FEATURE FILMS

Todd Hitchcock, Director, AFI FEST and the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center

FIUME O MORTE!

October 22, 3:10 p.m.

October 26, 8:45 p.m.

One of my favorite films of the year is Igor Bezinović’s inventive hybrid documentary FIUME OR MORTE! (FIUME OR DEATH!), which re-enacts momentous events from history in the contemporary places where they unfolded a little over a century ago. In the aftermath of World War I, Gabriele D’Annunzio — a celebrated Italian poet, playwright and army general — besieged the Adriatic port of Fiume (now Croatia’s Rijeka) in 1919, which would later surrender to the newly formed Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (Yugoslavia), despite its large Italian population. The film moves organically from casting call interviews of various acting candidates, to having the non-professional actors assume their roles and recite their lines from primary historical sources of letters, public edicts and press accounts. The actors in period dress occasionally interacting with contemporary onlookers provides levity, as does the Wes Anderson–esque code and catalog for ideal soldiering — directly quoting the dandyish D’Annunzio. Bezinović’s film powerfully reminds us about this little-remembered chapter of history and sounds a general warning about all the history that we risk forgetting. The film’s playful yet thought-provoking use of re-enactments — combined with expert pacing and rhythmic editing — makes for an innovative, fresh form of documentary. 

October 26 screening to be followed by a conversation with director and screenwriter Igor Bezinović.

ORPHAN (ÁRVA)

October 23, 2:45 p.m.

October 25, 11:15 a.m.

Just on a visual level, this may be the most beautifully textured and endlessly interesting looking film I have seen all year. Cinematographer Mátyás Erdély (AFI Class of 2005) also shot director László Nemes’ 2015 Oscar® winner SON OF SAUL, and more recently THE IRON CLAW and THE NEST for director Sean Durkin. In 1957 Budapest, adolescent Andor (Bojtorján Barabas) longs for his Jewish father who’s been missing since the war for over a decade now. His mother tells him that the Gentile man who sheltered her during WWII — for a price — is his real father, but the truth of this remains a mystery. Regardless, Andor utterly rejects Berend (Grégory Gadebois) as his father. There is a great deal at play here with imposed-father-to-resistant-son dynamics, patriarchy and Freudian baggage, all mirrored by the presence of the occupying Soviet Russian army and the subjugated Hungarian citizenry — the Hungarian Uprising of a year prior having just been crushed. Andor feels weak, dominated and frustrated in his efforts to resist the father he does not want. In a word, oppressed. It is a credit to Nemes’ artistry, command of tone and the noteworthy performances by young Barabas and veteran Gadebois that the viewers feel Andor’s anxiety and rage so viscerally. A remarkable film. 

Abbie Algar, Director, Programming, AFI FEST and AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center

GHOST ELEPHANTS 

October 25, 10:30 a.m.

Leave it to Werner Herzog to transform what might have been a conventional wildlife expedition into a haunting, poetic meditation on myth, memory and human obsession. GHOST ELEPHANTS begins in an unlikely spot: the rotunda of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., where a towering taxidermized elephant silently greets millions of visitors each year. But how many stop to wonder — where did he come from? Could his descendants still be glimpsed somewhere in the wild? From this simple premise, Herzog takes us on a journey stretching from the museum’s marbled halls to the highland wilds of Angola, where National Geographic explorer Steve Boyes is chasing a tantalizing mystery: the so-called “ghost elephants” rumored to be the surviving kin of the museum’s iconic specimen. But in classic Herzogian fashion — wry, curious, and tinged with existential melancholy — this is no straightforward expedition documentary. What begins as scientific pursuit quickly drifts into something dreamlike: a cinematic exploration of the unknowable, the ecological traces of colonialism and our very human need to believe in what we cannot quite prove. A must-see for longtime Herzog devotees and a perfect starting point for new audiences, GHOST ELEPHANTS is a singular entry in the master filmmaker’s documentary canon — as intellectually rich as it is emotionally resonant.
 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director and screenwriter Werner Herzog, editor Marco Capalbo and executive producers Brian Nugent and Andrew Trapani. 

