After the trailer debuted last week, it now feels much more real: Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman is nearly here, a new mob opus with an astonishing cast led by Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, and Joe Pesci. And while the film’s Netflix release date hasn’t been confirmed yet, we now know when it will first hit UK shores.
The Irishman has been confirmed to close out the BFI London Film Festival 2019, which will mark the film’s international premiere, coming on Sunday 13 October. Not only that, but the film will simultaneously receive preview screenings at cinemas across the UK – with further details to be revealed in due course. “I’m extremely honored to be having the International Premiere of The Irishman at the closing night of the BFI London Film Festival,” says Scorsese. “This picture was many years in the making. It’s a project that Robert De Niro and I started talking about a long time ago, and we wanted to make it the way it needed to be made. It’s also a picture that all of us could only have made at this point in our lives. We’re all very excited to be bringing The Irishman to London.”
The film stars De Niro as Frank Sheeran, a mob hitman who recalls his life working in the criminal underworld – a tale that will span a considerable swathe of the 20th century. To tell the decades-long story, Scorsese is employing extensive de-ageing technology, with De Niro, Pacino and Pesci set to appear in younger incarnations for much of the runtime. The Irishman will receive its world premiere at the New York Film Festival on 27 September – and will arrive on Netflix and beyond later in the autumn.