Claire Foy and Brendan Gleeson brought H Is for Hawk, Philippa Lowthorpe's film of Helen Macdonald's memoir of grief and falconry, to the BFI Patrons' Gala.
Philippa Lowthorpe’s H Is for Hawk had its UK premiere as the BFI Patrons’ Gala at the Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank on Sunday 12 October 2025. Claire Foy and Brendan Gleeson, who play daughter and father, led the cast on the carpet.
Gleeson was born in Dublin in 1955 and taught English and Irish at a secondary school while acting on the side. He left teaching for the stage in 1991, and Braveheart and Michael Collins followed.
In Bruges and The Guard made him a leading man. His Winston Churchill in Into the Storm won an Emmy, and The Banshees of Inisherin brought an Academy Award nomination.
Lowthorpe wrote the screenplay with Emma Donoghue from Helen Macdonald’s 2014 memoir. Foy plays Macdonald, an academic who takes on a goshawk named Mabel after the sudden death of her father. The film sets her grief against the physical and psychological demands of falconry.
The film had played Telluride in August, and Lionsgate released it in British cinemas on 23 January 2026.
Lindsay Duncan and Denise Gough, who complete the principal cast, joined them on the carpet.