The 67th San Francisco International Film Festival (SFFILM Festival) presented from May 2–4, 2024, unveiled the full lineup of films. This year’s program will screen exclusively in theaters in San Francisco’s Marina and Presidio neighborhoods, and in Berkeley from April 24–28.
Opening Night celebrates the Bay Area’s own Sean Wang with his Sundance award-winning first feature, Dìdi (弟弟). Wang was recently nominated for an Academy Award® for Best Documentary Short (Nai Nai & Wài Pó, Festival, 2023).
Closing Night features Thelma, a new work from Josh Margolin that stars the 94-year-old Academy Award® nominee June Squibb along with Fred Hechinger, Parker Posey, Clark Gregg, Malcolm McDowell, and Richard Roundtree (in his final film role).
Several marquee titles in both narrative and documentary features include The Idea of You, directed by Michael Showalter and starring Anne Hathaway; Janet Planet, directed by Annie Baker and starring Julianne Nicholson; Sing Sing, directed by Greg Kwedar and starring Colman Domingo and co-starring multi-talented Bay Area artist Sean San José, who will be in attendance; Porcelain War winner of Sundance’s U.S. Grand Jury Prize for Documentary, directed by Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev; Luther: Never Too Much about singer and musician Luther Vandross from SFFILM Festival alum Dawn Porter; and Billy & Molly: An Otter Love Story, a documentary for the whole family from renowned wildlife cinematographer Charlie Hamilton James.
“We have been boldly imagining a future where the San Francisco Bay Area is thriving in its celebration of and engagement with the arts and community,” said Anne Lai, Executive Director of SFFILM. “Film—always a reflection of and beacon for society—remains the gateway to a vibrant, healthy future of our culture and city. This year’s Festival brings the pleasure of movie-going to a footprint highlighting San Francisco’s unparalleled and iconic beauty. We look forward to welcoming guests to be inspired, entertained, and connected in the way only movies can do.”
SFFILM’s Director of Programming Jessie Fairbanks expanded on what audiences can expect to see on screen. “The cornerstone of this year’s program is the considered, international curation we are known for,” she said. “We have put together a group of films that is global in scope, artistry, and impact, and includes discovery titles, hotly anticipated films, and powerhouse shorts blocks. Now more than ever we need the art of cinema—to entertain, to provoke, to question and to inspire—and each film in this lineup is richly deserving of our attention.”
SFFILM will also celebrate the filmmaking careers of two artists, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Joan Chen, with unique tribute programs.
Special honors and awards at the 2024 SFFILM Festival celebrate the art and craft of filmmaking and its indelible influence on culture. The Mel Novikoff Award which honors film exhibitors will celebrate Bay Area legend Gary Meyer whose career kicked off while working for Novikoff himself. Meyer will be in an onstage conversation with IndieWire Editor at Large and film journalist Anne Thompson and includes Meyer-selected screenings of Macario (Festival, 1960) directed by Roberto Gavaldón and a short film, Sour Death Balls (Festival, 1992) directed by Jessica Yu. The Persistence of Vision Award goes to filmmaker Johan Grimonprez who will be in an onstage conversation with Dr. Fumi Okiji, Assistant Professor of Rhetoric at University of California Berkeley, at BAMPFA. The program also features a screening of his latest work, the vibrant essay film Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat, the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Cinematic Innovation at Sundance this year. In partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, SFFILM will present three films as part of their SFFILM Sloan Science in Cinema Initiative which supports the compelling depiction of science on screen. The first is the world premiere of On the Invention of Species directed by Tania Hermida, recipient of the Sloan Science on Screen Award. The other two highlighted films are the world premiere of Mabel directed by Nicholas Ma with Judy Greer starring, and Rob Peace directed by Chiwetel Ejiofor.
A selection of titles, curated from the full festival, will be presented from May 2–4 as SFFILM Festival Encore Days at the historic Roxie Theater.
67TH SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL PROGRAM
Big Nights + Special Events
Opening Night: Dìdi (弟弟)
Sean Wang (USA 2023, 90)
Narratives: USA
Sean Wang’s auspicious, semi-autobiographical feature debut centers on a universally recognizable phase of adolescence — that moment we begin the lifelong process of self-determination. Set in 2008 Fremont, this Sundance audience award winner follows 13-year-old Taiwanese American Chris (Izaac Wang) in the fleeting months prior to freshman year as he clumsily pursues his first crush, nurtures his passions for filming and skating, and experiments with the dawning intensity of online relationships via AIM chat and MySpace. At home, Chris’ college-bound sister Vivian (Shirley Chen) and weary mother Chunsing (an illuminating Joan Chen) annoy him, while his acerbic grandma Nai Nai (Chang Li Hua, the director’s real-life grandmother) frets over his diet. All three women draw his ire as Chris stumbles through a series of hilarious coming-of-age situations. Nuanced and tender, Wang’s film is a layered exploration of learning to love oneself against the Darwinian backdrop of teenage cliques, cultural conformity, and the maddening frustrations of growing up.
