Glasgow Film Festival: Outlander premiere, 'Brandon Lee' movie, teenage surf sensation and gang culture comedy lined up

The Glasgow Film Festival will return in March with an exclusive preview of Outlander's new season and an in-conversation event with The Thick of It creator Armando Iannucci.

A documentary following a 14-year-old Scottish surfing sensation's bid to conquer one of the world’s biggest waves and Alan Cumming's portrayal of notorious schoolboy imposter "Brandon Lee" will also feature.

A new romantic drama set and filmed in the Outer Hebrides, a surreal comedy inspired by Scottish gang culture and a documentary following a man who has lived alone in a hand-made log cabin in the Highlands for 40 years complete a busy festivalprogramme.

The 18th edition of the festival in March will bring back audiences to its home at the Glasgow Film Theatre and the nearby Cineworld after the 2021 event had to be staged entirely online due to Covid restrictions.

The festival, which will screen selected highlights from the programme on its online platform, will return with the UK premiere of Oscar-winner Mark Rylance’s Chicago-set gangster thriller The Outfit, and close with tense famliy drama Murina, an award winner at Cannes last year.

The festival has scored a major coup with a premiere of the feature-length curtain-raiser to the eagerly-awaited sixth season of Outlander, the hit time-travel fantasy series that has been filmed in Scotland since 2013.

Highlights of the festival include the premiere of Skint, a new BBC series exploring personal stories of poverty and homelessness, which Scottish actors, directors and writers Peter Mullan, Cora Bissett, Jenni Fagan and Derry Girls creator Lisa McGee have all worked on.

The festival has secured the European premiere of My Old School, Jono McLeod’s drama documentary on Brian MacKinnon, the former Bearsden Academy pupil who duped staff and pupils for two years after re-enrolling when he was 30.

An exclusive preview of the curtainraiser for the sixth season of Outlander will be screened at the Glasgow Film Festival in March.

Coming-of-age comedy Angry Young Men, which was made in Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, will follow the efforts of fictional gang The Bramble Boys to defend their turf against their rivals The Campbell Group.

Ride the Wave will follow Tiree-based surfer Ben Larg and his family over the course of three years, culminating in a bid to conquer the 30ft high waves that break off Mullaghore Head in County Sligo in Ireland.Belgian filmmaker Bouli Lanners has directed and starred in the Isle of Lewis-set Nobody Needs To Know, which focuses on a farm hand suffering from memory loss who encounters a woman who tells him they were previously inlove.

Documentaries include a profile of Ken Smith, the man dubbed “The Hermit of Treig” for his off-grid existence on the banks of Loch Treig, and Scottish war correspondent David Pratt’s exploration of Iraq’s recenthistory.There are other documentaries on 1980s Norwegian pop sensations A-ha, the activists within the Extinction Rebellion movement, a brick-maker’s attempt to kick-start an action movie industry in Uganda and the legacy of punk, made by Joe Corre, the son of Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood who famously burnt millions of pounds worth of memorabilia.Horrors in the line-up include A Banquet, the debut feature of Scottish filmmaker Ruth Paxton, which focuses on a widowed mother and a teenage daughter who have a supernatural awakening, Irish vampire-hunting romp Let The Wrong One In, and Monstrous, which stars Christina Ricci as a traumatised mother fleeing with her seven-year-old son from her abusive ex-husband.The festival, which runs from 2-13 March, will feature 10 world premieres, 4 European premieres, 65 UK premieres and 13 Scottish premieres.

Allan Hunter, co-director of the festival, said: said: ‘Welcoming audiences old and new to the festival is a source of great joy and not a little relief.

The new documentary movie Rise The Wave will follow the exploits of Hebridean surfing sensation Ben Larg.

“I think we have all missed that sense of community and discovery you experience at a festival.

“The team have watched more films than ever to compile a programme rich in its diversity and wonders.

“There are so many great films to recommend from around the world and I am especially excited by the abundance of Scottish stories

and productions that showcase the country’s many shining talents.”

Scottish gang culture is turned into a surreal comedy in Paul Morris's debut feature Angry Young Men.

Co-director Allison Gardiner added: “I can’t begin to describe our joy at being able to have our

loyal, committed and fun audiences back to the festival.

“We have all undergone different and difficult times over the last two years and nothing helps us to heal and connect like film.”

Sambrooke Scott, head of audience development at Screen Scotland, one of the festival’s main funders, said: “We're thrilled that

2022 marks Glasgow Film Festival’s return to the big screens of the city, giving audiences the opportunity to experience a rich programme of new films and classic cinema from Scotland, the UK and beyond.

"It's a festival that celebrates creativity and community, one that feels both local and global at the same time.”