MĀRAMA

October 25, 9:00 p.m.

I personally love a good haunted house film — but MĀRAMA isn’t just good, it’s bone-deep chilling in a way that creeps up on you and lingers long after the credits. With his gothic horror debut, Māori filmmaker Taratoa Stappard takes us far from genre tropes and right into the haunted heart of colonial legacy with a revenge story like no other. When young Māori teacher Mary Stevens (a phenomenal Āriana Osborne, channeling an ethereal yet determined presence à la Lily-Rose Depp in NOSFERATU) travels from Aotearoa (New Zealand) to the foggy moors of 1859 North Yorkshire in search of her family roots, what she finds instead is a cold manor house full of secrets, stolen treasures and a wealthy whaling magnate (Toby Stephens) who thinks he knows her people. Spoiler alert: he doesn’t, and Mary (who takes on her Māori name of Mārama) is having none of it. The film takes its time — and I mean that in the best possible way. There are no cheap jump scares here. Instead, MĀRAMA builds a slow, eerie dread, winding through candlelit corridors and ancestral trauma until it erupts in a haunting final act. It’s a film that holds a mirror up to the horrors of colonialism — not as a dusty chapter of history, but as a living, breathing presence. Stappard forces us to confront the ghosts we’ve inherited — whether they’re in our bloodline or buried under empire. Think GET OUT meets THE OTHERS, told through an indigenous lens, and you are part way to MĀRAMA. We’re proud to spotlight a bold new Māori voice — and thrilled to bring something this eerie, smart and unforgettable from Aotearoa to our lineup. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director and screenwriter Taratoa Stappard. 

Mimi Brody, Feature Film Programmer, AFI FEST

COVER UP

October 22, 6:15 p.m.

For nearly two decades, Laura Poitras (ALL THE BEAUTY AND THE BLOODSHED; CITIZENFOUR) tried to convince legendary journalist Seymour “Sy” Hersh to let her tell his story. Finally, he agreed, and Poitras — joining forces with co-director Mark Obenhaus — has created a documentary that is both timely and urgent. Hersh has spent more than 60 years rattling the cages of power, chasing the stories others wouldn’t touch. While many correspondents have historically been content to recycle White House talking points, rehash the current news cycle ad nauseam or to be fed stories from their own corporate-owned news outlets, Hersh was pounding the pavement — cultivating sources, following leads and refusing to let go until the truth came out. His exposés on the My Lai massacre in Vietnam, Watergate and Abu Ghraib shook the country and the world, and his relentless pursuit of accountability hasn’t slowed since. This film isn’t simply hagiography; it’s a bracing reminder of the stakes of journalism at a moment when reporters — here and abroad — are literally under siege. Drawing uncomfortable echoes between past and current atrocities — including Gaza — Poitras and Obenhaus ask us to consider what happens when truth-tellers are silenced. The result is a riveting portrait of a reporter who never stopped digging — and a call to protect the freedom of the press itself. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with directors and producers Laura Poitras and Mark Obenhaus. 

FANTASY LIFE

October 25, 3:20 p.m.

One of the most enjoyable discoveries I made during the film selection process this year was Matthew Shear’s charming directorial debut — a sharp, funny and surprisingly tender story about 30-something Sam Stein, played by Shear himself, a would-be New York lawyer with crippling anxiety — who becomes a nanny to his therapist’s grandkids. What could possibly go wrong? Amanda Peet is a knockout as an actress juggling career stall-outs, ageism and a rocky marriage to her rock musician husband (Alessandro Nivola). Her tentative, sometimes hilariously awkward bond with Shear’s oddball caregiver makes this two-hander one of the year’s best. FANTASY LIFE features across-the-board stellar performances — not only the film’s leads, who have a delightful, naturalistic rapport, but also the terrific ensemble cast, including Holland Taylor, Jessica Harper, Andrea Martin and the two Jewish family patriarchs — Judd Hirsch as Sam’s therapist and Bob Balaban in a wry turn as the affluent curmudgeon who is more than put-off by the presence of the hapless interloper. Triple threat writer/director/co-lead Matthew Shear (a frequent Noah Baumbach collaborator) is a filmmaking talent to watch, and his debut was a multiple prize-winner at SXSW earlier this year. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director, screenwriter and actor Matthew Shear and actor and producer Amanda Peet. 

