BFI programme highlights announced for January 2026

Although he was a certified grandmaster of the surreal, and frequently characterised as a maker of challenging films, the true defining quality of David Lynch’s work is its power to connect with audiences. He crafted distinct dreamscapes that are charged with human emotion, moving us to both frightening and nostalgic places and taking us on journeys to examine and understand the darkness that lurks under pristine facades. 

A year on from his passing, and in what would have been his 80th birthday month, BFI Lead Programmer Kimberley Sheehan and Head of Cinema Programme Justin Johnson invite audiences to reflect and pay tribute to a unique visionary with this season at BFI Southbank and BFI IMAX that includes his great masterpieces, his innovative short films, and a series of contextual events. The season introduction on 7 January, The Cinematic Visions of David Lynch, with guests including writer Simran Hans and author Tom Huddleston, will consider the defining elements of Lynch’s idiosyncratic style and haunting sound design, alongside his work outside of cinema and his immense influence on artists and filmmakers.

Films screening at BFI Southbank and BFI IMAX from 1 to 31 January will include Eraserhead (1977), The Elephant Man (1980), with a screening introduced by actor Dexter Fletcher on 27 January, Dune (1984), Blue Velvet (1986), Wild at Heart (1990), Lost Highway (1997), The Straight Story (1999), Mulholland Drive (2001) and Inland Empire (2006), plus Jon Nguyen’s intimate documentary portrait of the filmmaker and his philosophy of leading a creative life, David Lynch: The Art Life (2016). 

We also preview a new documentary, Welcome to Lynchland (Stéphane Ghez, 2025), on 3 January. Ghez takes the viewer on a journey through the life and career of Lynch, weaving in perspectives from some of his closest collaborators including Kyle MacLachlan, Laura Dern, Isabella Rossellini and Sabrina Sutherland. Throughout his career, Lynch harboured an enthusiasm for short-form work and animation. 

The Short Films of David Lynch on 11 January will present six of his iconic shorts, followed by all eight episodes of his animated web series Dumbland (2002). Lynch embraced the internet early, exploring the possibilities of digital video. He used his website DavidLynch.com as a raw sketchbook that burst with experimental, sometimes haunting, often playful pieces which he wrote, directed and scored himself. He compiled the best of these into Dynamic: 01 (2006), which we screen on 9 January.

BFI audiences will also get to immerse themselves in the world of Twin Peaks. The BFI National Archive’s pristine 35mm print of Twin Peaks – Original US Pilot (1990), used for the original BBC broadcast and a massive hit when last played at the BFI Film on Film Festival in June, will be screened on 12 January. Lynch’s cinematic prequel masterpiece, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992), will also play in the season with a screening on 13 January followed by a discussion about the importance of Lynch’s work to the trans community, hosted by Sarah Cleary, curator of Funeral Parade presents. 

Plus, the rarely screened Twin Peaks: The Missing Pieces (2014), Lynch’s companion piece released 20 years after Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me and assembled from deleted scenes and alternative takes is essential viewing for Lynch completionists. Visitors to BFI Southbank can also step inside another dimension and visit the Black Lodge themselves with a special installation of the iconic Red Room, recreated in venue for the duration of the season.

Further special events will include the return of our Philosophical Screens series on 15 January, which will take a drive down David Lynch’s Lost Highway with Lucy Bolton, Ben Tyrer and Catherine Wheatley navigating the twists and turns of Lynch’s neo-noir nightmare. We host a relaxed screening of Wild at Heart for neurodivergent audiences on 12 January in partnership with Stims Collective, followed by a discussion with filmmaker and co-founder Georgia Kumari Bradburn. 

Elsewhere, two relaxed Sip and Paint painting sessions, themed around Twin Peaks on 12 January and the Lynch “art life” on 31 January, will pay homage to the filmmaker’s first passion and the creative output he always returned to. 

