Internationally recognised art and literary critic, writer and cultural producer. Published in ELLE, Glamour, Esquire and Cosmopolitan; member of the Union of Writers.
By Maria Bregman, writer, film and literary critic
By the time I reached the Royal Festival Hall, London had already come alive. The Southbank wore that festival glow: spotlights cutting through the evening haze, umbrellas like dark flowers along the pavement, programmes damp and curling at the edges, little puddles snagging flashes from cameras. I’d been at the morning press previews, where chatter drifted from one familiar name to the next – directors who keep returning, actors who somehow improve with each role. Now, under a steady, fine rain, the red carpet shone and shutters snapped like distant applause.
The choice for the night felt inevitable: Rian Johnson’s Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery. Daniel Craig returned as Benoit Blanc, steering a plot that tips its gothic leanings just enough to be felt but never to overwhelm. Standing among journalists and guests, you could sense the anticipation tighten – that collective inhale before the lights go down.
Inside, the crowd buzzed without excess. Glenn Close and Josh Brolin exchanged a few brisk, cordial words. Andrew Scott stopped to grin for photos. It was measured: glamorous, yes, but not theatrical; intimate where it needed to be. Just the right temperature.
Johnson’s film unravels on its own timetable. Darker and more contemplative than his last outing, it treats murder as a surface problem and morality as the deeper knot. Most of the audience sat utterly still; even the coughs seemed disciplined. When the credits rolled there was a pregnant pause, then the room released into applause. It’s the kind of picture that invites you to think, not just to react.
Back in the press room, opinions coalesced around a familiar line: “Johnson’s most layered work to date,” someone scribbled across a notebook. Praise gathered around Craig’s quieter beats – the small, almost private choices – and the cinematography: muted grays, candlelight that hardly flickers, tension that lives at the frame’s edges. For me it was the film’s rhythm – slow, confident – that allowed unease to creep in and then settle like dust.
Earlier screenings made one thing clear: this year prizes mood and texture. Over eleven days the festival will show 247 films from 79 countries, a lineup stretching from glossy international premieres to fragile debut documentaries. That breadth is what keeps London special; you can move from a lacquered red-carpet gala to a cramped first-time screening and still feel plugged into something larger.
The Royal Festival Hall remains the festival’s heartbeat, but energy spills out to BFI Southbank, Curzon Soho, Picturehouse Central and beyond. And thanks to the BFI Player, people who can’t be here in person still get to join the conversation – a practical change that stuck after the pandemic.
Usually the best moments live in the gaps: between carpet and cinema, between curtain call and the next drink. On opening night those gaps were full of small scenes – filmmakers deep in hushed debate in the foyer, volunteers darting past with radios, London’s own life leaking in through the doors.
The gala set the tone: confident without pretense. Wake Up Dead Man is both crowd-pleasing and stubbornly thought-provoking – exactly the sort of film the BFI likes to crown. As I left close to midnight I passed a knot of students arguing the ending. One shrugged and said, “It’s not about the mystery; it’s about what we choose to believe.” Maybe that sums up the film. Maybe it sums up the festival.
The BFI’s 69th edition has begun, and if opening night is anything to go by, it promises stories that linger long after the house lights come up.
