Films

When life becomes fiction, the boundaries begin to blur. Pedro Almodóvar turns filmmaking, memory, desire, and betrayal into a colorful, melodramatic journey fueled by singer-songwriter Chavela Vargas’s music and the director’s unmistakable cinematic flair.

Esiri brothers Arie and Chuko transposes Mrs. Dalloway’s timeless story to contemporary Nigeria in this fiery reimagining of the Virginia Woolf classic, starring a luminous, profoundly melancholic Sophie Okonedo as the eponymous Lagos society woman.

Two soldiers fall in love amidst World War I in celebrated Belgian filmmaker Lukas Dhont’s (Close) latest work. Emmanuel Macchia and Valentin Campagne shared Best Actor at Cannes for this tender drama that mixes sensual sex scenes with stark combat sequences.

In the forests of southern Nepal, a mother searches for her missing daughter as wild elephants roam the night, in a haunting and tender story of chosen family, belonging, and survival.

After playing composer Richard Rodgers in Blue Moon and RAF meteorologist James Stagg in Pressure, Andrew Scott hits the biopic trifecta with his portrayal of Ian Charleson as the actor prepares to play his final role, Hamlet.

An unforgettable study of identity, family, and generational remorse, the stunning Fatherland traces the relationship between renowned writer Thomas Mann and his accomplished actress-writer daughter Erika amidst the ruins of postwar Germany.

Three eras, one buried story. La bola negra is a mesmerizing cinematic journey through love, memory, persecution, and the quiet wounds passed from one generation to the next, told with haunting beauty.

French teenagers take a summer class trip to Naples, Italy, in this marvelous coming-of-age film that is subtle, mysterious, and intelligent. Marine Atlan’s feature debut garnered the Cannes Critics Week Best Picture award.

In this striking neo-noir debut, a fiercely independent Lagos taxi driver’s careful life is upended when she becomes the driver for a group of glamorous, reckless sex workers—including her long-lost childhood friend.

Andrew Haigh tells an intimate, tenderly heartbreaking tale of personal awakening and familial reckoning set in the gorgeously snow-clad Mountain West of the 1950s, starring Fred Hechinger in a stunning turn.

In AIDS-era New York, an artist throws himself into work, love, music, and desire, surrounded by people who challenge the boundaries of intimacy, loyalty, and the life he wants to live.

Sandra Hüller delivers a performance of searing psychological intensity as a 17th-century war veteran who conceals many secrets in Markus Schleinzer’s stark, formally stunning drama.

MVFF partners with CalArts, UC Santa Cruz, UCLA, California College of the Arts, and CSU Long Beach for a stellar showcase of animated work directed by female and nonbinary filmmakers. This selection features films reflecting family, friendship, life, death, and cultural identity.

"If music could talk, which means whatever your mind can bring.” This collection of documentary short films invite a sense of curiosity and quest, seeking to grasp human thought, motive, and expression. In Nita Blum and Jonathan Pickett’s A NEW INFERNO (US 2026, 16 min), paramedics race to save the lives of heatstroke victims using a radical new treatment. With an experimental sensibility, Karla Condado’s MIRIAM (Mexico 2025, 19 min) copes with grief as the filmmaker reads personal letters to her aunt who was a victim of femicide. Along the picturesque coastline of Brittany, France, bright orange novelty Garfield phones wash ashore in Zack Grant’s eccentric SILLY LITTLE PLASTIC CAT (France/US 2026 12 min). In SWING SWISH SWAY (US 2026, 7 min), TT Takemoto's colorful and tangible reconstruction of history is inspired by Filipina-American Rose Bamberger, founder of Daughters of Bilitis, San Francisco’s own first lesbian activist group. Free-spirited and expressive, Charlie Eguia’s HAPPINESS FOR A HERDER (US/Mongolia 2026, 16 min) follows a group of nomadic herder families in Mongolia. —Diana Sánchez Maciel

“But go easy Step lightly Stay free.” As we grow older, we tend to abandon all inherent free spirit and audacity. This collection of short documentary films brings those feelings flooding back, allowing us to live vicariously through these bold, intrepid, and resilient characters. In THE RIGHT FIT (US 2025, 12 min), Max Mollring and Nicolas Collins introduce the owner of a one-of-a-kind small business in San Rafael. Intimate and observational, Hao Zhou's AT THE STAGE WHEN (China 2026, 15 min) follows a young urban couple experiencing societal pressure around parenthood. Composed of black-and-white 35mm photographs, A TOWN CALLED NEEDVILLE (US/Canada 2026, 5 min) traces filmmaker Audrey Lane's inpatient stay at an all-women’s mental health facility in Texas. A collaboration between Ukrainian painter Alla Hurenko and directors Natalie Shirinian and Elizabeth Baudouin, ROOM OF THE ABSOLUTE (US, Ukraine 2026, 18 min) is a time capsule and portrait of resilience in the face of relentless destruction in Ukraine. It is 1980 in Yuba City, California, in Reaa Puri’s HARVEST PARTY AT CAMP TWO (US 2026, 16 min), and a group of Young Punjabi Sikh farmworkers throw the biggest party their small town has ever seen. —Diana Sánchez Maciel

“What the hell is wrong with me? I'm not who I want to be.”  These short films from around the world compel their characters to rethink who they are and what they may want.  Petch Kitwattanachai’s OF VEINS AND WIRES (Thailand 2026, 16 min) imagines a future where artificial means can replace human procreation. In Erin Cramer’s ENJOY YOUR VISIT (US 2026, 19 min), an African American actress cosplays as a slave at a tourist-based historical site.  The gay couple in Mehdi Davachi’s ITALIANO (Iran 2026, 20 min) reevaluates their relationship to their repressive Persian culture when the prospect of leaving their homeland arises. And in Jasmine Bisette’s THE DOCTOR AND THE FLOATING BRIDGE (France 2026, 19 min), a Korean expatriate doctor must confront his mixed feelings about his former home when he meets a very special patient.  Life and sense of self are never exactly how they appear in these provocative and moving stories. —Sterling Hedgpeth

Leah Nelson’s beautifully animated film, based on Sarah Leavitt’s graphic memoir, stars Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Abbi Jacobson, and Bryan Cranston as a family struggling to support each other through a mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s.

After playing composer Richard Rodgers in Blue Moon and RAF meteorologist James Stagg in Pressure, Andrew Scott hits the biopic trifecta with his portrayal of Ian Charleson as the actor prepares to play his final role, Hamlet.

Three eras, one buried story. La bola negra is a mesmerizing cinematic journey through love, memory, persecution, and the quiet wounds passed from one generation to the next, told with haunting beauty.

Intimate and observational, At the Stage When follows a young urban couple experiencing societal pressure around parenthood.

A breakup from the point of view of a young woman hoping to glue the pieces together but discovering that some broken things cannot be fixed.

A gay couple reevaluates their relationship to their repressive Persian culture when the prospect of leaving their homeland arises.

TT Takemoto's colorful and tangible reconstruction of history is inspired by Filipina-American Rose Bamberger, founder of Daughters of Bilitis, San Francisco’s own first lesbian activist group.