Film Festivals
![2016 BFI London Film Festival Highlights](https://www.filminquiry.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/bfi-lff.jpg)
The 60th annual London Film Festival has just drawn to a close, having shown 245 feature films from a number of different countries covering a plethora of genres. Not only that, but it has been a groundbreaking year with the British Film Institute (BFI) hosting a number of talks concerning diversity in the British film industry, while using the festival to announce the launch of its Black Star programme. It’s designed to celebrate and showcase the work of black film and television-makers in a series of talks, screenings and exhibitions running until the end of the year through a variety of theatrical and online platforms.
![TIFF Diary #5: The Long TIFF Closes](https://www.filminquiry.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Nocturnal-Animals.jpg)
The last weekend of TIFF is always bittersweet. On one hand, you’re so sleep-deprived from all the morning/early afternoon screenings that it’s a relief to have your regular schedule back in order. And yet, on the other, you feel a pang in your gut as you realize that the end is nigh – no more friendly crowds, no more of those endearingly irritating commercials, no more Q&As and no more beautiful venues to ogle over as you wait for the programmer to introduce the film (and TIFF has some cool programmers, too).
![](https://www.filminquiry.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Hema-Hema.jpg)
Hundreds of thousands of moviegoers, press, and industry players descend on Canada every year for the Toronto International Film Festival. Eleven days of red carpets, screenings, junkets, and presentations cause a gluttonous amount of content to stream out of the city, covering everything from awards season contenders to fashion faux pas. It’s difficult to imagine anything getting missed by the avalanche, but those who attend know just how immense the festival is.
![SOUTHBOUND: A Sojourn Into Redneck Americana](https://www.filminquiry.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/southbound.jpg)
The title of horror anthology Southbound implies a deep sojourn into racist, redneck Americana, locked and loaded under a blood red, lone star. This is a Democrat’s version of hell, ruled by Donald Trump’s tentacles and all of his Republican demons, suckered into building a never ending wall between America and the rest of the world. Southbound suggests a one-way ticket to Hades, but its various characters are still on their terrifying journeys, clutching desperately to their ever diminishing morality.
![The Wales International Documentary Festival: A Film Critic's Diary](https://www.filminquiry.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/thetouchofanangelfeat.jpg)
This year saw the very first Wales International Documentary Festival, which ran from 12th-14th May in the valleys of South Wales. Blackwood, to be more specific, north of Cardiff, and the home of the band Manic Street Preachers, the boxer Joe Calzaghe and the Dream Alliance race horse syndicate. They are, in fact, the very reason why the WIDF has found its home here.