Stewart Copeland documentary to premiere at Raindance Film Festival

Stewart Copeland is back on a festival screen with a film that compresses a whole career into 74 minutes, and that feels about right for a drummer whose ideas have always moved faster than the average rock bio. Copeland gets its world premiere on Friday, June 19, 2026, at 6:30 p.m. at Vue Piccadilly during Raindance Film Festival, with a second screening set for Saturday, June 20, at 6:15 p.m. at Vue Piccadilly Screen 3.

The documentary is directed by Aragonese filmmaker Pablo Aragüés and is anchored by a concert in Italy. Raindance lists it as a 74-minute film, and Copeland has already framed it in promotional language as “74 years in 74 minutes.” That setup matters because this is not just a Police nostalgia reel. The film traces Copeland’s musical journey across five decades of creativity and career milestones, with material drawn from his home life, family background, business instincts and the friendships that shaped him.

For drummers, the real draw is what Copeland still represents on the kit: feel that snaps without sounding stiff, orchestration that treats the whole drum set like a melody instrument, and punk energy that never turns into mush. That combination is exactly why his name keeps coming up in conversations about players who can do more than hit hard. He’s always been a drummer who thinks in layers, and the film’s own framing, including his long-running Persian rug metaphor for the structure of his music, points straight at that balance between chaos and control.

The documentary also reaches beyond the throne. Distributor material identifies Redwood Films as the production company, and the package includes rare Super 8 footage shot by Copeland himself of artists and bands tied to The Police’s touring years, among them Bob Marley, UB40, The Specials and The Clash. That kind of archive gives the film more bite than a standard career recap. It also fits Copeland’s larger profile as a composer for film and television, with credits that include Rumble Fish, Wall Street, Four Days in September, The Equalizer, Babylon 5, Desperate Housewives and Spyro the Dragon.

There is emotional weight here too. Copeland has said he was “heartbroken” after The Police’s 2003 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction because the band did not stay together afterward, and other reporting says he also felt “sadness” about that moment. The Police did regroup for the 2007-08 reunion tour, but the sting of that earlier split still colors the story. Raindance’s 34th edition opened on June 17 at Vue West End, and Copeland’s premiere lands in the middle of that run like a reminder that the sharpest drummers do not just keep time, they leave a shape behind.