HORROR AT THE LONDON FILM FESTIVAL
1/10/2022
 Ginger Nuts of Horror brings you news of some of the horror movies at this year's London Film Festival. We have kindly added a link to purchase tickets to the films at the end of each listing. The Festival runs 5 to 16 October in cinemas around the UK and from 14 to 23 October on the BFI Player For full details of the films on show please follow this link The Eternal Daughter – Thurs 06 Oct 21:20, Fri 07 Oct 15:15 (Southbank Centre, Royal Festival Hall)“Joanna Hogg returns to the LFF with an enthralling ghost story, featuring an astonishing performance by her The Souvenir and The Souvenir Part II (LFF 2021) collaborator Tilda Swinton.” Director-Screenwriter Joanna Hogg Producers Ed Guiney, Emma Norton, Andrew Lowe, Joanna Hogg With Tilda Swinton, Joseph Mydell, Carly-Sophia Davies UK-USA 2022. 96min Sales A24 Language English  Shot in secret during lockdown, the details of this project have been kept under wraps. To share too much would spoil some of the pleasure in decoding its riddles. Suffice to say The Eternal Daughter centres on a middle-aged filmmaker (Swinton) and her mother who spend a few nights in an old country hotel, a location that holds meaning for them both. It’s an intricately layered piece about motherhood, memory and loss, dressed up as a gothic chiller. Swirling mist, looming shadows, a ghostly presence half-glanced in a window… embracing some of the heightened stylistic flourishes seen in The Souvenir Part II, The Eternal Daughter takes Hogg into exciting new territory, while retaining her distinctive naturalistic signature. The film exists entirely as its own deeply enthralling and moving drama, but fans of the filmmaker’s recent work will also find it a puzzle-box of meta-textual delights. Coma (Dare Strand) – Weds 05 Oct 18:30 (Prince Charles Cinema), Thurs 06 Oct 21:00 (BFI Southbank, NFT2)“The dreams and nightmares of a teenager in lockdown are imagined in this darkly funny and nightmarish new film from Zombi Child (LFF 2019) director Bertrand Bonello.” Director-Screenwriter Bertrand Bonello Producers Justin Taurand, Bertrand Bonello With Louise Labeque, Julia Faure, Louis Garrel France 2022. 80min Sales Best Friend Forever Language French With English subtitles  Locked indoors, a teenage girl passes time in a state of limbo. She follows the channel of a mysterious YouTuber called Patricia Coma. FaceTime chats with girlfriends with whom she shares a passion for serial killers are interspersed with stop-motion animations of talking Barbie dolls and a VR perspective inside a terrifying forest; the juxtaposition of these elements creates an unsettling and disorienting observation on growing up in our troubled times. Where is the line between reality and an imagined world? Introduced by Bonello as letter to his 18-year-old daughter, Coma is a hugely creative, genre-bending and multi-layered film. The last entry in his trilogy on youth, it conveys the angst and guilt of living in a ‘sick’ world while conveying faith in the creative power of a younger generation. Attachment (Cult Strand) – Sat 08 Oct 20:15 (BFI Southbank, NFT3 SOLD OUT), Sun 09 Oct 15:40 (Prince Charles Cinema)“In this slow-burn horror, a Danish woman is forced to reckon with her girlfriend’s family secrets when she moves with her to London’s Orthodox Jewish community.” Director-Screenwriter Gabriel Bier Gislason Producer Thomas Heinesen With Josephine Park, Ellie Kendrick, Sofie Gråbøl Denmark 2022. 105min UK distribution Shudder Language English, Danish With English subtitles  Maja and Leah’s relationship starts with a romcom meet-cute. Maja, struggling with her acting career, is reading to kids in the Danish library that academic Leah is researching in. It’s love at first sight, so when Leah has an accident and is forced to move home to London, Maja’s all too keen to move with her. But the relationship quickly transforms into a worst nightmare scenario when Leah’s overbearing mother Chana, who lives in the flat below them, seems insistent on driving a wedge between the couple. Who is Chana trying to protect – Leah or herself? Bypassing traditional scares for creeping paranoia and rooted deeply in Jewish folklore, ATTACHMENT is a refreshing, queer horror film with a compelling central couple you’ll want to root for. The Kingdom Exodus (Cult Strand) – Thurs 13 Oct 20:50 (Curzon Mayfair, Screen 1), Sat 15 Oct 20:15 (BFI Southbank, NFT2)“Lars von Trier returns with the long-awaited third season of his landmark supernatural hospital drama, 25 years after the first series aired.” Episodes 1 and 2 Series Creator-Director Lars Von Trier Producer Louise Vesth Screenwriter Lars von Trier, Niels Vørsel With Mikael Persbrandt, Lars Mikkelsen, Bodil Jørgensen Denmark 2022. 