Anna Li, Associate Programmer, AFI FEST

THE MYSTERIOUS GAZE OF THE FLAMINGO

October 22, 8:45 p.m.

One of the most spectacular discoveries of the year, Diego Céspedes’ audacious debut transported me back to my formative years, when I’d just discovered the New Queer Cinema movement and was eagerly devouring the vulnerable, transgressive works of Haynes, Araki, Riggs and Friedrich. Despite living across the Pacific, as a young lesbian, I was inexplicably drawn to this history that I was, not physically but spiritually, a part of. Céspedes contends with this inexplicable pull of a communal past and recontextualizes it at the dawn of the AIDS crisis in Latin America, as 11-year-old Lidia is lovingly raised by a vibrant group of crossdressers and transgender queens in a dusty Chilean mining town. In our shared language of queer cinema, with history reframed and reimagined, the indelible bond of chosen family flourishes in the face of cyclical ire and prejudice. We always persist. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director and screenwriter Diego Céspedes. 

ALL THAT’S LEFT OF YOU 

October 22, 8:30 p.m.

Cherien Dabis’ deeply personal, sweeping epic injects some much-needed humanity that we may have started to forget in the onslaught of desensitizing statistics and news images. Here, a Palestinian family is given a voice for three generations, from a beautiful orange grove in Jaffa in 1948 to life in Israeli-occupied West Bank, to the family’s eventual exodus from their homeland. Seven decades of coordinated effort to an active genocide is charted in the same breath as generational trauma inherited by the Palestinian people. In the face of tremendous loss and injustice, we experience their anger and heartache, but also resilience and hope. This is a vital, unmissable film. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director, screenwriter, producer and actor Cherien Dabis. 

Julia Kipnis, Associate Programmer, AFI FEST

YES

October 23, 5:45 p.m.

Causing a stir at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Israeli filmmaker Nadav Lapid’s latest — and perhaps most unyielding — tour de force is a pointed critique of his country’s violent government and the influential circle of obscenely elite who pull society’s strings. Conflicted feelings and overlapping tensions of life in Tel Aviv in the wake of October 7th are embodied through the eccentric and desperate lives of jazz musician Y (played by poet and playwright Ariel Bronz) and dancer Yasmin (played by Israeli star actress Efrat Dor). Mirroring the film’s absurd reality, Bronz was recently detained by police for posting a provocative poem on social media, and despite being nominated for several Ophir Awards (Israel’s Oscars®), Lapid himself feared the film would not find distribution — which it has in North America with Kino Lorber and will have one of its first U.S. screenings at AFI FEST. A prominent thread running through this year’s lineup is cinema as an act of revolution — as radical disruptor. No film in the program better represents this ethos than YES…and possibly no other film this year. Try not to fret its runtime: every surreal moment and distinct visual flourish is necessary in Lapid’s contentious and nuanced deconstruction of moral ambivalence and artistic integrity in modern Israel. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director and screenwriter Nadav Lapid. 

AMOEBA 

October 22, 9:00 p.m.

October 23, 9:40 p.m.

