Scottish Film Events: September 2025

As we say goodbye to a bizarrely pleasant Scottish summer, the autumn tsunami of film festivals arrives just on schedule. You’ll find details of some of them, like Take One Action! (17 Sep-9 Nov, touring), IberoDocs (10-28 Sep, touring), Glasgow Youth Film Festival (26-28 Sep) and Sea Change (19-21 Sep) in Tiree in our September issue, out this week. These are great festivals embedded in their communities rather than shipped in from elsewhere. Be sure to give them your support.

Spooky season is still a while off, but that’s not holding back All Night Horror Madness, which returns to Cameo on 27 September with a delirious lineup. It’s got double zombies (The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue and Demons), it’s got killer conjoined twins (Basket Case), it’s got body horror (Videodrome) and it’s got a surprise film. Four of the movies are screening from 35mm and each one is crazier than a bag of frogs; it’s going to be a riot.

Talking of 35mm, there’s a slew of Paul Thomas Anderson 35mm prints playing in Scotland in September to whet audiences' appetite for PT’s new film One Battle After Another, out 26 September. DCA screens the trio of Magnolia (5-11 Sep), There Will Be Blood (13-16 Sep) and Boogie Nights (19-24 Sep), while GFT screen Boogie Nights (6-10 Sep) and There Will Be Blood (19-25 Sep).

We’re excited to see the new weekly community cinema night Leith Kino begin screenings at Leith Depot this month. The first three films are crackers, and show off the eclectic taste of the collective behind this new endeavour. Funeral Parade of Roses screens 7 Sep, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story screens 14 Sep, and the little-seen, newly-restored crime caper Ping Pong is on 21 Sep.

GFT have a six-film retrospective celebrating the cool and sensual cinema of Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar Wai. The lineup ranges from his early efforts like As Tears Go By (30 Aug & 2 Sep) and Days of Being Wild (6 Sep & 9 Sep) to his high masterpieces Happy Together (29 Sep) and In the Mood for Love (1 Oct). See them all on the big screen if you can.

We’d also like to shout out Filmhouse’s screenings of Edward Yang’s lovely family saga Yi Yi (19-25 Sep), playing from a 4K print; Cameo’s ‘Lynchspiration’ double bill of Lost Highway and Hitchcock’s Vertigo (6 Sep); and the DCA's bonkers pairing of Sergei Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin with a score by The Pet Shop Boys (6, 7 & 10 Sep).

And finally, GFT say goodbye to its long-serving head honcho Allison Gardner after three decades of service to the arthouse cinema. The GFT team are seeing her off on 14 September with an on-stage conversation, looking back at key moments from her career, hosted by long-time festival collaborator Allan Hunter, and the chat is followed by a screening of Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash, one of Gardner's personal faves. She’ll be dearly missed.