The month-long celebrations are capped by a David Lynch VJ Night on 17 January, when our VJs will take guests on a unique audiovisual experience across the dancefloor, and the David Lynch Quiz on 30 January. Finally, a four-week course City Lit at the BFI: The Interpretations of Lynchian Dreams will explore Lynch’s cinema from multiple angles. Through a range of perspectives, Mary Wild and Paul Sutton trace how Lynch’s films blur the realms of reality and dreams. More details on the season are available in a dedicated press release here.

Also in January, to mark the arrival of his joyful homage to the birth of the French New Wave, Ensemble: The Filmmakers From Richard Linklater’s Nouvelle Vague will explore the work of the figures that populate Richard Linklater’s latest film, Nouvelle Vague (Richard Linklater, 2025), which opens at BFI Southbank with previews from 23 January. A love letter to the movement that recreates the era and the people behind the making of Breathless (Jean-Luc Godard, 1960), which also plays throughout the month, the film invites you to hang out with New Wave filmmakers, their satellites and their influences. 

This season curated by the BFI’s Diana Cipriano and Kimberley Sheehan presents a range of significant films made by these individuals, offering a chance to immerse yourself in one of the most exciting periods of film history with screenings of Orphée (Jean Cocteau, 1950), Journey to Italy (Roberto Rossellini, 1954), The 400 Blows (François Truffaut, 1959), Les Cousins (Claude Chabrol, 1959), Pickpocket (Robert Bresson, 1959), Last Year in Marienbad (Alain Resnais, 1961), Léon Morin, prêtre (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1961), Paris nous appartient (Jacques Rivette, 1961), Le Bonheur (Agnès Varda, 1964), My Night with Maud (Éric Rohmer, 1969) and Out 1: Noli Me Tangere (Jacques Rivette, Suzanne Schiffman, 1971). 

The revolutionary spirit Linklater found in these films encouraged him to do the same by pulling together a community of enthusiastic cinephiles with little money for Slacker (Richard Linklater, 1990), which we also play in January. Whether revisiting these films or discovering them for the first time, they may just spark the same sense of freedom, joy and invention that they did for a young Linklater.

As leading figures in British cinema, Tina Gharavi and Gurinder Chadha’s work remains relevant for both current and future audiences. As part of two major projects on the archives of women filmmakers, Beyond the Frame: Women Filmmakers and Their Archives, we present a short season of films and events exploring the legacy of both filmmakers curated by the BFI’s Wendy Russell and Grace Johnston. 

Each embracing themes of identity, gender and politics, their archives provide insight into what it means to be a Global Majority filmmaker within the industry. This programme considers their body of work in the context of their personal archive collections, currently being researched and catalogued at the BFI National Archive as part of the Women’s Screen Work in Archives Made Visible project (funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council), which seeks to make the work of women in film and their archives more discoverable, and the BFI’s current Our Screen Heritage project (presented with the support of the BFI Screen Heritage Fund, awarding National Lottery funding) which explores how we capture filmmakers’ digital archives for current and future audiences. 

Both filmmakers will join us at BFI Southbank to discuss their filmographies and archive collections with the special events In Frame: Tina Gharavi on 23 January and In Frame: Gurinder Chadha on 30 January, which will include selected highlights from their collections preserved and cared for by the Screencraft team at the BFI National Archive’s Conservation Centre. Films playing throughout the month will also include The Short Films of Tina Gharavi, plus I Am Nasrine (Tina Gharavi, 2012), Bend It like Beckham (Gurinder Chadha, 2000) and Bride and Prejudice (Gurinder Chadha, 2004).

With a groundbreaking career spanning seven decades, Frederick Wiseman is one of the great American documentary storytellers. In our third and final selection of his works, this January we turn our attention to a group of films exploring aspects of cultural life, including the director’s most recent film, Menus-Plaisirs, Les Troisgros (2023), released UK-wide by BFI Distribution on 2 January ahead of a planned BFI Player subscription collection and BFI Blu-ray three disc release on 26 January. Other films playing across the month will include The Store (1983), Ballet (1995), La Danse: Le Ballet de l’Opéra de Paris (2009), National Gallery (2014) and Ex Libris: The New York Public Library (2017). 