Closing Night: Thelma
Josh Margolin (USA 2024, 97)
Narratives: USA
A steely and hysterical June Squibb sinks her teeth into her first leading role as a 93-year-old widow proudly living alone who falls prey to a cash-grabbing hoax. Vowing to bring the perpetrators to justice, Thelma sets out on an odyssey across an evocatively lensed Los Angeles landscape, accompanied by her old friend Ben (a scene-stealing Richard Roundtree in his final performance). Together, the determined duo wield their charm, social invisibility, and elder-age devices to overcome numerous obstacles. Director James Margolin overtly and subtly draws on action-hero genre cliches, playing with traditional set-ups to illustrate Thelma’s agency while also placing Tom Cruise and Mission: Impossible directly into the plot. Margolin is firmly at the helm of this hilarious romp but the film belongs to Squibb, as the Oscar®-nominated performer imbues Thelma with a hunger to be seen and understood by those who love her most, something we never grow out of.
A Tribute to Chiwetel Ejiofor + “Rob Peace” (Sloan Science on Screen)
Chiwetel Ejiofor (USA 2024, 146)
Narratives: USA
Tribute to actor, director, and writer Chiwetel Ejiofor with an intimate conversation celebrating his new feature Rob Peace.
Rob Peace
In an acting tour de force, Jay Will plays the talented titular character, a young New Jersey science prodigy headed for the Ivy League, but heavily impacted by his past. While Rob is still an adolescent, his father (another impeccable turn from writer-director Chiwetel Ejiofor) is convicted of homicide and the boy devotes himself to proving his dad’s innocence. As a budding scientist excelling in biophysics, Rob enters Yale, attempting to negotiate this elite new environment alongside his connection to family and community. Based on Peace’s Yale roommate Jeff Hobbs’ bestselling biography, Ejiofor’s exquisite drama details the collision of a life lived under immense pressure. The film features terrific supporting performances by Mary J. Blige as Rob’s caring mother and Mare Winningham as a Yale professor who grants him special lab access.
A Tribute to Joan Chen + “Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl”
Joan Chen (China 1998, 147)
Narratives: International
Tribute to actor/director/writer/producer Joan Chen with an intimate conversation celebrating her extraordinary career and unique 35 mm screening of her debut feature Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl.
Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl
An astonishingly confident directorial debut from San Francisco-based actress Joan Chen, Xiu Xiu is a heartbreaking coming-of-age melodrama set during the later stages of the Cultural Revolution. A young girl, Xiu Xiu, is sent to a desolate part of Tibet to learn horse breeding from her trainer, Lao Jin, a serene Tibetan herdsman. Deserted in such a bleak, uncompromising landscape, Xiu Xiu dreams of a better life, but slowly realizes that the authorities have no intention of ever rescuing her. Her dreams shattered, she is coerced into sex by visiting townsmen and their promises of “help.” But no help ever comes, and the silent, love-struck Lao Jin is left as her only hope. Chen’s slow-building moods and self-assured narrative tone recall the emotional power and underlying social critique inherent in mainland China’s Fifth Generation filmmakers as well as the work of their predecessor Xie Jin (whose 1977 film, Youth, saw Chen in one of her first starring roles). Austere, uncluttered—no unnecessary dramatic pyrotechnics or visual exotica—Xiu Xiu achieves a purity of vision not found in most contemporary cinema. Coaxing gorgeously refined performances out of radiant newcomer Lu Lu and the Tibetan-born Lopsang, Chen weaves a story of love unspoken and love lost, and in so doing introduces an exciting new voice to world cinema. —Jason Sanders, Festival 1998
Awards
Mel Novikoff Award: Gary Meyer + “Macario” + “Sour Death Balls”
Roberto Gavaldón (Mexico 1960, 146)
Narratives: International
For over 30 years, the SFFILM Mel Novikoff Award has been given to an individual or institution whose work has enhanced the film-going public’s appreciation of world cinema. This year’s Mel Novikoff presentation will include Gary Meyer in conversation with NBC News journalist Anne Thompson, followed by a screening of the 1960 Mexican classic Macario and Jessica Yu’s memorable short Sour Death Balls.
Macario
A village’s Day of the Dead celebration foreshadows a bewitching magical realist fable in director Roberto Gavaldón’s dreamy adaptation of a B. Traven (The Treasure of the Sierra Madre) short story set in colonial Mexico. Impoverished woodcutter Macario (Ignacio López Tarso) has never gone a day without hunger, more acute now that he has five children to feed. His wife produces a rare turkey for him and him alone to eat but when he elects to share it with a mysterious stranger, he gains the power to heal, a gift that enriches the family but also puts Macario in the murderous crosshairs of the Spanish Inquisition. Mexico’s first foreign-language film Oscar® nominee, its star Tarso won the Golden Gate Award for Best Actor when Macario screened at the 1960 Festival. Gabriel Figueroa’s (Luis Buñuel’s The Exterminating Angel) luminous black-and-white cinematography sparkles anew and astonishes in a 4K restoration.
