Actress, writer, and comedian Miriam Margolyes and American filmmaker Lloyd Kaufman have been named recipients of the 2026 Raindance Icon Awards, part of the festival’s 34th edition running from 17–26 June in London. Margolyes will receive her award at the Raindance Opening Gala on 17 June, following the UK premiere of April X (dir. Michel…
Tag: raindance film festival
Raindance Film Festival Returns to London with Bold Line-Up of Indie Voices and Global Stories
The Raindance Film Festival returns to London from 17–26 June for its 34th edition, presenting one of its most wide-ranging programmes to date. This year’s programme includes 85 narrative and documentary features alongside 112 short films, with more than half of the feature selection coming from first-time directors. The festival also expands its immersive strand,…
BIFA Raindance Maverick Award 2024 Longlist Announced
Britain’s largest independent film festival, Raindance, stands as a lighthouse for maverick filmmakers who bring creativity, resourcefulness, and boldness on a limited budget. Celebrating these intrepid talents, Raindance introduced the Raindance Maverick Award in 1998 at the British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs), an award that continues to honor visionary filmmakers working under a budget of…
26th Raindance Film Festival: Princesita Review
Somewhere in the southern Chile, in a rural commune that seems to be perpetually bathed in the sun, a 12-year-old Tamara (Sara Caballero) is growing up in a seemingly free manner. The sun for her seems to be not so much the outside source of light, but a person – everything she knows and everything…
26th Raindance Film Festival: We the Kings Review
Reportedly around 94,000 children in the UK were living in care in 2016. A number that is only on the rise. With children in care four times more likely to suffer from mental health issues, and if left in care sixty times more likely to end up homeless upon leaving, it’s an issue that is…
The 25th Raindance Film Festival: In Conversation with Rade and Danilo Šerbedžija, Directors of ‘The Liberation of Skopje’
Rade Šerbedžija, born in Bunić, Yugoslavia (now Croatia), is a well-established actor with over 180 (!) film credits. He began his career after graduating from the Academy of Dramatic Arts of the University of Zagreb. He started to perform in films while he was a student, while he also performed at the Gavella Drama Theatre and at…
The 25th Raindance Film Festival: The Liberation of Skopje Review
When on April 17th 1941, Kingdom of Yugoslavia fell under the Nazi Germany and its allies, the nearby Kingdom of Bulgaria and the lives of those living in the country were severely disrupted. Dušan Jovanović (Born 1939), a theatre director, essayist and playwright, used the aforementioned events as an interesting subject in his 1977 play…
The 25th Raindance Film Festival: Scaffolding Review
Matan Yair taught literature in Israel for almost a decade before he switched to film-making. While teaching the subject, he came across individuals from various backgrounds – including challenging youngsters. Matan Yair believed that he could inspire his pupils by letting them follow their own path of self-discovery. One of his students was Asher – his…
The 25th Raindance Film Festival: Siblings Review
There are over 11 million of unauthorised immigrants in the United States, including 5.6 million Mexicans who labour in fields, restaurant kitchens and factories. When not caught and sent to detention centres and courts, they try to survive under the radar, away from immigration officers while chasing their “American Dream”. The Founding Fathers may have…
The 25th Raindance Film Festival Programme Announced
Raindance Film Festival, the largest independent film festival in Europe, is returning for its 25th anniversary edition this year; it is slotted from September 20th to October 1st 2017, with its venue in Central London – and just yesterday, on August 15th 2017, the festival announced its 25th line-up of over 200 feature and short films. For…
The 24th Raindance Film Festival: Five Days on Lesvos
“The world is facing an unprecedented displacement crisis,” European Commission has said. The EU has been discussing the aforementioned issue for months; however, their help is inadequate to deal with the rising numbers of dislodged people who are predominantly refugees from war-torn countries such as Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq. Many people arrive in the EU after…
In Conversation with Kai Barry, director of ‘Rogue Agent’
American filmmaker Kai Barry is the brains behind Rogue Agent, the gritty spy thriller that opened last year’s Raindance Film Festival and is now available to watch in cinemas. Starring Bafta award-winning actor James Floyd, the film is about Alex, a newly recruited contractor who is framed for killing his team when a mission goes wrong….
The 22nd Raindance Film Festival: Panic Review
Desperation can make people do crazy things – and there’s no greater demonstration of that than Sean Spencer’s Panic. With London as its backdrop, Panic is a study in urban isolation, desperation, and London’s ghost community through music journalist Andrew Deeley’s subjective lens. Influences from Hitchcock’s classic Rear Window are immediately obvious, reminiscent in Deeley…
VIEW OF THE ARTS 