Ahead of Wednesday’s kickoff, the second-year LFF head talks about a program that’s inching toward what appears to be an interesting strategic shift for the fest: a full-scale embrace of the avant-garde. From the big opening-night premiere of Steve McQueen’s harrowing film about the Nazi bombing raids on the UK capital to ‘Queer,’ ‘The Apprentice,’ ‘Endurance’ and more, the 12-day event’s experimental mix-up is the enthusiasm of the city’s “very cinema-literate audience,” she tells Deadline’s Zac Ntim.