Roberto Gavaldón
Director
A contemporary of Douglas Sirk and Vincente Minnelli with whom he shared an affinity for melodrama, Roberto Galvaldón (1909–1986) was a key figure in the Golden Age of Mexican Cinema of the 1940s and ‘50s. He co-directed five features before making La barraca (1945), his first solo feature, the winner of 10 Ariel awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. In all, he was nominated for 17 Ariels, winning seven. In 1986, the Ariels awarded him its Salvador Toscano Medal for lifetime achievement.
Macario screens with Sour Death Balls (Festival 1992, 5 min), Jessica Yu’s hilarious short about kids and grownups accepting the sour candy taste challenge.
Persistence of Vision Award:
Johan Grimonprez + “Soundtrack for a Coup d’Etat”
Johan Grimonprez (Belgium 2024, 200)
Documentaries: International
Who owns our imagination in a world of existential vertigo where truth has become a shipwrecked refugee? Is it the storyteller who can contain contradictions, who can slip between the languages we have been given to become a time-traveler of the imagination? Johan Grimonprez’s critically acclaimed work dances on the borders of theory and practice, between art and cinema, going beyond the dualisms of documentary and fiction, other and self, mind and brain to weave new pathways in how we perceive our realities. Our histories and memories are not only a means to reimagine our contested past, but also tools to negotiate our shared present. In Wonderland, the Queen rephrases it to Alice: “It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.”
Soundtrack for a Coup d’Etat
What is the first step a country might take when engineering its first post-colonial African coup? Weaponize music and appoint a jazz ambassador. The stylings of Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Abbey Lincoln, Max Roach, and more form a backbeat in Johan Grimonprez’s (dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y, 1997 New Visions GGA; Shadow World, Festival 2016) rich essay that interweaves interviews, archival footage, and more to tell the story of Western nations conspiring against the nascent Democratic Republic of the Congo in order to protect capitalist interests. Featuring a Who’s Who of midcentury international players, the documentary depicts how the US, Belgium, and other Western interests plotted first a coup and then the assassination of Patrice Lumumba, Congo’s first prime minister. The film allows the viewer to connect the dots and make connections, holding a mirror to our own era as it harks back to a violent historical chapter written to serve colonizers and capitalists—all of it set to the soundtrack of cool jazz.
Sloan Science on Screen Award: “On the Invention of Species”
Tania Hermida (Ecuador 2024, 91)
World Premiere
Narratives: International
On the Invention of Species
When Carla’s dad drags her to the Galapagos Islands for a convention on conservation and species evolution, she is less than thrilled. On the cusp of womanhood and grappling with the loss of her brother, Carla finds herself adrift on the historic archipelago that led to Charles Darwin’s breakthrough studies on adaptation. Befriending two young boys who become her emotional foils, Carla pretends to be a different version of herself in order to surmount this emotional and physical journey. In this stunningly lensed lyrical debut, Tania Hermida deftly toys with parables while exploring the evolving relationship between man and nature. With Terrence Malick stylings, hints of Agnès Varda observational irony, and a dash of Alice Rohrwacher magical-realism, this tender film is a celebration of the shared sentient experience—biological and emotional.
Tania Hermida
Director
A native of Cuenca, Ecuador, Tania Hermida studied film direction at Cuba’s International Film and TV School of San Antonio de las Banos, creative writing at Madrid’s School of Letters, the aesthetics of cinema at the University of Valladolid, and earned a master’s in cultural studies from the University of Azuay. Her features include How Much Further (2006), winner of the Havana Film Festival’s Opera Prima award and the Montreal World Film Festival’s Silver Zenith, and In the Name of the Girl (2011).
Documentaries: International
Agent of Happiness
Arun Bhattarai, Dorottya Zurbó (Bhutan 2024, 94)
Documentaries: International
Can happiness be measured by points? In a policy woefully simplified by Western media, Bhutan calculates its development by gross national happiness. Embarking on a census-like enterprise, two government officers ask citizens if they are happy. The answer might be yes, if a farmer’s cow gave birth, or no, if a family was denied citizenship. In a journey that is as political as it is personal, people’s revelatory answers lay bare their relationship to Bhutan’s government, its nation state, and monarchy. With stunning cinematography, Agent of Happiness investigates the age-old quest to find the purpose of life—and to derive happiness from fulfilling that purpose.