120min UK distribution MUBILanguage Danish, Swedish, Latin With English subtitles  In 1994, Von Trier directed two seasons of wildly singular television, set in the neurosurgical ward of a Copenhagen hospital where something evil lurks. Returning to this world, The Kingdom Exodus sees the filmmaker on playful metatextual form as he has Karen (Bodil Jørgensen), a sleepwalker and fan of the original TV show, searching for the truth. These episodes are deeply in dialogue with the ones that came before, referencing and mirroring events we’ve already seen (a quick refresher prior to viewing wouldn’t go amiss). It features many of the original cast members, alongside newcomers that include Mikael Persbrandt (Sex Education) and guest star Alexander Skarsgård. This is a wild and wily piece of work, with the provocative Von Trier continuing to plough his own distinctive furrow. New Normal (Cult Strand) – Sat 15 Oct 20:50 (ODEON Luxe West End, Screen 1 SOLD OUT), Sat 15 Oct 21:05 (ODEON Luxe West End, Screen 2 SOLD OUT), Sun 16 Oct 14:50 (Prince Charles Cinema)“Six tales of loneliness, romance and brutal murder interconnect in this ingenious horror-comedy set in social media-obsessed, post-pandemic Seoul.” Director-Screenwriter JUNG Bum-shik Producers PARK Min-woo, CHOI Jin With CHOI Ji-woo, LEE Yu-mi, CHOI Min-ho South Korea 2022. 112min Certificate LFF 18 Sales UNPA STUDIOS Language Korean With English subtitles  The portmanteau horror film hasn’t been in fashion for a while now, but this riotous midnight-movie cracker from South Korea’s Jung Bum-shik is a cool throwback to the genre’s 60s British heyday. Unspooling in discrete chapters, starting with the story of a vulnerable woman being creeped out by a leery handyman in her apartment late at night, it seems at first to be a series of vignettes inspired by the strangeness of lockdown. By the third chapter things start to become far stranger – characters return and their stories impact on each other’s in ever more macabre ways. After that, it’s up to the viewer to piece it all together. New Normal combines the feral fun of Damián Szifron’s Wild Tales with the whip-smart jigsaw storytelling of Doug Liman’s Go. NightMare (Cult Strand) – Tues 11 Oct 20:45 (ODEON Luxe West End, Screen 1), Tues 11 Oct 21:00 (ODEON Luxe West End, Screen 2), Weds 12 Oct 20:45 (ICA, Screen 1), Sun 16 Oct 20:35 (Curzon Soho Cinema, Screen 3)“Like the 3am screams of a new-born, this chilling Norwegian pregnancy horror is guaranteed to give you sleepless nights.” Director-Screenwriter Kjersti Helen Rasmussen Producers Einar Loftesnes, John Einar Hagen With Eili Harboe, Herman Tømmeraas, Dennis Storhøi Norway-France 2022. 100min UK distribution ShudderLanguage Norwegian With English subtitles  Life is good for Mona and Robby. Having just moved into their new apartment, and with Robby landing his dream job, the young couple have much to celebrate. News of Mona’s pregnancy should be the icing on their happiness cake, but the expectant mother finds herself plagued with bad dreams, which intensify following the tragic death of their neighbour’s baby. As nightmares seep into reality, Mona becomes convinced that the demon of her dreams has its sights set on her unborn child. From the high-class chills of Rosemary’s Baby to the exploitation thrills of It’s Alive, the horror genre has proved a fertile breeding ground for exploring antenatal anxieties. With her thrillingly assured, deliciously unnerving debut, Kjersti Helen Rasmussen definitively proves there are few things more terrifying than the impending pressures of motherhood. CHECK OUT TODAY'S OTHER ARTICLES BELOW
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