One of the hottest talents in British cinema will be the guest of honour at next week’s Keswick film festival.

Alice Lowe co-wrote and starred in the black comedy Sightseers, then wrote, starred and directed in the even darker comedy-horror Prevenge.

She will be appearing to help celebrate the event’s 20th anniversary and to talk about festival film Sometimes Always Never, in which she appears.

Alice will take part in a Q&A after the screening, with Director Carl Hunter.

She told The Cumberland News: “As soon as I found out the film was written by Frank Cotterell Boyce, I really wanted to do it.

Starring alongside Bill Nighy, Jenny Agutter and Sam Riley, it is a family drama with Nighy trying to reunite with a missing and wayward son.

Alice says: “It is a dysfunctional family, but my character is one of the more functional ones.

“It is something new to me,” she laughs.

Festival organisers have added the critically lauded Prevenge to the event in honour of their guest.

Festival director Ian Payne said: “Alice being here for our 20th Film Festival will be the icing on the cake.

“She is hugely talented both in front of and behind the camera and her Q&A will be fascinating. I think Keswick has a special place in her heart after Sightseers.”

Alice is in serious demand.

She’s working on her latest movie - Timestalker - due to be filmed this summer and which she describes as a violent, time-travelling romcom about a woman who keeps falling in love with the wrong man and is reincarnated every time.

She has written it and will also direct and take the lead role of Agnes in it.

She said: “I don’t see it like extra work. It’s like someone saying ‘wow, so you wrote the song AND you’re going to sing it as well!’

“I’ll be on set all day anyway!”

Before that is released, she will appear in three other films which are due for release this year. She s also “attached” to three more that are under development.

Sightseers is based on a couple who lose their way and their marbles on a caravan holiday that turns into a murderous rampage involving the Castlerigg Stone Circle and Keswick pencil museum.

Her experiences haven’t put her off returning to the town. She plans on taking daughter Della, now three, to the Pencil Museum and on a walk round Derwentwater.

“We are going to mix the trip with a family holiday. Every child should be dragged round a lake when it is cold and wet.

“I remember being taken for a walk by my parents and pouring water out of my Wellingtons to show my mother how miserable I was.

“I think it was Windermere. I think that sort of thing is very formative!”

The 34-film festival will also feature the Oscar-tipped Green Book, starring Viggo Mortensen.

A powerful film set in the southern states of the US in the 1960s, Mortensen is a bouncer hired to drive a renowned African-American pianist across the country for a series of concerts.

The 33-film festival kicks off on February 28 with Jellyfish, an award-winning British film about 15 year-old Sarah who must balance school and caring for her invalid mother as well as a part-time job.

Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem star in Everybody Knows a Spanish psychological thriller while Rachel Weisz and Rachel McAdams appear in Disobedience, a tangled tale of romance set against the strictures of Jewish orthodoxy.

Also appearing in the festival will be Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson in Fighting with My Family, a comedy written and directed by Stephen Merchant, the long-time collaborator of Ricky Gervais.

Florence Pugh stars as a wrestler in a completely different role from her hit spy thriller series The Little Drummer Girl.

The Keswick film festival runs from next Thursday until March 3. Sometimes Always Never will be screened on Saturday, March 2 with Prevenge screened beforehand.

Joint tickets to see both Prevenge and Sometimes Always Never for £10 are on sale from the Theatre by the Lake. For more information, go to www.keswickfilmclub.org/festival