Oscar-winning director Andrea Arnold will head up the official competition jury at this year’s 61st BFI London Film Festival. Emma Thomas, producer of “Dunkirk” and the Oscar-nominated “Inception,” will also serve on the jury.
The festival’s Best Film Award recognizes inspiring, inventive and distinctive filmmaking, with the jury selecting the winner from a short-list of 12 titles. Last year’s winner was Kelly Reichardt’s “Certain Women.”
Joining Arnold (pictured) and Thomas on the official competition jury are actors Eric Bana and Lily Cole; British-Iranian filmmaker Babak Anvari; programmer Ashley Clark; and Alexei Popogrebsky, head of directing at Moscow Film School.
This year’s official competition lineup comprises Robin Campillo’s “120 Beats Per Minute”; Vivian Qu’s “Angels Wear White”; Majid Majidi’s “Beyond the Clouds”; Nora Twomey’s “The Breadwinner”; Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra’s “Good Manners”; Xavier Beauvois’ “The Guardians”; Andrew Haigh’s “Lean On Pete”; Andrey Zvyagintsev’s “Loveless”; Azazel Jacobs’ “The Lovers”; Warwick Thornton’s “Sweet Country”; Cory Finley’s “Thoroughbreds”; and Annemarie Jacir’s “Wajib.”
Additional juries will decide winners in the festival’s First Feature, Documentary and Short Film competitions. Producer and composer Melissa Parmenter (“The Face of an Angel”) will head up the jury of the First Feature Competition this year; Oscar-winning producer John Battsek will serve as jury head for the Documentary Competition; and “The Red Turtle” director Michael Dudok de Wit will chair the Short Film Competition.
The awards will be presented at a ceremony Oct. 14. As previously announced, British filmmaker Paul Greengrass will receive this year’s BFI Fellowship at the ceremony.
The London Film Festival runs Oct. 4-15.
