Scarlett Johansson Stuns in Two Red Dresses for Two Premieres in One London Day

Some actors treat a film festival like a marathon. Scarlett Johansson treats it like a doubleheader — and on Saturday, she won both games.

The 41-year-old star pulled off the rare two-premiere day at the BFI London Film Festival, starting with the world premiere of her animated movie Ray Gunn in the morning and closing out the evening with the premiere of James Gray’s crime drama Paper Tiger. Two films. Two red dresses. One very long glam session — and honestly, both looks ate.

It’s the kind of day that sounds exhausting on paper and looks effortless in photographs. Most of us would need a nap and a strong coffee just to make it through the first carpet. Scarlett made two feel like a victory lap.

Two Premieres, One Day, Zero Misses

Let’s talk about the fashion first, because the internet already is. For the morning’s Ray Gunn premiere at the Royal Festival Hall, Johansson wore a vivid red strapless satin dress from the Hermès Resort 2027 collection — gathered bodice, full skirt that fell just past the knee, and, the detail everyone clocked immediately, pockets. She kept it playful, posing with her hands tucked inside them. Manolo Blahnik red sandals, a delicate gold pendant, and soft tousled waves did the rest. Nobody expected an Hermès dress from her; the house is more famous for leather goods than red-carpet coups. This one worked anyway.

Then she went home, presumably drank some water, and did it all again. For the evening’s Paper Tiger premiere, she switched into a second red dress — this time custom Prada, a red silk georgette bias-cut gown with ruched detailing that flowed instead of structured. Her blonde bob was curled softly to one side for an old-Hollywood feel, and she finished it with a statement Barron London necklace. Her longtime stylist Kate Young put the whole thing together, and it’s the kind of pairing that explains why Scarlett has been a Prada fixture for years.

She was joined on the Paper Tiger carpet by co-star Adam Driver and director James Gray. Miles Teller, who rounds out the film’s central trio, wasn’t in the London lineup — but honestly, with Johansson in head-to-toe red twice in one day, the carpet wasn’t exactly hurting for star power.

What Paper Tiger Is Actually About

Strip away the red carpet and you’ve got a movie with real weight behind it. Paper Tiger is James Gray’s latest — the director has made a career out of bruised, romantic crime stories about family and ambition, and this one sits squarely in that territory. Driver and Teller play brothers Gary and Irwin Pearl. Gary is a former cop with a plan; Irwin is an engineer and family man who’s more cautious by half. When Gary’s scheme promises them a way up, they take it — and then the Russian mafia gets involved, and everything that looked like a shortcut turns out to be a trap.

Johansson plays Hester, Irwin’s wife, the one whose family ends up most exposed as things spiral. The film runs 115 minutes, was made for around $15 million, and Neon is distributing in the US — the same company that’s turned prestige bets into cultural events for the better part of a decade.

The film premiered at Cannes back in May in the main competition, where it earned a ten-minute standing ovation. It then opened the 2026 New York Film Festival a few weeks ago. London was its latest stop on the festival circuit, and the awards chatter is getting harder to ignore. A limited theatrical release lands November 13, with a nationwide expansion on November 20. Mark it.

The Reunion Everyone’s Been Waiting For

Here’s the detail that’s doing a lot of quiet work: Paper Tiger is the first film to reunite Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver since Marriage Story.

That one mattered. Noah Baumbach’s divorce drama landed in 2019 and got both of them Oscar nominations — Johansson for lead, Driver for lead. They were devastating in it, the kind of pairing where you could feel the whole theater holding its breath during the argument scenes. Seven years later, Gray casts them as family again, this time bound by blood and circumstance instead of a marriage falling apart.

Driver plays the more volatile brother this time, the ex-cop dragging his brother into trouble. Johansson is the wife watching it all curdle. It’s a completely different dynamic — not lovers coming apart, but a family being pulled under. If you’re the kind of viewer who still thinks about the “being alive is falling down” monologue, this casting should have your full attention.

Ray Gunn: Brad Bird’s 30-Year Gamble Finally Pays Off

The morning premiere was its own story, and a long time coming. Ray Gunn is Brad Bird’s passion project, and I mean that literally — he’s been trying to make this movie for roughly thirty years.

It started life in the mid-1990s at Turner Feature Animation. Then Warner Bros. absorbed Turner, the project died, and Bird went off and made The Iron Giant instead. Which, fine — that turned out okay for him. But Ray Gunn never left his head. It finally found a home with Skydance Animation and Netflix, and on Saturday it had its world premiere at the Royal Festival Hall.

The setup is delicious. It’s a neo-noir sci-fi mystery set in Metropia, a giant city in an alternate 1939 where humans and aliens live side by side. Sam Rockwell voices Raymond Gunn, one of the last human private detectives. Johansson voices Venus Nova, a hugely famous multimedia star whose troubles drag Gunn into a murder investigation. The voice cast also includes Tom Waits, Matt Berry, Bobby Cannavale, Michelle Rodriguez, Matt Jones, Aasif Mandvi, Alan Tudyk, and Kathryn Hunter. Music comes from Michael Giacchino — his sixth collaboration with Bird since The Incredibles back in 2004.

Oh, and the origin story is too good not to mention: Bird has said the whole concept started because he misheard the B-52’s 1979 track “Planet Claire” and thought it was a new version of the Peter Gunn theme. Ray Gunn. That’s it. Three decades of work because of a misheard song.

The film runs 119 minutes, cost upward of $150 million, and hits select theaters December 4 before streaming on Netflix December 18. Early reviews are strong — a 93% on Rotten Tomatoes from the first batch, with critics calling it one of the year’s best animated films. The premiere also happened to fall on Giacchino’s birthday, so Johansson and Rockwell led the audience in singing to him. A premiere and a party, all in one.

Scarlett’s Banner Year, and Awards Season Is Just Warming Up

Step back for a second and look at the shape of Johansson’s 2026. She headlined one of the summer’s biggest studio releases, made her directorial debut with Eleanor the Great at Cannes, and now she’s closing out festival season with two premieres in a single day — one an auteur crime drama gunning for awards, the other a decades-in-the-making animated noir from one of the best in the business.

That’s range. And it’s worth remembering how unusual it is: actors who can open a studio tentpole and also carry a James Gray film are in short supply. She did the Marvel years, she did the Oscar-nomination years, and now she’s in a chapter where she seems to be picking projects because she actually wants to make them.

Paper Tiger hits theaters in about a month. Ray Gunn arrives on Netflix right before the holidays. Between now and then, expect to see a lot more of both on the circuit — and if Saturday was any indication, expect Johansson to dress like she means it every single time.

Source: Just Jared