17 days of new films in venues and on Leeds Film Player
We love sharing films with audiences through Leeds International Film Festival and we are thrilled to be able to present a programme this year in venues and on our new streaming platform Leeds Film Player. Our regular programme sections for new films - Official Selection, Cinema Versa, Fanomenon, and Leeds Short Film Awards - return with the same dedication to diverse filmmaking from the UK and around the world.
We have worked very closely with our fantastic venue partners – Leeds Town Hall, Vue Cinemas and City Varieties in partnership with Hyde Park Picture House – to provide a safe LIFF 2020 experience and we are launching Leeds Film Player for anyone to view films from home anywhere in the UK. We can’t wait to share LIFF 2020 with you wherever you join us.
View What's On for all films in LIFF 2020.
View LIFF 2020 Festival Guide.
Official Selection
In Official Selection we present some of the most anticipated films of the year alongside exciting discoveries from new filmmaking talent. Don’t miss award-winners and audience favourites from other film festivals like our powerful opening film Sun Children from Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi and Chloé Zhao’s beautiful, lyrical Nomadland, which closes LIFF 2020. We are presenting UK Premieres for some of the most acclaimed films from the recent Venice Film Festival including Dear Comrades from Russian master Andrey Konchalovsky and Bosnian filmmaker Jasmila Žbanić’s remarkable Quo Vadis, Aida?. We are also delighted to present Yorkshire filmmaker Francis Lee’s eagerly-awaited Ammonite and The Trouble with Nature starring Leeds-born actor and musician Antony Langdon.
View films in Official Selection.
Cinema Versa
Cinema Versa encompasses a huge diversity of extraordinary global themes in this turbulent year. Documentary film has been immediate in its response to the Covid-19 pandemic and 76 Days is the definitive 2020 film from the frontline of the earliest days of the outbreak in Wuhan, China. Elsewhere we have the jaw-dropping tale of North Korean political intrigue in Assassins and intrigue on a smaller scale in an Argentine nursing home in The Mole Agent. There are profiles of two of the greatest filmmakers of all time, Stanley Kubrick and Andrey Tarkovsky, and unmissable music docs on industrial music pioneers Throbbing Gristle and David Byrne’s American Utopia.
Fanomenon
Fanomenon is the destination for genre fans looking for the latest in horror, fantasy, sci-fi, action, thriller and cult films. This year’s highlights include British films The Reckoning from Neil Marshall, sci-fi epic Dune Drifter from Marc Price – receiving its world physical premiere, and Damien McCarthy’s feature debut Caveat, a dark and disturbing psychological horror. The annual Fanomenon all-night horror marathon goes online with Night-in of the Dead, available on Leeds Film Player from Friday 13thNovember. European black comedies The Columnist and Delete History focus on the dangers of social media, while Wolfwalkers from the makers of Song of the Sea and Naoko Yamada’s anime Liz and the Blue Bird are among the highlights of the animation programme.
Leeds Short Film Awards
Short films have always been an integral and popular part of the LIFF experience and this year we are delighted to announce one of our largest selections yet, with 180 shorts from new filmmaking talent in 52 countries. The short film programmes include seven competitions as part of the Leeds Short Film Awards including the Oscar-qualifying International Short Film Competition and World Animation Competition. We are also presenting several exciting guest and panorama short film programmes including screenings of the nominees for the Film Africa 2020 Baobab Award.
View film programmes in Leeds Short Film Awards.
View the full list of short films selected for LIFF 2020.
Leeds Young Film Festival
Following the postponement of Leeds Young Film Festival earlier this year, we’re delighted to bring you a selection of the best family films that we couldn’t screen at Easter. The programme includes the beautifully animated comedy-drama The Bear’s Famous Invasion of Sicily - a treat for children and adults alike, fascinating documentaries including 2040, an eco-doc that looks at how we can address the climate emergency in a positive way, and the multi-award winning drama Romy’s Salon about a young girl dealing with her grandmother’s dementia. The programme includes a wonderful selection of films for children of all ages - even grown up ones!
View films in Leeds Young Film Festival
