Stars Rosamund Pike, David Oyelowo and Laura Carmichael will celebrate the best of British film when their new picture A United Kingdom opens the BFI LondonFilm Festival.

The film tells the love story of Seretse Khama, King of Bechuanaland, now modern Botswana and Ruth Williams, the London office worker he married in 1948 in the face of opposition from their families and governments.

The film is directed by Amma Asante, the woman responsible for Belle, and will be shown on the opening night gala of the festival.

Other films receiving gala premieres during the star-studded festival will be Oliver Stone’s new movie Snowden, the current Oscar frontrunner La La Land and designer Tom Ford’s follow-up to A Single Man, Nocturnal Animals.

Stars expected to walk the red carpet in London include Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Sigourney Weaver, Casey Affleck, Michelle Williams and Nicole Kidman.

Oyelowo will make a second appearance at the festival when he returns on Sunday for the premiere of Queen of Katwe, in which he stars opposite Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o.

Adams will also make a double appearance to promote Arrival, opposite Renner, and Ford’s Nocturnal Animals, while Williams is expected at the premieres of both Sundance hit Manchester by the Sea and Certain Women.

The festival will close with Free Fire, Ben Wheatley’s follow-up to High Rise, which stars Oscar-winner Brie Larson and Peaky Blinders actor Cillian Murphy.

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