U.S. Premiere

Full-circle moments are a rare treat on the festival circuit — it’s not often that we have the opportunity to showcase a filmmaker’s breakthrough short films and then her feature-length directorial debut just a few years later. Siyou Tan’s (AFI DWW+ Class of 2019) filmmaking journey has evolved from her shorts HELLO AHMA and STRAWBERRY CHEESECAKE playing AFI FEST in 2019 and 2021 respectively to screening the U.S. Premiere of her TIFF-debuted discovery AMOEBA in 2025. Her sinister revenge short STRAWBERRY CHEESECAKE explores kindred themes to AMOEBA of teenage angst and defiance centered around a close-knit friend group of rebellious, badass schoolgirls. Tan expands upon this further in her first feature while also delving into the hypocrisy of Singapore’s cultural myths, including the iconic symbol for “Lion City” in the Merlion (a mythical creature with the head of a lion and body of a fish). Tan’s uncanny playfulness and sharp-witted touch immerse viewers in the suffocatingly authoritarian halls of an elite all-girls Chinese school in Singapore, where a quartet of rambunctious girls navigate the school year and their oppressive faculty before pivotal exams determine what their futures will hold. Infectiously dissident and mischievous with a supernatural undercurrent, Siyou Tan makes her mark with this impressively subversive and socially pertinent feature debut. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with AFI DWW+ Alumna, director and screenwriter Siyou Tan. 

Josh Gardner, Senior Film Programmer & Public Relations Manager, AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center

SILENT FRIEND 

October 26, 11:15 a.m.

Did you know ginkgo biloba trees can live for over 1,000 years? The central figure in SILENT FRIEND is one such tree, a beautiful behemoth who watches over the Philipps University of Marburg in Germany. She was there when Grete became the first female botanist student admitted in 1908, when Gundula started experimenting with a pink geranium in 1972 and when visiting neurology professor Tony (Tony Leung Chiu-Wai) started studying trees instead of humans during COVID lockdown. Intertwined like the knotted roots of a tree, this tripartite narrative follows Grete, Gundula and Tony as they push the boundaries of botany over the course of a century. Acclaimed Hungarian filmmaker Ildikó Enyedi (whose very first film, MY 20TH CENTURY, screened at AFI FEST in 1990) crafts visually distinct eras using black and white 35mm stock for the 1800s, sun-soaked 16mm for the 1970s and a precise digital image for the modern age. The result is a transcendent viewing experience bursting with a tactile, earthy sensuality that brought me closer to the natural world and will leave you feeling the same. 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director and screenwriter Ildikó Enyedi. 

PIN DE FARTIE 

October 23, 11:45 a.m.

October 25, 8:00 p.m.

Born out of the wave ushered in by New Argentine Cinema at the dawn of the 21st century, El Pampero Cine is a fiercely independent and boundary-pushing production company and filmmaking collective. Its members include Mariano Llinás (LA FLOR), Laura Citarella (TRENQUE LAQUEN, AFI FEST 2022) and Alejo Moguillansky (CASTRO, AFI FEST 2009). Beloved for their complex, literary meta-narratives and playful, razor-sharp wit, Moguillansky’s latest continues El Pampero’s winning streak. PIN DE FARTIE is a kaleidoscopic adaptation of Samuel Beckett’s play “Endgame,” filled with magical little moments: a breathtaking sunset dance, a trepidatious romance, a pair of filmmakers practicing practical effects. A Russian nesting doll of adaptation and inspiration, the film is a joyful little gem in our lineup and should not be overlooked. 

October 25 screening to be followed by a conversation with director, screenwriter and editor Alejo Moguillansky. 

Javier Chavez, Film Programmer, AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center

THE TALE OF SILYAN 

October 22, 4:30 p.m.

October 26, 3:10 p.m.

