THE fourteenth annual Glasgow Film Festival came to a close on Sunday night as it celebrated record-breaking attendance in the face of bad weather.

Admissions on the opening seven days were up nine per cent on the previous year after stars including Karen Gillan, David Tennant, Lynne Ramsay and Imogen Poots walked the red carpet.

Glasgow Film Theatre enjoyed 2,276 admissions on Saturday February 24, a new single day record for the venue.

The festival team worked throughout the week to ensure the event stayed operational during the Beast From the East after some screenings were cancelled in light of the red weather warning.

Read more: Glasgow Film Festival screenings and SWG3 pop-up event cancelled as bad weather sets in

The last weekend ended with high-profile guests including Gemma Arterton and Ben Wheatley and sell-out screenings, including the return of the ever-popular FrightFest and the World Premiere of Douglas King’s Glasgow-set dystopian rom-com Super November.

Home-grown talent continued to shine as the festival closed with the Gala World Premiere of Felipe Bustos Sierra’s rousing documentary Nae Pasaran.

The Scottish-made feature tells the incredible true story of the East Kilbride factory workers who defied a dictatorship from the other side of the world by grounding half of Pinochet’s air-force in the 1970s.

Read more: Glasgow Film Festival screenings and SWG3 pop-up event cancelled as bad weather sets in

The workers themselves – Bob Fulton, Stuart Barrie, John Keenan and Robert Somerville – were all in attendance at the World Premiere along with Felipe.

Glasgow Film Festival will be keeping the festival magic alive as GFF18 on Tour brings four of its most popular films to cinemas across Scotland later in the year: Nae Pasaran, the crowd-pleasing The Divine Order, Maggie Smith in Muriel Spark’s classic The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and Brimstone & Glory, the stunning documentary about Mexico’s jaw-dropping National Pyrotechnics Festival.

Xavier Legrand, director of the GFF18 Audience Award Winning Custody said: "It is a great honour to win this award and my thanks go to the festival and its wonderful audiences for it.

"The festival has a great spirit and sense of community especially in the face of this week's weather events and myself and the film's star Denis Menochet hope to revisit again in the coming years, with or without the snow!"

David Tennant, who attended Glasgow Film Festival 2018 with the European Premiere of You, Me and Him said: “I am so pleased and proud that we got to premiere You, Me and Him at the GFF. In the GFT, possibly my favourite cinema in the world.

"The Glasgow audience is so engaged and enthusiastic and discerning, it’s the perfect place to celebrate all that is exciting about British film. Thanks for having us!”

Allison Gardner, Glasgow Film Festival Co-director said: "We have had the most wonderful time at GFF18, from our stunning stop animation Opening with the UK Premiere of Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs through to our closing weekend featuring two World Premieres of Scottish films - Super November and Nae Pasaran.

Read more: Glasgow Film Festival screenings and SWG3 pop-up event cancelled as bad weather sets in

"Despite the best efforts of the Beast from the East, our fantastic team here pulled together and achieved the herculean task of ‘the show must go on’. Before the storm GFF18 was 9% ahead of GFF17"

Allan Hunter, Glasgow Film Festival Co-director added: "I am thrilled that Custody has won the 2O18 Glasgow Film Festival Audience Award. Xavier Legrand's stunning debut feature had audiences on the edge of their seats as he explored the fallout from a bitter custody battle.

"Brilliant performances and Legrand's impeccable control of the escalating tension made Custody unforgettable. We hope the award is a sign of great things to come for Custody's UK release via Picturehouse."