Press room

Barbican Cinema is pleased to announce a special UK preview of Bitter Christmas, as an addition to this year’s Outdoor Cinema line-up. Prior to the screening on Tuesday 18 August, we are also delighted to welcome the renowned auteur director Pedro Almodóvar to introduce his latest film, which is a metafictional melodrama that tackles issues around love, loss and artistic freedom. 

Pedro Almodóvar is back with his unique brand of storytelling, setting the stage for the tale of a filmmaker who begins to be a little too heavily inspired by the real lives of those around him. Raúl is a cult filmmaker in the middle of a creative crisis. When tragedy strikes one of his closest collaborators, he draws inspiration from it to write his next film. Little by little, he imagines Elsa, a filmmaker in the middle of writing a script, whose journey begins to mirror his own. The two directors become two sides of the same character, in a game of mirrors where the raw honesty of autofiction reveals as much as it destroys. 

This completes the line-up of the Barbican’s Outdoor Cinema series which returns this summer with a sparkling programme of films to watch under the city’s stars, set in the surroundings of the iconic Barbican Sculpture Court, complete with a selection of street food vendors and bars. 

This year’s programme features an original line-up of some of the best visual storytellers of our time, with films from Sean Baker, Denis Villeneuve, Jean-Luc Godard, Spike Lee, Hettie Macdonald, Jafar Panahi, Susan Seidelman, Makoto Shinkai, John Singleton, and Mati Diop, that demand to be seen on the big screen. 

Outdoor Cinema opens Tuesday 18 August with Bitter Christmas (Spain 2026), followed on Wednesday 19 August by Arrival (US 2016), Denis Villeneuve’s captivating sci-fi, in which a linguistics professor is recruited by the military to interpret the language of newly arrived alien creatures who threaten the world’s status quo. 

Running over eleven days, the series closes on Sunday 30 August with David Byrne’s American Utopia (US 2020), Spike Lee’s document of David Byrne’s hugely popular Broadway show. Here the former Talking Heads frontman uses contemporary dance and spoken reflections to reflect on human nature and how we can work together to make our time on this planet more just and equitable. 

In between, the line-up has something for all cinematic tastes, including: Sean Baker’s bittersweet The Florida Project (US 2017); Hettie Macdonald’s 90s British gay comedy Beautiful Thing (UK 1996); Jean-Luc Godard’s explosive Pierrot le Fou (France 1964), starring the iconic duo Jean-Paul Belmondo and Anna Karina; Jafar Panahi’s Iranian football comedy Offside (2006); and Susan Seildemen’s joyful and 80s-tastic Desperately Seeking Susan (US 1985), starring Madonna as a gorgeous grifter; plus many more. 

Rebecca Fons, Head of Barbican Cinema says: 

“We’re delighted to host this special screening of Pedro Almodóvar’s Bitter Christmas ahead of its general UK release on Friday 28 August. Against the backdrop of the Barbican, the beloved auteur's trademark colour palette will look especially stunning, and as Bitter Christmas is such a personal story, it is a true honour to have the director in person to introduce the film." 

Bitter Christmas is presented in partnership with Curzon. 

Outdoor Cinema is kindly supported by Associate Partner Mastercard. 

SCREENINGS

Bitter Christmas + Introduction by Pedro Almodóvar (15) 
Spain 2026, Dir Pedro Almodóvar, 111min
Tue 18 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court

Pedro Almodóvar is back with his unique brand of storytelling, setting the stage for the tale of a filmmaker who begins to be a little too heavily inspired by the real lives of those around him.  Raúl is a cult filmmaker in the middle of a creative crisis. When tragedy strikes one of his closest collaborators, he draws inspiration from it to write his next film. 

Little by little, he imagines Elsa, a filmmaker in the middle of writing a script, whose journey begins to mirror his own. The two directors become two sides of the same character, in a game of mirrors where the raw honesty of autofiction reveals as much as it destroys. 

Arrival (12A) 
US 2016, Dir Denis Villeneuve, 116min
Wed 19 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court 

Alien crafts appear across the globe and governments scramble to react. The US military recruits expert linguist Louise (Amy Adams) and theoretical physicist Ian (Jeremy Renner) to attempt to communicate with the visitors. As time passes and tension grows, other nations lose patience and interpret their presence as hostile, where Louise does not. Can she uncover the reason for their arrival before it is too late? 

This high-concept drama has humanity at its core. Louise looks best placed to succeed because of her patience, intelligence and her empathy. As she learns their language, her compassion for the creatures grows and she begins to see the world as they do. 

Offside (PG) 
Iran 2006, Dir Jafar Panahi, 93min 
Thu 20 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court 

Panahi’s feminist film takes an original angle – football fandom – to denounce the place of women in Iranian society. Cleverly filmed at the actual stadium during Iran’s qualifying Match against Bahrain in 2006, the electricity and excitement pour out of the setting and the young girls. Though Panahi was ready for either result, the outcome brings the film to its glorious denouement.  

Atlantics (12A) 
France/ Senegal/Belgium 2019, Dir Mati Diop, 104min
Fri 21 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court

In the suburbs of Dakar, Ada (Mame Bineta Sane) has fallen for construction worker Soleiman (Ibrahima Traoré) despite being betrothed to another man. When Soleiman’s boss refuses to pay his workers, the crew decide to set sail to earn some money overseas. After a while, strange things begin to happen in the town at night, drawing the attention of a police detective who soon becomes embroiled in the whole mysterious affair.  

In this poetic romantic drama, the ocean looms over all; the waves at once symbolising loss and return, the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade, and a connection between the living and the dead. Rarely has a film seemed more perfect for our outdoor cinema screen, than this visually arresting, hypnotic tale. 