Black Box Diaries
Shiori Ito (Japan 2024, 104)
Documentaries: International
A 2015 dinner with Noriyuki Yamaguchi evolves into a years-long nightmare for Shiori Ito after the veteran journalist drugged and sexually assaulted the Reuters intern. In her quest for justice, Ito faces long odds: Yamaguchi is not only a high-profile newsman but also Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s personal biographer. But she will not be deterred in this powerful, intensely personal documentary that depicts her campaign to hold her assailant accountable. The case makes Ito the face of Japan’s #MeToo movement while launching a national discussion about the country’s outdated sexual assault and consent laws. As she faces threats and the possibility of a coverup, she turns investigator, chasing leads, determined to expose the truth. Splashed across the media as both a hero and villain, Ito becomes a voice for the modern Japanese woman, speaking for those whose own experiences have been too often silenced.
Eternal You
Hans Block, Moritz Rieswieck (Germany 2024, 87)
Documentaries: International
If you could, would you communicate with your dead loved ones? Would you embrace the possibility if your mother or father or spouse could live on virtually after they have left this plane of existence? Can there be life—of a sort—after death? Those queries and more are at the heart of this bold examination of a revolutionary new AI frontier that endeavors to connect the living with the dead and, in a way, conquer death. Ethical questions abound in this fascinating look at “digital afterlife” and a burgeoning industry with no guardrails. A woman who lost her young daughter and another who regrets never answering her first love’s final text message are among the early adopters of these technologies that appear alongside entrepreneurs, research scientists, and critics in Hans Block and Moritz Riesewieck’s comprehensive and provocative documentary. Where will we go when we die? Heaven? Hell? Purgatory? Or cyberspace?
Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa
Lucy Walker (USA 2023, 98)
US Premiere
Documentaries: International
A heroine hides in plain sight as a dishwasher in a Connecticut Whole Foods in Lucy Walker’s astonishing documentary. The film tells the inspiring story of Lhakpa Sherpa, the first Nepali woman to conquer Mount Everest and survive. Walker captures this elite athlete’s life as she prepares for a tenth summit — a new record for women mountaineers. The world knows her from her top-of-the-world exploits but Walker’s portrait reveals a range of seemingly insurmountable challenges that Lhakpa manages to transcend. At this “low altitude,” the mother of three endures hardscrabble challenges as an immigrant and single parent. Through it all, she perseveres, finding purpose in both daily and historic accomplishments. Mountain Queen shines a deserving spotlight on Lhakpa’s unyielding determination and spirit as it brings her incredible saga to triumphant heights.
Porcelain War
Brendan Bellomo, Slava Leontyev (Ukraine 2024, 90)
Documentaries: International
When the Russians invade Ukraine, husband-and-wife artists Slava and Anya, their faithful dog Frodo, and dear friend Andrey, seize their destiny as they choose to stay and fight. Setting aside their civilian life and past selves, Slava and Andrey join a special ops unit on the frontlines, while Anya makes delicate porcelain art amid constant bombardment. Made in partnership with US-based co-director Brendan Bellomo, these first- time film collaborators steel themselves against the atrocities of war by cherishing spring blossoms, lifelong friendships, and long walks through their beautiful, ravaged country. It is rare for a documentary to capture a war unfolding in real time with such lucidity, while also transcending the immediacy of violence to celebrate the indomitable power of the human spirit. Buoyed by a passion for living and charming animated sequences, this Sundance Documentary Grand Jury prize-winner vividly depicts the human need to create and compulsion to survive.
Sugarcane
Julian Brave NoiseCat, Emily Kassie (Canada 2024, 107)
Documentaries: International
Offering searing insights into generational trauma inflicted on Indigenous children, co-director Julian Brave NoiseCat’s documentary feature debut delivers an intimate investigation into the abuse elders in his family and community suffered while attending St. Joseph’s Mission Residential school near Canada’s Sugarcane Reserve. As NoiseCat and co-director Emily Kassie search for answers, the Canadian government continues a revelatory probe into the cases of the institution’s missing and murdered children. The film fearlessly confronts the survivors’ experiences through powerful testimony and difficult conversations as it highlights a community seeking accountability from the government and the Catholic Church and questions whether it is possible to journey out of shame and silence to find forgiveness and healing. NoiseCat and Kassie won the U.S. Documentary directing award at the Sundance Film Festival for their stunning work.
The Cats of Gokogu Shrine
Kazuhiro Soda (Japan 2024, 119)
North American Premiere
Documentaries: International
This rich observational documentary opens with a bratty orange tabby grabbing director Kazuhiro Soda’s microphone and attempting to eat it. That funny scene serves as a reminder that cats are internet stars because of their playful antics. But while irresistible images abound throughout this film, this is a work of more serious intent as Soda tenderly observes his seaside hometown Ushimado as the community contends with an aging population, erasure in the face of modernity and shifting industrial investment, and the pandemic. Employing his typical tenets of verité filmmaking, Soda allows the subjects to guide his camera while he captures day-to-day machinations of daily life and the unusually fraught deliberations over what to do about the feral population residing in Ushimado. A shrine without felines — who have been largely abandoned there — seems unlikely and the film makes a poignant case for their contributions to village life as charming, fluffy providers of purring hospitality.
