‘Bad Day at the Office’ Drops New Clips Ahead of Festival Debut

Bad Day at the Office will have its world premiere as the opening film of the Midnight Madness strand at this year’s Edinburgh International Film Festival, with two new clips released ahead of its debut. Directed by Chee Keong Cheung, the first-person action thriller stars John Hannah, Radha Mitchell, Tamer Hassan and Lana Parrilla, and arrives in UK and Irish cinemas this October.

Hannah stars as Karl, a man who wakes in a wrecked hotel room with no memory of who he is or how he got there. His situation deteriorates almost immediately when he discovers a dead body in the bathtub, while a knock at the door from two police officers sets in motion an increasingly dangerous chain of events.

Forced to flee alongside hotel maid Molly, played by Radha Mitchell, Karl finds himself pursued across the city while attempting to recover his memories. As fragments of his past begin to surface, he discovers abilities he cannot explain, suggesting there is far more behind his identity than he first imagined. With a bounty seemingly placed on his head and enemies closing in from every direction, survival depends on uncovering the truth before time runs out.

Cheung directs from a screenplay he co-wrote with Oliver Morran, employing an ambitious first-person perspective throughout the entire feature. Captured through the protagonist’s point of view using GoPro cameras, the approach places the audience inside every chase, confrontation and explosion rather than observing events from a conventional cinematic distance.

The cast also includes Tamer Hassan, Lana Parrilla, Tim Fellingham, Roxanne McKee, Branko Tomovi? and Victor Gardener, with producers Andreas Roald, Ioanna Karavela and Cheung overseeing the production for Action Xtreme.

Discussing the production, Cheung described Bad Day at the Office as ‘an intense, very physical, technically complex and thrilling creative journey’, adding that he hoped audiences would enjoy immersing themselves in the experience as much as the cast and crew did while making the film.

Edinburgh International Film Festival’s Midnight Madness producer Emma Boa praised the feature’s energetic style, describing it as ‘shot in the style of first-person shooter video games with cine-literate wit, humor, ferocious pacing and a cracking soundtrack’, calling it ‘the ultimate Midnight Madness experience’.

Bad Day at the Office receives its world premiere at the Edinburgh International Film Festival on 13 August before opening in UK and Irish cinemas on 30 October 2026.