It’s hard for me not to love a film where a central character is an animal and Tamara Kotevska’s (HONEYLAND) latest poetic and lyrical documentary just proves that point. THE TALE OF SILYAN features incredible footage of the white storks that inhabit North Macedonia, weaving large nests atop electrical poles where they rear their adorable offspring. I also learned that these majestic creatures love arching their beaks backward and clapping their beaks together in a raucous chorus of sound. All of it is engrossing and serves not merely as a backdrop but as a relevant part of the tale of a man whose own son has abandoned him; it’s also about nothing less than mankind’s relationship with nature, class division, economic turmoil and the threat of modernity. In a year filled with indelible images, one that will stay with me for years to come is that of a man sitting on a couch holding an injured stork wrapped in a blanket to his chest, gently stroking its head. 

October 26 screening to be followed by a conversation with director and producer Tamara Kotevska, and cinematographer and producer Jean Dakar. 

WE BELIEVE YOU (ON VOUS CROIT)

October 22, 6:45 p.m.

Charlotte Deville and Arnaud Dufeys’ taut, nail-biting, alarming and profoundly moving debut feature gripped me quite literally from the first shot, in which we see lead actress Myriem Akheddiou in an extreme close-up within a narrow 4:3 frame that envelopes viewers in her emotional duress , tears flowing down her cheeks as she struggles to take her children to a court hearing. It’s a powerhouse performance, and I can’t imagine how hard it must be for an actor to perform such intense emotions all while a camera is inches from their face. The rest of the players are as astonishing, and the central court hearing — which takes up a large percentage of the film’s succinct runtime — is a natural showcase for every one of the performers, as well as Deville and Dufeys’ ability to keep viewers engaged through a dialogue-heavy scene set in one small location. This is, in my opinion, quite a discovery! 

Travis Weedon, Associate Programmer, AFI FEST

A POET (UN POETA)

October 24, 8:45 p.m.

Anyone who has at one time been enticed by noble literary pursuits over the dictates of the marketplace — thinking themselves above the rat race — will find discomfiting recognition in the perennially misfortunate, wannabe-poet Oscar Restrepo, played by Ubeimar Rios. His own worst enemy, Oscar fails at real life in order to achieve his high-minded ideal of poetic tragedy. We learn of Oscar’s principles — and conceitedness — primarily through heated, drunken rants — spectacles of self-aggrandized bloviating most people have at least encountered if not been the culprit of themselves. But Oscar gets one last shot at not being a total loser when he takes a promising young poet under his wing and attempts to reconnect with his estranged daughter. Can he stay out of his own way? Winner of the Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes, A POET is hilarious, smartly pointed in its critique of liberal institutions, and even heartfelt — a true triple threat. Colombia likes the film so much that they chose it as their submission for Best International Feature at the Academy Awards®. You’ll probably like it too! 

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director, screenwriter and producer Simón Mesa Soto. 

PHANTOMS OF JULY (SEHNSUCHT IN SANGERHAUSEN)

October 24, 8:20 p.m.

North American Premiere 

Julian Radlmaier’s newest is a sneaky delight of a film. It’s a breezy, goes-down-easy experience without being slight. Audiences will be immediately seduced by the warm 16mm cinematography that they’ll just want to fall right into. The story opens on a luxurious German estate in the late 18th century, rendered with convincing period detail. After following a chambermaid’s story for a short spell, we are whisked away to the modern era where we meet a waitress and a YouTube travel influencer in the same area, now the quaint town of Sangerhausen, with more than an undercurrent of small-town xenophobia. Quirky hijinks ensue around a set of repeating motifs, including cherries, camels, proletarianism and the German poet Novalis. Big ideas are bandied about, but they’re mellowed by whimsy, humor and an insistently approachable tone that never errs into pretension. 

SHORT FILMS

Nichole Young, Associate Programmer, Short Films, AFI FEST

DEMONS TO DIAMONDS 

Screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM: AFTER DARK October 24, 9:40 p.m.

World Premiere 

Within the cold labyrinth of Paris’s La Défense business district, a series of suicides reveals its decaying society. Paranoia of a burgeoning surveillance state looms throughout the city, alienating its inhabitants all while one captive, lurking in the shadows, threatens to destroy it all. Valentin Noujaïm’s expressionist tale questions what the overwhelming pressure of modernity spawns; demons, diamonds — or does this transmutation embrace both? Denis Lavant and Kayije Kagame immerse us in this eerie, neon cityscape, concluding Noujaïm’s The Defense Trilogy. 