Zinzindurrunkarratz
Oskar Alegría (Spain 2023, 89)
Documentaries: International
“This is a film about a path,” says director Oskar Alegría (Zumiriki, Festival 2020 and ‘21) near the opening of this playful and poetic documentary about disappearing practices, among other wide-ranging concerns. The journey begins with his father’s ancient Super 8 camera that, surprisingly, still works though it no longer records sound. Needing to make every moment count—a reel is only a little over three minutes long—Alegría brings this camera on a scenic shepherding route traversed by his grandfather, accompanied by an elegant and unforgettable donkey named Paolo. Armed with this antique machine and alongside this equable equine, the filmmaker pays glorious attention to the natural beauty of rural Spain with a discerning and often wryly amusing eye. And, as each celluloid reel fades to black, his equally lyrical voiceover muses on light, history, old traditions, and capturing voices from the past.
Documentaries: USA
Billy & Molly: An Otter Love Story
Charlie Hamilton James (UK 2023, 78)
Documentaries: USA
In a place where land ends and the sea takes over—Scotland’s Shetland Islands—an orphaned otter washes up against Billy and Susan’s isolated jetty. At first utterly dependent on the couple for her survival, the “wee girl” they name Molly quickly captures their hearts, with Billy particularly besotted. This irresistible documentary spins a tale of love and longing in its depiction of the emotional bond between Billy and the playful creature. The melancholic man finds joy, a new connection to the natural world, and purpose in caring for Molly and preparing her for independent life. Billy & Molly delves deep into the workings of the human (and otter) heart, becoming a rumination on what it means to give and receive love, and questioning the limits of how far one can or should go in its pursuit. The answer, like the seas that surround the Shetlands, is eternal and fathomless.
Recommended for ages 9 and up.
Counted Out
Vicki Abeles (USA 2024, 89)
Documentaries: USA
Math is a gatekeeper in the US. In an increasingly algorithm-and-data-driven 21st century, assumptions made about a child’s mathematical ability affect their odds of finding future success. Unsurprisingly these barriers mostly affect those already suffering under systemic racism, patriarchy, and/or the cycle of poverty who are presumed to have fewer skills. This revealing and urgent documentary weaves together a mosaic of voices and stories across generations and professions to explain the detrimental effects of declining math skills on civic participation, legal rulings, and fulfilling careers. Further, the film challenges the notion that only a select few can be “math people” and illustrates what happens when the myths surrounding math are shattered and mathematics education becomes more inclusive.
Luther: Never Too Much
Dawn Porter (USA 2024, 131)
Documentaries: USA
One can never get too much Luther Vandross, as Dawn Porter’s wonderfully comprehensive and jubilant film demonstrates. Known as the “Velvet Voice,” Vandross sold over 40 million records, recording 11 platinum albums. The documentary begins as his career starts as an 18-year-old performing with his first group on Sesame Street. From there, he segues into gigs as a behind-the-scenes vocalist, singing and arranging with David Bowie and several notable R&B acts, and writing and performing numerous lucrative ad jingles. Porter’s film also dives into more sensitive territory, including unwanted journalistic focus on his weight and personal life, and his feelings of being relegated to a certain “type” of music. Featuring classic performances of Vandross hits like “Any Love,” “A House Is Not a Home,” and the titular foot-tapper, the documentary is filled with reminiscences and insights by Jamie Foxx, Mariah Carey, Dionne Warwick, and archival interviews with the man himself.
Seeking Mavis Beacon
Jazmin Renée Jones (USA 2024, 103)
Documentaries: USA
What ever happened to Mavis Beacon? That guiding question propels two intrepid electronic sleuths, Jazmin and Olivia, who dive into the cosmos as they hunt for the woman of Haitian descent who became the face of the 1980s era popular educational software Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing. Through dynamic “desktop cinema,” observational footage, and interviews with artists, writers, and software designers, the investigation lifts the veil on how Mavis’ persona came to be. While highlighting ethical questions regarding representation, the film slowly becomes a celebration of glitch art’s legacy as a means for underrepresented people to deconstruct and reclaim notions of Queerness and Racialization. A spellbinding cyberspace adventure, Jazmin Renée Jones’ inquisitive directorial debut expands ideas around feminism and digital selfdom, while also portraying the importance of tender, healing friendship in a complex world.
Uncropped
D.W. Young (USA 2023, 111)
Documentaries: USA
James Hamilton, one of America’s foremost portrait photographers, gets his own portrait in D.W. Young’s charming documentary. In a career that spans decades, Hamilton’s pictures chronicle the cultural zeitgeist via celebrities, political icons, historic moments, and the ever shifting landscape of New York City. Richard Goldstein, Alexandra Jacobs, Thurston Moore, and Wes Anderson are among the former subjects that speak to his artistry and craft, their conversations peppered throughout with hundreds of his images. Patti Smith, Liza Minnelli, Lou Reed, Noah Baumbach, and Alfred Hitchcock are among the legends whose portraits become part of the documentary’s fabric. Hamilton’s friendship with Anderson makes up a large chapter of Hamilton’s career as the two become lifelong friends and collaborators after a fateful portrait session. Uncropped offers voyeuristic insight into a life of rare access and enviable vantage point. Hamilton’s work reminds us of the power of imagery and the value of print journalism.
