pushing experiments, and socially conscious storytelling.
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