Weathering With You (12A)
Japan 2019, Dir Makoto Shinkai, 112min 
Sat 20 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court 

High school freshman Hodaka Morishima leaves his home on an isolated island and moves to Tokyo, but he quickly finds himself in financial trouble. He eventually lands a job as a writer for a shady, occult magazine. 

Then one day in an alley, Hodaka meets a young girl named Hina Amano, bright and strong-willed, who possesses a strange and wonderful ability: the power to stop the rain and clear the sky. 

The highest grossing film in Japan in 2019, Weathering with You is a visually stunning body-swap romance, set in a world experiencing unexplained natural disaster. Dazzling and moving, Shinkai once again mines the teenage heart, thrilling us with magical realism and a peppy soundtrack.

Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (PG) + recorded Intro by Kaiju expert Steven Sloss  
Japan 1964, Dir Ishirō Honda, 93min 
Sun 23 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court 

One of the best Godzilla films brings back the dream team of director Ishirō Honda, special effects maestro Eiji Tsuburaya, composer Akira Ifukube and some of Toho’s most beloved monsters – Mothra (making her third movie appearance), Rodan (his second) and the greatest adversary Godzilla ever faced, King Ghidorah, making his debut. Will Godzilla, up until now a malevolent force, battle Ghidorah and help save the earth? 

The film has some of the strongest performances of the franchise, with Akiko Wakabayashi as a possessed princess and Hiroshi Koizumi as a psychiatrist. Best of all, of course, is the monster mayhem, a tremendous spectacle on our Outdoor Cinema screen. 

The Florida Project (15)
US 2017, Dir Sean Baker, 111min 
Tue 25 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court 

Six-year-old Moonee (Brooklynn Prince) spends her days lounging with her young mother Halley (Bria Vinaite), annoying the kindly hotel manager Bobby (Willem Dafoe) and exploring with her friends. When Halley turns to illegal activities for cash, she’s put on the radar of social services, jeopardising her life with Moonee. The pair are wily, resourceful and endearing, but will this be too much to weather? 

Bold, brash, and beautiful; Baker’s kinetic drama is infused with all the exuberance of youth, as well as the helplessness a lack of autonomy can bring. The stark inequality existing between locals and tourists brutally underlines their daily life. 

Pierrot le Fou(15) 
France 1965, Dir Jean-Luc Godard, 110min 
Wed 26 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court

One of the most explosive films from the French New Wave, Pierrot le Fou is a wild and dangerous road trip with crime thriller elements, starring Jean-Paul Belmondo and Anna Karina.

A married man quits his bourgeois life and runs off with the babysitter. They leave Paris and head to the south of France, but they are followed by a group of gangsters. The film sees Godard at his most playful. Along the way, we are bombarded with satire, politics, anti-bourgeois critique and pop culture, which culminates in one of the most-discussed endings in cinema history. 

Poetic Justice (15) 
US 1993, Dir John Singleton, 109min 
Thu 27 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court

Janet Jackson makes an acclaimed film debut as Justice, a poet and hairdresser reeling from the trauma of her boyfriend’s death. Coaxed by her best friend (future Oscar-winner Regina King) into a road trip to Oakland, she clashes with Lucky (Tupac Shakur), a charismatic postal worker facing struggles of his own, who is along for the ride. Tension gradually gives way to romance as the two discover more about each other. 

Beautiful Thing (15) 
UK 1996, Dir Hettie Macdonald, 87min 
Fri 28 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court

Beautiful Thing is one of the sweetest of all gay films, telling the story of troubled teens boys: Jamie (Glen Berry) is picked on at school, Ste (Scott Neal) is bullied at home – who find love in each other’s arms. Told against a suburban London estate backdrop, it’s packed with wit, with a sparky script based on the stage play by Jonathan Harvey. 

Thirty years since its UK premiere, it has lost none of its magic. Glen Berry and Scott Neal have real chemistry, while there is scene-stealing support from Tameka Empson as a boisterous neighbour and Linda Henry, who later starred in Bad Girls and Eastenders, as Jamie’s fiery mother. 

Desperately Seeking Susan (15) 
US 1985, Dir Susan Seidelman, 104min 
Sat 29 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court

Bored in her unhappy marriage, New Jersey housewife Roberta (Rosanna Arquette) obsessively follows Susan (Madonna) and her lover Jim as they communicate through the personal ads.  But when the couple schedules a reunion in New York City, Roberta – longing for adventure – secretly stalks them. But when a bump to the head leaves Roberta with amnesia, she inadvertently takes on Susan’s identity, and as she stumbles through Susan’s bohemian life, getting wrapped up in a dead mobster and a burgeoning romance. By the time the two women finally meet, Roberta’s life has been irrevocably changed.  

David Byrne’s American Utopia (12A) 
US 2020, Dir Spike Lee, 135min 
Sun 30 Aug, 8.30pm 
Barbican Sculpture Court

In his Broadway show American Utopia, former Talking Heads lead and beloved renaissance man David Byrne uses contemporary dance, spoken reflections, works by James Baldwin and Janelle Monáe, alongside Talking Heads classics to reflect on human nature. It asks how we can work together to make our time on this planet more just, equitable, and righteous. 

Byrne is joined by an ensemble of musicians in constant motion on a minimalist stage, and director Spike Lee shifts perspectives between performers and audience – transforming American Utopia from a typical concert documentary to an immersive, dynamic experience. As the show unfolds with intimacy and urgency, it calls for anti-fascism and anti-racism, and ultimately a hopeful vision for unity and civic engagement.