The London Film Festival is usually the highlight of any capital-based cinephile’s year, and 2023 has been no exception. With new films from Martin Scorsese, Emerald Fennel, Hayao Miyazaki and Aardman Animations, the rest of 2023 (and early 2024) is looking jam-packed with all that lovely cinematic goodness we know and love. For 99.99% of the UK, however, the goings on at LFF will have completely passed you by. Helpfully, we’ve been eschewing sleep and overdosing on caffeine to see as many of the festival’s offerings as possible – and have found the very best bits coming to cinemas and streamers over the next few months. The sacrifices we make for this job… Counter to last year’s festival (and much of the awards season that followed), the film industry seems to have planted its feet firmly in the feel-good camp this year. While serious dramatic fare like Killers Of The Flower Moon, One Life and All Of Us Strangers have earned some well-deserved praise, these are the exceptions rather than the rule; Richard Linklater’s Hit Man, Alexander Payne’s The Holdovers and Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things have all received rapturous receptions across the board, and none of them take themselves all that seriously. Throw the delightful Chicken Run: Dawn Of The Nugget and a wider revival of the romantic genre into the mix, and this winter is looking to be a lot more cheerful than we’ve seen for some time. Is the wider variety of films on display the sign of a healthier cinema industry? Maybe. In a year where Barbie, Oppenheimer and The Super Mario Bros. Movie have torn up the modern blockbuster rulebook, there’s a very real sense that the adult cinema audience is up for grabs for the first time in half a decade. Though the ongoing Hollywood actors’ strike has thrown a bit of a spanner in the star-driven works, 2023 increasingly feels like it could be a turning point within the industry. Without further ado, then, here are the best new films coming to the UK after the London Film Festival. Reckon we’ve overlooked something? Shout angrily at us in the comments (please don’t, we will cry).
LFF 2023 round-up | Best new films coming this winter
The London Film Festival is usually the highlight of any capital-based cinephile’s year, and 2023 has been no exception. With new films from Martin Scorsese, Emerald Fennel, Hayao Miyazaki and Aardman Animations, the rest of 2023 (and early 2024) is looking jam-packed with all that lovely cinematic goodness we know and love. For 99.99% of the UK, however, the goings on at LFF will have completely passed you by. Helpfully, we’ve been eschewing sleep and overdosing on caffeine to see as many of the festival’s offerings as possible – and have found the very best bits coming to cinemas and streamers over the next few months. The sacrifices we make for this job… Counter to last year’s festival (and much of the awards season that followed), the film industry seems to have planted its feet firmly in the feel-good camp this year. While serious dramatic fare like Killers Of The Flower Moon, One Life and All Of Us Strangers have earned some well-deserved praise, these are the exceptions rather than the rule; Richard Linklater’s Hit Man, Alexander Payne’s The Holdovers and Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things have all received rapturous receptions across the board, and none of them take themselves all that seriously. Throw the delightful Chicken Run: Dawn Of The Nugget and a wider revival of the romantic genre into the mix, and this winter is looking to be a lot more cheerful than we’ve seen for some time. Is the wider variety of films on display the sign of a healthier cinema industry? Maybe. In a year where Barbie, Oppenheimer and The Super Mario Bros. Movie have torn up the modern blockbuster rulebook, there’s a very real sense that the adult cinema audience is up for grabs for the first time in half a decade. Though the ongoing Hollywood actors’ strike has thrown a bit of a spanner in the star-driven works, 2023 increasingly feels like it could be a turning point within the industry. Without further ado, then, here are the best new films coming to the UK after the London Film Festival. Reckon we’ve overlooked something? Shout angrily at us in the comments (please don’t, we will cry).