I SEE BUILDINGS FALL LIKE LIGHTNING

UK, FRANCE, USA | 2026 | COLOR | DCP | 109’ | ENGLISH

Against the backdrop of a rapidly changing urban landscape, a group of young friends watch as their city’s skyline transforms, with old buildings being demolished to make way for glass towers. At the same time, they see every certainty shattered by the challenges of coming of age, whilst the modern façades seem to mirror their own inner collapse. The brilliant Clio Barnard adapts the novel of the same name into an atmospheric character-driven drama to capture the existential angst in the face of an uncertain future, using Birmingham’s architectural transformation as an allegory for the dreams of a generation that withered away amidst the concrete and buried its hope under tons of glass and steel. The film won the Audience Award at the Directors’ Fortnight section of the Cannes Film Festival. Thodoris Karamanolis

DIRECTOR: Clio Barnard
SCREENWRITER: Enda Walsh
DoP: Simon Tindall
MUSIC: Harry Escot
EDITOR: Maya Maffioli
PRINCIPAL CAST: Anthony Boyle, Joe Cole, Jay Lycurgo, Daryl McCormack, Lola Petticrew, Michael Horton

CLIO BARNARD

English director born in Leeds. She studied Fine Arts in Newcastle and holds and MA in Electronic Imaging (Dundee). Her documentary and fiction debut “The Arbor” (2010) and “The Selfish Giant” (2013) respectively made her immediately an important voice of the then new British generation.

FILMOGRAPHY
2026 I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning
2021 Ali & Ava
2017 Dark River
2013 The Selfish Giant
2010 The Arbor