Narratives: International
Alemania
María Zanetti (Argentina 2023, 87)
Narratives: International
María Zanetti’s vivid debut feature, inspired by her own family’s story, tells the story of Lola, a 16-year-old who dreams of escaping her challenging homelife. Lola struggles with school and driving lessons but the mental illness of older sister Julieta presents greater challenges. Julieta consumes their parents’ time and money, leaving Lola often ignored, at constant odds with her mother, and dreaming of a different life. Maite Aguilar makes an indelible screen debut as a young woman yearning for refuge and security in this complex drama that drifts between a teen’s inherent need to embark on her own path and the difficulties her parents face in meeting the disparate needs of their daughters. Striking cinematography further enhances this vibrant coming-of-age tale, which won the Best Director and Best Screenplay prizes at Cine Ceará—Ibero-American Film Festival.
Banel & Adama
Ramata-Toulaye Sy (Senegal 2023, 87)
Narratives: International
The titular Senegalese couple at the center of this visually ravishing romantic drama faces several challenges — Adama is in line to be chief but doesn’t want the responsibility while Banel insists they not have children, especially in light of the economic hardships brought about by drought. Tired of being relegated to female-designated roles, Banel would rather relocate outside the village where sandstorms have buried several houses but where she and Adama will be removed from the daily life that hems them in. Though deeply in love and prepared to realize his beloved’s wishes, Adama is more pragmatic and concerned about their livelihoods and familial responsibilities. Ramata-Toulaye Sy’s poetic debut, which competed at Cannes, tells a fable-like story imbued with dreamlike imagery and palpable chemistry between the two young lovers at its heart.
Empty Nets
Behrooz Karamizade (Germany 2023, 101)
Narratives: International
What begins as a pursuit of love becomes a dangerous journey into the seedy underbelly of Iran’s fisheries in director Behrooz Karamizade’s heart-wrenching neorealist debut. Deeply enamored with each other, Amir and Narges want to marry but Narges’ upper-class parents disapprove of the union. Amir is determined to prove himself worthy by earning a quick fortune for her dowry—a challenge in Iran’s difficult employment market. A talented swimmer, he earns a spot in a fishing operation, where he learns there is big money to be made in the perilous work of poaching and human smuggling. Now living far from his beloved, will Amir’s relationship with Narges survive the separation? Ashkan Ashkani’s dreamy cinematography captures the beauty of the Caspian Sea, a contrast to the ugly secrets the water holds, in this striking portrait of romance struggling against Iran’s social realities.
Eureka
Lisandro Alonso (Argentina 2023, 146)
Narratives: International
A triptych of stories focused on Indigenous culture in the Americas takes the spotlight in the latest feature from one of international cinema’s most exciting auteurs, Lisandro Alonso. A striking opening sequence revisits and remixes his last film Jauja (Festival 2015), reuniting the director with lead actor Viggo Mortenson, who plays a gunslinger looking for his kidnapped daughter. In an abrupt shift of location, filmmaking style, and gaze, the scenario moves to the Pine Ridge reservation in wintry South Dakota where Native American police officer Alaina searches for another missing young woman. And in the final segment, a shape-shifting bird introduces viewers to a forest-dwelling tribe in the Amazon and a community contending with interpersonal rivalries. Employing different cinematic styles and an increasingly dreamlike narrative, Eureka (which premiered at Cannes) is elusive and pointed in its willingness to abandon traditional storytelling methods in favor of something stranger and more magical.
Great Absence
Kei Chika-ura (Japan 2023, 152)
US Premiere
Narratives: International
An emotional depiction of father/son estrangement, a decades-long love story that takes on multiple shades, and, most centrally, a portrait of dementia, Kei Chika-ura’s remarkable drama begins when police raid elderly Yohji’s home before shifting forwards and backwards through time to explain the circumstances that led to the crisis. Though it starts with a bang, the film is more interested in the quieter shocks that permeate the lives of Yohji, his actor son Takashi, and Naomi, the woman Yohji’s lived with since the departure of Takashi’s mom. Unraveling the nuances of these relationships is part of the pleasure of watching Great Absence, but its essence is Yohji’s decline into senility, enveloping everyone around him. Tatsuya Fuji is unforgettable as the alternately raging, wounded, and confused patriarch and deservedly won the Best Actor prize at the San Sebastian Film Festival.
