Richard Linklater, Ralph Fiennes, Kate Kinninmont become Honorary Associates of The London Film School at its Annual Show

LFS celebrates a year of graduate achievement

At the London Film School’s Annual Show on 8 December, Mike Leigh, LFS Chairman and 1964 graduate, and new LFS director Jane Roscoe presented Honorary Associateships to director Richard Linklater (BOYHOOD, BEFORE SUNRISE, DAZED AND CONFUSED, FAST FOOD NATION), actor and director Ralph Fiennes (THE ENGLISH PATIENT, SCHINDLER’S LIST, THE INVISIBLE WOMAN, CORIOLANUS) and Chief Executive of Women in Film and TV Kate Kinninmont MBE.

Associateships were then awarded to graduating students from the MA Filmmaking, MA Screenwriting and Fast Forward Producing programmes.

Mike Leigh said, “We welcome our new Honorary Associates and, as we head towards our 60th anniversary in 2016 and the move to the Barbican in 2017, we thank all the valued supporters and partners joining with us on this exciting journey”

Jane Roscoe said  “I am delighted to take the helm in a year when we are celebrating so much talent and achievement.  Congratulations to the class of 2014!"

The school celebrated a year of graduate achievements around the globe, a particular highlight the unprecedented success for LFS filmmakers at the Cannes Film Festival, where LEIDI, the 2014 graduation film of Simón Mesa Soto, was awarded the highest honour, the Palme d'Or for Best Short Film in Competition. It is the first time a British film school has won this prize.  Six LFS graduates were in official selection in Cannes, including Mike Leigh with MR TURNER, which won two prizes and Juliano Ribeiro Salgado with THE SALT OF THE EARTH, co-directed with Wim Wenders, winner of the Un Certain Regard Special Jury Prize.

The submission list for the 2015 Foreign Language Oscars includes three LFS graduates. Ann Hui with THE GOLDEN ERA for Hong Kong, Mohamed Khan with FACTORY GIRL for Egypt and  Leticia Tonos with CRISTO REY for The Dominican Republic. A clear testament to the School’s impact on world cinema.

Credit rolls have featured scores of LFS graduates in all the craft areas.  Cinematographers have been particularly prolific, with more established names such as Jo Willems (THE HUNGER GAMES), Erik Wilson (PADDINGTON and 20,000 DAYS ON EARTH) and Ole Bratt Birkeland (THE MISSING) joined by recent graduates shooting their first features.  The School’s long tradition of excellence in cinematography was marked by the introduction of a £10,000 Panalux sponsored award. Winners announced at the Annual Show were Mark Khalife, Yiannis Manolopoulos and Daniel Zafer.

During the past year, films made at the school had around 200 festival entries, winning over 30 prizes, The list spans Venice, Tribeca, Clermont Ferrand, The BFI London Film Festival,  Edinburgh, Encounters and Sundance. 12 LFS graduates were selected for Palm Springs, 10 for Aesthetica and 14 for The London Short Film Festival.

This year the School also launched the MA International Film Business, in partnership with University of Exeter, and welcomed the first cohort of 29 students.

Read about the 2014 LFS graduates here.

The Annual Show was presented in association with Pinewood.

The London Film School
Founded in 1956, LFS is one of the world's longest established graduate filmmaking schools. It is constituted as an international conservatoire with 70% of its MA Filmmaking students coming from outside the UK. The School offers a core 2-year MA Filmmaking, a 1-year MA Screenwriting, a 1-year MA International Film Business and a PhD Film by Practice with the University of Exeter, plus around 50 Continuous Professional Development courses each year as LFS Workshops. LFS is recognised by Creative Skillset, the UK government agency for audio-visual training, as one of three ‘Film Academies’, accredited as a centre of excellence.

