It’s easy to underestimate the deceptive simplicity of London. The vast majority of its runtime consists of shot/reverse-shot conversations between the placid, elderly Bobby (Bobby Sommer) and a succession of strangers he drives to their requested destinations. From Vienna to Salzburg and back again, along the scenic West Autobahn—a piece of infrastructure with its own dark history, having been conceived and begun by the Nazis in the late 1930s—Bobby listens, absorbs, and contributes to the candid conversations of the young men and women who occupy his passenger seat.
There is a soldier who questions the necessity of warfare; a deli clerk on his way to visit his ailing mother; a movie-theatre worker who extols the Marxist virtues of James Cameron’s Avatar; a Romanian migrant who, despite speaking neither German nor English, manages to communicate where she needs to go; a history buff fascinated by the bridges constructed by the Nazis; and a queer activist preparing to marry despite the frosty opposition of her conservative family. There are several others, too, each briefly sharing a kind of communion with their rideshare driver for the duration of their journey. Aside from a few interludes in which Bobby steps out to grab a bite to eat, stretch his legs, use the washroom, and so forth, London remains tethered to the road, finding stillness within perpetual motion.
Except that it isn’t. Not really. It is a testament to Sebastian Brameshuber’s filmmaking prowess that he so seamlessly maintains the illusion of documentary fidelity that it can be difficult to recognize these conversations were filmed entirely in a studio. The vistas that flicker past the windows, across different seasons and times of day, were pre-filmed and projected onto rear-projection screens. The gentle movement of the vehicle? A crew member in the backseat periodically making the car bounce. As time suspends itself in the casual conversations between Bobby and his passengers, so too does our sense of reality. The artifice quietly recedes, ceding the frame to the power of the spoken word. Each small revelation, each granule of empathy, each fragment of memory is consequently heightened, allowing geographies of time, place, and kinship to emerge with remarkable grace and patience. And as Bobby’s quiet elusiveness gradually ebbs away, a more intimate portrait takes shape: that of an elderly man carrying his own painful losses while discovering new sources of purpose and understanding.
It was gratifying to see Bobby Sommer on screen again. I still remember his lovely performance in Jem Cohen’s 2012 film Museum Hours, which receives a sly reference here, though Bobby is not playing the same character. In some respects, Brameshuber’s film feels like a natural extension of Cohen’s sensibility, exchanging the discursive space of the art museum for the conversational possibilities of modern vehicular travel. It is a particular kind of travel, too, mediated by technological convenience and a younger generation fluent in the mechanics of getting from one place to another. At every turn, there is the possibility of disparate worlds colliding, leaving silence, confusion, or misunderstanding in their wake.
But nothing like that ever happens here. The beauty of London lies in its generosity toward connection and interaction at a time when both can feel increasingly rare and unsatisfying. Its message is hardly more complicated than a gentle reminder to look up and around, allowing the histories of the people and places in our immediate vicinity to stir our curiosity, even if only for a few minutes. The air is teeming with stories waiting to be told—stories capable of imprinting valuable truths that we can carry with us. Sometimes, all it takes to unlock them is a friendly greeting, an observation, a passing pleasantry.
It’s a cliché, to be sure, but it really is the journey, not the destination, that counts. Hop in, get comfortable, and enjoy the ride. Like the characters in London, you may find that the journey changes you for the better.
London had its North American premiere at TIFF in the Wavelengths programme on Wednesday, September 16, 2026.
The Lonely Film Critic 