Heartless
Nara Normande, Tião (Brazil 2023, 90)
US Premiere
Narratives: International
In this drama inspired by co-director Nara Normande’s own life, teenage Tamara spends the summer of 1996 hanging with her group of friends before leaving them behind to study in Brasilia. While restlessly exploring her village on Brazil’s northwest coast, Tamara’s relationships begin to shift. She grows apart from her boyfriend Kinzão while developing an attraction for another girl, nicknamed “Heartless” for the surgical scar on her chest. Dazzling images illustrate this magical realist coming-of-age tale that touches on a young woman’s blossoming sexuality and anxious anticipation of the future. Normande and her co-director Tião elegantly weave poetic sentiments with fantastical elements to spin a strikingly poignant story of the connection between nature, sexuality, and growing up.
Ru
Charles-Olivier Michaud (Canada 2023, 116)
Narratives: International
Ten-year-old Tinh’s family flees Vietnam after the 1975 fall of Saigon, undertaking an arduous journey to Quebec in Charles Oliver-Michaud’s gripping adaptation of Kim Thúy’s Award-winning novel. As Tinh works to overcome the trauma and memories of war and forge an identity in Canada, her educated, formerly wealthy family struggles to adapt to their new circumstances as refugees. Chloé Djandji is riveting as Tinh in a drama that combines a harrowing recreation of the family’s flight from Vietnam, striking cinematography, vivid flashbacks, and a compelling narrative to create a hauntingly beautiful portrayal of healing told from the powerful perspective of a young girl coming to terms with her past.
Sidonie in Japan
Élise Girard (Japan 2023, 95)
US Premiere
Narratives: International
Isabelle Huppert, one of the best actors working today, crafts a uniquely soft and vulnerable character in Élise Girard’s low-key charmer. The eponymous Sidonie is a writer, predominantly known for an early novel that charted her grief after the deaths of family members in a car crash. Now grieving another loss, she agrees to a brief tour in Japan to celebrate a new translation of this book, accompanied by soft-spoken interpreter Kenzo (Tsuyoshi Ihara). What unfolds is a moving and gentle portrait of a woman slowly emerging from her protective carapace through probing conversations with Kenzo, a side trip to the famous art island of Naoshima, and the ghostly return of her deceased husband. Eschewing broad strokes of closure, Girard instead grabs at the heart with a beautifully nuanced look at a woman who finds a new lease on life.
Sloan Science on Screen Award: “On the Invention of Species”
Tania Hermida (Ecuador 2024, 91)
World Premiere
Narratives: International
Presented through a partnership between SFFILM and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the Sloan Science on Screen Award is a recognition that celebrates the compelling depiction of science in a narrative feature film.
This screening will feature the presentation of the Sloan Science on Screen Award and an enhanced Q&A after the film with cast and crew alongside Berkeley biology professor Noah Whiteman.
On the Invention of Species
When Carla’s dad drags her to the Galapagos Islands for a convention on conservation and species evolution, she is less than thrilled. On the cusp of womanhood and grappling with the loss of her brother, Carla finds herself adrift on the historic archipelago that led to Charles Darwin’s breakthrough studies on adaptation. Befriending two young boys who become her emotional foils, Carla pretends to be a different version of herself in order to surmount this emotional and physical journey. In this stunningly lensed lyrical debut, Tania Hermida deftly toys with parables while exploring the evolving relationship between man and nature. With Terrence Malick stylings, hints of Agnès Varda observational irony, and a dash of Alice Rohrwacher magical-realism, this tender film is a celebration of the shared sentient experience—biological and emotional.
Tania Hermida
Director
A native of Cuenca, Ecuador, Tania Hermida studied film direction at Cuba’s International Film and TV School of San Antonio de las Banos, creative writing at Madrid’s School of Letters, the aesthetics of cinema at the University of Valladolid, and earned a master’s in cultural studies from the University of Azuay. Her features include How Much Further (2006), winner of the Havana Film Festival’s Opera Prima award and the Montreal World Film Festival’s Silver Zenith, and In the Name of the Girl (2011).
The Practice
Martín Rejtman (Argentina 2023, 95)
Narratives: International
Argentina’s master of deadpan humor Martín Rejtman (Silvia Prieto, Festival 1999; Two Shots Fired, Festival 2014) returns with a droll satire of relationships and wellness culture in a tale centered on an Argentinian yoga instructor living in Chile. Gustavo (Esteban Bigliardi) is recently divorced and struggling with the end of his marriage, problems at his yoga studio, and an injury he is trying to treat with exercise instead of the recommended surgery. An ex-wife he is still in love with, a nagging mother who wants him to return to Chile, a student recovering from a brain injury, another student who may be a thief, and a comely pharmacist are among the characters whose lives and problems intersect in Rejtman’s surreal, absurd, and complex comedy.
