Tom Hanks and Daniel Radcliffe to attend London film festival

Tom Hanks, Carey Mulligan and Daniel Radcliffe are among the stars attending this year's BFI London Film Festival, organisers have announced.

The event, which begins on 9 October, will show 234 fiction and documentary features including 22 world premieres.

Judi Dench and Steve Coogan are due on the red carpet for the gala screening of Stephen Frears' film, Philomena.

The festival will also unveil Steve McQueen's 12 Years A Slave, starring Benedict Cumberbatch.
Cumberbatch stars alongside Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbender and Chiwetel Ejiofor in the historical drama based on Solomon Northup's autobiography of the same name, about a free black man who was kidnapped and sold into slavery.

Hanks will open the festival with his latest film, Captain Phillips, directed by British Bourne Identity filmmaker Paul Greengrass.

The biopic tells the story of Captain Richard Phillips, who was taken hostage by Somali Pirates during the Maersk Alabama hijacking in 2009.

Saving Mr Banks, the untold story of how the Disney classic Mary Poppins made it to the screen - which also stars Hanks alongside Emma Thompson, will close the festival.

Other big hitters to be screened include the sci-fi thriller Gravity, starring George Clooney and Sandra Bullock, The Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis and the critically acclaimed lesbian drama, Blue is the Warmest Colour.

Thirteen films will compete in the official competition including Jonathan Glazer's Under The Skin starring Scarlett Johansson as a man-eating alien; Parkland, Peter Landesman's film about events in Dallas, Texas on the day President John F Kennedy was assassinated; and Starred Up from British director David Mackenzie.

The first feature category includes John Krokidas's debut, Kill Your Darlings, which stars Radcliffe as Beat poet Allen Ginsberg; and Sixteen, about a former child soldier in the Congo looking for a fresh start in London, starring Rachael Stirling.

The festival will host 16 international premieres and 29 European premieres. There will also be screenings of 134 live action and animated shorts.

The only world premiere is John Noel's The Epic Of Everest, which charts the famous 1924 Everest expedition.

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High School Goes 'Big' to Get Tom Hanks to Attend Homecoming

One high school is rolling out the red carpet with a “Big” social media campaign in hopes of getting Hollywood A-lister, Tom Hanks, to attend their homecoming on October 9. 

“Our homecoming is huge. It’s a small town, about 14,000 people,” Margaret Nichols, the assistant principal at Kerman High School in Kerman, California, told ABC News. “Homecoming is a huge event for our whole community so each year we pick a theme. This year it’s Tom Hanks movies. And then everyone thought, ‘Well, let's try to get him here.’” 

And that’s exactly what they’re doing. The entire community has launched a huge social media campaign, creating Twitter and Facebook pages under the name and hashtag #TomHanks2KermanHC to try to get the actor’s attention. 

“Our pie in the sky dream would be for him to come be our Grand Marshal, but even a personal shout out on social media or a 15-second video would be great,” said Nichols. “Just for him to acknowledge us, the kids would be so excited.” 

The school coincidentally does have a connection to Hanks, albeit small. A former Kerman high school Principal is related to the Oscar-winner. 

“I grew up in Kerman. I’ve been here all my life and went to school here,” Nichols explained. “My principal when I was here is actually second cousins with him, but he hasn’t seen him in 30 years.”

The students have been busy creating banners and signs to place all over the school in celebration of their Tom Hanks-themed homecoming. They’re even using entertaining catch phrases to get Hanks’ attention. 

“Life is like a box of chocolates, and it will be even sweeter if you come to Kerman’s homecoming,” one student told local ABC affiliate, KFSN. 

“There’s no crying in baseball but there will be some crying in Kerman if you don’t show up to homecoming,” said another. 

So far the seniors have chosen to make a “Forrest Gump”-themed float, the juniors are doing a “Toy Story” float and the sophomores are working on a “Big”-themed float. The freshmen haven’t decided yet (because they were waiting on the seniors to decide first), but will know shortly. 

“The underlying idea was to bring our campus and community together to go towards one goal and it’s really happening,” Nichols said of their homecoming efforts. “The teachers are all really on board and it’s created a buzz and it’s just gone all over and you can just feel the excitement in the air.” 

More than anything, the entire community would love Tom Hanks to acknowledge the social media campaign to give these students the story of a lifetime. 

“Oh my gosh, I would be so excited for the kids,” said Nichols. “They’ve worked so hard and they’re very passionately attached to this campaign. Just to see their excitement would mean everything. We have a great student body and I’d love to see it happen for them. We’re trying to keep their hopes up but I also don’t want them to be crushed. If he could just acknowledge us at least, that would mean the world.” 

ABC News has reached out to Tom Hanks’ representatives with no response … yet.

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