Elsewhere, to celebrate the centenary of television, we present the short season Magic Rays of Light: Early Television which looks at the very earliest years of the medium. Curated by John Wyver, author of Magic Rays of Light: The Early Years of Television in Britain, the programme will include Television Arrives!, which features three documentaries made by the BBC to showcase pre-war television from Alexandra Palace and a fourth that marked the service re-opening in June 1946. 

Other screenings include The Fools in the Hill (David Giles, 1986, BBC), Jack Rosenthal’s loving, comic recreation of the television service at Alexandra Palace as it prepared for opening night in November 1936, plus dramatic depictions of early television on film including Maurice Elvey’s British sci-fi thriller High Treason (1929), Will Hay playing a lightly disguised Lord Reith in Radio Parade of 1935 (Arthur B. Wood, 1934), the head of the broadcasting organisation NBG occupying an Art Deco premises clearly modelled on the BBC’s New Broadcasting House, and Adrian Brunel and Alfred Hitchcock’s Elstree Calling (1930), a lavish musical film designed as a British version of the Hollywood Revues in which Tommy Handley introduces an array of comedy and musical sketches, linked by acts presented in a television broadcast.

Special events taking place in January will include a TV preview of Lord of the Flies (Marc Munden, 2025), including a Q&A with creators Jack Thorne, Marc Munden and Joel Wilson on 26 January. This BBC adaptation – the first for television – of William Golding’s acclaimed novel tells the story of a group of schoolboys stranded on a deserted island. It’s an uncompromising tale of their fight for survival and an arresting portrait of the fine line between civilisation and barbarity. 

A preview of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (Owen Harris, 2026) on 16 January will also include a Q&A with cast members Ira Parker, Peter Claffey and Dexter Sol Ansell. A century before the events of Game of Thrones, a naïve but courageous knight, Ser Duncan the Tall, and his diminutive squire, Egg, wander Westeros. With the Targaryen line still holding the Iron Throne, powerful foes and dangerous exploits await these improbable and incomparable friends. On 22 January we will also preview Scarlet (2025), the powerful, time-bending animated adventure from visionary filmmaker Mamoru Hosoda about a medieval-era, sword-fighting princess on a dangerous quest to avenge the death of her father.

The Woman With a Movie Camera Summit returns on 24 January, when a Summit Pass will offer access to a full day packed with talks, Q&As and panel discussions with filmmakers, curators and creatives, as well as workshops and drop-in sessions. The full programme line up and tickets will be available online in December. A Woman With a Movie Camera preview of BFI Distribution’s The Chronology of Water (Kristen Stewart, 2025) will also take place on 24 January, ahead of its UK-wide and Ireland cinema release on 6 February. A journey through the sensuous and the sensual, Kristen Stewart’s film chronicles Lidia Yuknavitch’s life as she experiences and processes childhood abuse, first love, addiction and grief, led by a raw and magnetic performance from Imogen Poots. 

Other film previews will include the UK premiere of Messy (Alexi Wasser, 2024) on 9 January, followed by a Q&A with writer-director Alexi Wasser. This outrageous sex-comedy follows Stella, a love addict and writer who moves to New York in the wake of a breakup. Cosmo in hand, she embarks on a summer of self-discovery. Fun and filthy, this festival hit comes with a John Waters stamp of approval. Meanwhile, All That’s Left of You (Cherien Dabis, 2025) sees Noor, a Palestinian teen, confront Israeli soldiers at the West Bank. Afterwards his mother recounts the history of their family’s fearlessness, spanning the Nakba in 1948 through to the present day. We preview the film on 21 January.

The London Short Film Festival, the UK’s leading short film festival returns to BFI Southbank from 23 January to 1 February, delivering the best in short form work and spotlighting the multiplicity of filmmakers, visual artists and creatives. The full festival line-up will be announced in December. Finally, Mark Kermode Live in 3D returns on 19 January with surprise guests and discussion of upcoming releases, cinematic treasures, industry news and even some guilty pleasures.

Tickets for BFI Southbank screenings are on sale to BFI Patrons on 1 December, BFI Members on 2 December, and to the general public on 4 December.