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September 2, 2015

From Suffragette to Steve Jobs: 9 films that have got us all excited for London Film Festival 2015

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Rebecca Lewis / Metro.co.uk

The 2015 BFI London Film Festival has been deemed the ‘Year of the Strong Women’. And we can see why.

From opening night film Suffragette to films such as Carol, focusing on two women who fall in love in mid-century America, and Brooklyn, which deals with one young girls struggle adapting to life in 1950’s America, the highs and lows of women throughout the years pepper the festival’s programme.

Now in its 58th year, the London Film Festival has become one of the most important film highlights in the calendar particularly with its position smack-bang at the beginning of awards season.

With that in mind, we take a look at nine films we’re most looking forward to at this year’s outing…

1. Suffragette

The London Film Festival hosts the European premiere of this year’s opening gala, Suffragette.

Timed for release 100 years after the height of the suffrage movement, the film stars UK heavyweights Helena Bonham Carter, Carey Mulligan, and Anne Marie Duff, as well as Meryl Streep and tells the compelling tale of the British women who, quite simply, changed history forever. As Carey Mulligan’s Maud puts it to you: ‘What you gonna do? Lock us all up? We’re in every home, we’re half the human race.

‘You can’t stop us all.’

Suffragette’s premiere will also screen live across the UK in select cinemas.

2. Carol

Hot off rave reviews from this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Carol is the intoxicating story based on Patricia Highsmith’s controversial 1952 novel The Price Of Salt.

Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara star as two women who against the odds courageously fall in love in a time when the norm told them it was wrong. But Todd Haynes’ direction never quite lets the audience get too comfortable as we see Cate’s Carol begin to lose her outside elegant poise as Rooney’s Therese gains confidence as their love blossoms.

3. Brooklyn

When a tragic event from her past disrupts her current happiness, a young girl from Ireland, now living in Brooklyn, must make one of the most heartbreaking decisions of her life.

Starring Saoirse Ronan, Emory Cohen and Domhnall Gleeson, Brooklyn is a stunning love letter to home and discovering that home isn’t always where we thought it was.

4. The Witch

Set years before the Salem Witch Trials, The Witch is a dark and chilling tale about one family who are banished from their plantation in New England and make a new life for themselves in the woods.

Paranoia and hysteria soon settle in when the youngest child goes missing – and what follows is a terrifying unsettling film filled with tension. The trailer alone is two minutes of horror that you can’t turn your head away from – who knows how the full film will make us feel.

5. Goosebumps

Everyone’s favourite series of horror books from the nineties (we were partial to the Give Yourself Goosebumps books) is back and with a big screen adaptation.

Premiering at the London Film Festival as part of the ‘Family’ strand, Goosebumps brings all of R.L Stine’s terrifying creations to life – including the creepy ventriloquist doll.

Jack Black takes on R.L Stine in what is certain to be one heck of an entertaining film.

Just don’t let the Say Cheese And Die camera make an appearance…

6. High Rise

Tom Hiddleston stars in what we are hoping will be one of the highlights of the London Film Festival – the premiere of Sightseers director Ben Wheatley’s High Rise.

Based on J.G. Ballard’s satirical novel, the film is a savage look at western society, following the inhabitants on a high rise block of flats which gives tenants all the conveniences of modern life – schools, supermarkets, swimming pools – so they never have to leave the building.

Sounds perfect but soon flaws in the building and flaws in human nature see the carefully constructed social norms fall to pieces as power and desire

7. Room

Based on Emma Donoghue’s 2010 best-selling novel, Room stars Brie Larson, one of America’s most promising young actresses (seriously, go and watch Short Term 12).

Brie stars as Ma, who keeps her son Jack entertained and educated as any mother can – despite the pair living in a hidden 11-square-foot room.

The book was one of the most moving in recent years and we feel certain that director Lenny Abrahamson (Frank, What Richard Did) will do exactly the same to this stunning story.

8. My Scientology Movie

Louis Theroux is back and this time with a new feature-length documentary on one of the most intriguing religions of the last 100 years – Scientology

It follows in the footsteps of the 2014 hit documentary Going Clear which saw ex-members speak out about the church and delved into the long and complicated history. However Louis is more concerned with how the church works in 2015.

Using the church’s own method of filming for intimidation, Louis attempts to enter headquarters – but finds himself at the centre of a film about Louis Theroux instead.

9. Steve Jobs

Michael Fassbender is the iconoclastic Apple founder Steve Jobs in Danny Boyle’s film based on the life and troubles of one of the most famous and inspiring men of the last thirty years and one who changed how we communicate forever.

With a script by Aaron Sorkin, Steve Jobs looks set to be an exhilarating and fast-paced ride with a performance by Kate Winslet as Steve’s long-suffering marketing chief of Macintosh, one of the only people able to challenge and gain Steve’s respect.

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