AL BASATEEN (THE ORCHARDS)

Screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM: DOCUMENTARY 2 October 25, 5:00 p.m.

U.S. Premiere 

A decade after the obliteration of Damascus’s Basateen al-Razi district at the hands of Bashar al-Asaad’s regime, two former residents replicate their original neighborhood through 3D animations and archival photographs. AL BASATEEN is an urgent, deeply ruminative exposition of displacement and authoritarianism. From the ashes of their razed orchards and beloved homes remains a community who refuses to be erased. Memories are awakened, history is preserved and resistance prevails. This mournful record of what once was captures the everlasting strength of the human memory. 

Daniel Crooke, Associate Programmer, Short Films, AFI FEST

CASI SEPTIEMBRE

Screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM: LIVE ACTION 1 October 23, 8:15 p.m.

North American Premiere 

Restless and beautifully subjective filmmaking heighten the senses in this emotionally arresting summer romance from Spanish director Lucía G. Romero, whose ability to evoke authentic off-the-grid ambience and then fill it with rounded, effortlessly inhabited characters deserves comparison to Alice Rohrwacher. Set in and around a liminal RV park on the sea, at the height of tourist season, Romero fills her frames through a fight-or-flight collision of desire, trust and uncertainty. It’s a swooner! 

BENEATH WHICH RIVERS FLOW 

Screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM: DOCUMENTARY 1 October 24, 6:50 p.m.

Director Ali Yahya crafts a brave and surprising mode of nonfiction storytelling in this rich portrait of a region on the brink. What begins as an atmospheric immersion into an intimate farming community in the southern marshlands of Iraq morphs — via the type of formal Big Swing we crave at the cinema — into an adventurous and chilling study of how a life on the water becomes threatened due to climate change and industrialization. A miracle movie I haven’t stopped thinking about. 

Payton Ewalt, Associate Programmer, Short Films, AFI FEST

9 MILLION COLORS (9 MILIONŮ BAREV)

Screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM: ANIMATION 1 October 25, 11:30 a.m.

In an operatic tale of marine love, Fran, a curiously bloodthirsty mantis shrimp, falls in love with Milva, a blind fish, and becomes determined to show her the ocean through her point of view. Ignorant of the violence that follows in her wake, Fran quickly learns what love and sacrifice mean as Milva teaches her what it means to see — without her eyes. The ocean is full of unknowns, but this brilliantly vibrant musical will make you certain that the sea can host a love as beautiful as this. 

Eli Prysant, Assistant Programmer, AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center

SNOW BEAR

Screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM: ANIMATION 1 October 25, 11:30 a.m.

Starring one of nature’s most paradoxically huggable apex predators, SNOW BEAR follows a polar bear looking for a friend in the wild. Not seeing any other bears in sight and rebuffed by other species, the bear fashions its own pals out of snow, but these snow bears can only provide so much companionship before the aching solitude returns once more. Winningly animated, this short tells a relatable story of searching for your own fellow pack. 

MERMAIDS (GORGONES)

Screens as part of SHORTS PROGRAM: LIVE ACTION 2 October 24, 4:00 p.m.

Aiming for a private hang at the beach, two different friend groups have their hopes dashed as they find themselves at odds with their preconceptions of their seaside neighbors. Two star-crossed lovers emerge between the groups and just like in the old Bard’s tale, the two “families” disapprove — one made up of heteronormative jocks/cool kids and the other comprised of queer free spirits. There’s more than meets the eye though, as hidden desires give way to fateful trysts and legendary creatures. 

Learn more about AFI’s annual film festival in the heart of Hollywood at FEST.AFI.com.