Previous Honorary Associates include directors William Friedkin, Stephen Frears, Ken Loach, Lynne Ramsay, Richard Lester, Pawel Pawlikowski, Mike Figgis, Abbas Kiarostami, Jack Gold and Amma Asante, producers Rebecca O’Brien, Christopher Hird, Jeremy Thomas, Tessa Ross and Christine Langan, actors Gillian Anderson, Jim Broadbent, Samantha Morton, Rita Tushingham and Philip Davis, film critic Philip French

Richard Linklater
Before SLACKER, an experimental narrative revolving around 24 hours in the lives of 100 characters, garnered acclaim in 1991, Richard Linklater had made many shorts and completed a Super 8 feature, IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO LEARN TO PLOW BY READING BOOKS (1988).
 Linklater's additional credits include the 70's cult hit DAZED AND CONFUSED (1993); BEFORE SUNRISE (1995), for which Linklater won the Berlin Film Festival Silver Bear Award for Best Director; SUBURBIA (1997); THE NEWTON BOYS (1998), a western/gangster film set in the 1920s; the animated feature WAKING LIFE (2001); the real-time drama TAPE (2001); the hit comedy SCHOOL OF ROCK (2003); $5:15 AN HOUR (TV), BEFORE SUNSET (2004) which earned him an Academy Award nomination; BAD NEWS BEARS (2005); A SCANNER DARKLY (2006); FAST FOOD NATION (2006); INNING BY INNING: A PORTRAIT OF A COACH (2008); ME AND ORSON WELLES (2009); BERNIE (2012); UP TO SPEED (2012, HULU); BEFORE MIDNIGHT (2013); and BOYHOOD (2014).

Linklater also serves as the Artistic Director for the Austin Film Society, which he founded in 1985 to showcase films from around the world that were not typically shown in Austin. Now one of the nation’s top film organizations, The Austin Film Society shows over 200 films a year, has educational programs, and has given out over $1,500,000 in grants to Texas filmmakers since 1996.

Ralph Fiennes
Fiennes made his feature film debut as Heathcliff in WUTHERING HEIGHTS.  Steven Spielberg was so impressed by Fiennes’ performance in this film that he cast him as the sinister Nazi Aman Goeth in SCHINDLER’S LIST.  His role earned him an Academy Award nomination, as well as the Best Supporting Actor award from BAFTA. Since then Fiennes has starred in, THE ENGLISH PATIENT, QUIZ SHOW, STRANGE DAYS, SUNSHINE, THE END OF THE AFFAIR, SPIDER, RED DRAGON, THE CONSTANT GARDNER, IN BRUGES, THE READER, SKYFALL and played the dreaded Lord Voldemort in the HARRY POTTER series.

Fiennes made his feature film directorial debut in 2011 with CORIOLANUS and last year directed and starred in the critically acclaimed film THE INVISIBLE WOMAN, in which he played the role of Charles Dickens, starring opposite Felicity Jones. This year, Fiennes starred in Wes Anderson’s THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL, appearing alongside Edward Norton, Saoirse Ronan, Owen Wilson, Jude Law, Tilda Swinton and Bill Murray, among others.   He recently completed production in Luca Guadagnino’s drama A BIGGER SPLASH with Tilda Swinton and in December 2014, he will reprise his role as “M” on Sam Mendes’ BOND 24.

Kate Kinninmont
After a career in Adult Education, Kate joined the BBC to work on social action programmes, first in radio then in television. She went to produce, direct or present dozens of programmes in Education, Religion, Documentary Features and Drama.  Her schedule took her all over Britain and then all round the world, from Singapore to San Francisco. She has filmed on glacier lakes in Canada, in the jungles and tea plantations of Malaysia,  and on the rivers and canals of Bangkok.  Since 2007, Kate has been Chief Executive of Women in Film and Television in the UK,  promoting the interests of women in the industry by running an ambitious series of events and networkings, mounting an extensive Mentoring Scheme, lobbying government and celebrating female achievement at a massively over-subscribed Awards Ceremony at the Park Lane Hilton every December.

Kate is a member of BAFTA, NUJ, Directors UK, Women in Journalism, The Royal Television Society, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Kate was awarded an MBE in the Queen's New Year Honours List 2014 for services to the women in the TV and film industry.
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