The Teacher
Farah Nabulsi (UK 2023, 118)
Narratives: International
The destruction of a Palestinian home by Israeli edict and the murder of a youth at the hands of an Israeli settler set the stage for even more shocks to come in writer/director Farah Nabulsi’s assured feature debut. Saleh Bakri is Basem, an amiable educator who tries to steer the deceased boy’s younger brother Adam (Muhammad Abed Elrahman) from seeking revenge. At the same time, Basem ignores his own advice, maintaining ties with the resistance and involving himself in a hostage situation. He tries to keep his activities secret from Adam and his British girlfriend Lisa (Imogen Poots) but it becomes harder to maintain his silence when Israeli troops show up at his door. Inspired by a real incident and set in 2014, The Teacher is a shattering work that feels as current as today’s headlines, and a drama made more devastating by Bakri’s soulful performance.
A Tribute to Joan Chen + “Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl”
Joan Chen (China 1998, 147)
Narratives: International
Join us as we pay tribute to actor/director/writer/producer Joan Chen with an intimate conversation celebrating her extraordinary career and unique 35 mm screening of her debut feature Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl.
Joan Chen
Honoree + Director
Joan Chen made her screen debut at 17 with Youth (1977), rocketing to stardom in her native China before relocating to the United States where she broke through to American audiences with roles in The Last Emperor (1987) and the David Lynch series Twin Peaks (1989–1991). She continues to act, appearing in Festival opener Dìdi (弟弟), but she has also built careers as a screenwriter, producer, and director. Her debut directorial feature Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl (Festival 1998) received a Film Independent Spirit Award Nomination for Best First Feature—Over $500,000 and won five Golden Horse Film Festival Awards, including Best Director and Best Feature Film. She went on to direct Autumn in New York (2000); Shanghai Strangers (2012), a short; The Iron Hammer (2020), a documentary; and a segment of Hero (2022). Most recently, she served as an executive producer on Dìdi (弟弟). SFFILM honored her in 2014 as Essential SF and paid tribute to Xiu Xiu: The Sent-Down Girl in 2017 with a 20th anniversary screening.
Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl
An astonishingly confident directorial debut from San Francisco-based actress Joan Chen, Xiu Xiu is a heartbreaking coming-of-age melodrama set during the later stages of the Cultural Revolution. A young girl, Xiu Xiu, is sent to a desolate part of Tibet to learn horse breeding from her trainer, Lao Jin, a serene Tibetan herdsman. Deserted in such a bleak, uncompromising landscape, Xiu Xiu dreams of a better life, but slowly realizes that the authorities have no intention of ever rescuing her. Her dreams shattered, she is coerced into sex by visiting townsmen and their promises of “help.” But no help ever comes, and the silent, love-struck Lao Jin is left as her only hope. Chen’s slow-building moods and self-assured narrative tone recall the emotional power and underlying social critique inherent in mainland China’s Fifth Generation filmmakers as well as the work of their predecessor Xie Jin (whose 1977 film, Youth, saw Chen in one of her first starring roles). Austere, uncluttered—no unnecessary dramatic pyrotechnics or visual exotica—Xiu Xiu achieves a purity of vision not found in most contemporary cinema. Coaxing gorgeously refined performances out of radiant newcomer Lu Lu and the Tibetan-born Lopsang, Chen weaves a story of love unspoken and love lost, and in so doing introduces an exciting new voice to world cinema. —Jason Sanders, Festival 1998
Wakhri
Iram Parveen Bilal (Pakistan 2023, 99)
Narratives: International
Filmmaker Iram Parveen Bilal takes inspiration from the story of Qandeel Baloch in crafting this compelling drama. Baloch was Pakistan’s first social media celebrity, who often used her platform to speak out against the patriarchy, until her brother murdered her in an act of “honor” killing. Her life planted the seeds from which spring this film’s widowed schoolteacher Noor and her queer best friend Guchhi. To live out their dreams and aspirations, the pair leads double lives. In bright makeup and flashy wigs, Noor and Guchhi adopt brash, fearless social media personas, representing a freedom so enticing that people can’t look away. Too often the cinemascape has portrayed Muslim women and queer people from the Global South as victimized objects of pity. Wakhri has a different tale to tell, one that celebrates the resilience with which its protagonists demand equality within a flawed society.
Woodland
Elisabeth Scharang (Austria 2023, 100)
Narratives: International
In Elizabeth Scharang’s evocative drama, a journalist from Vienna retreats to her childhood village and her late grandparents’ barely habitable home as she copes with the trauma of witnessing a terrible crime. Marian (Brigittle Hobmeier) finds peace in the surrounding woods but it is not a comfortable homecoming — the townspeople resent her for critical articles she’s written and her best friends Gerti (Gerti Drassi) and Franz (Johannes Krisch) still feel the sting of being left behind. Marian has more to heal than just her wounded psyche as she recalls the tight bonds of her youth and attempts to mend broken relationships. Hobmeier delivers a nuanced performance as a woman shut down by the violence she experienced who gradually learns to embrace life again — not through the isolation she originally sought but by reaching for human connection.
Narratives: USA
Dìdi (弟弟)
Sean Wang (USA 2023, 90)
Narratives: USA
Sean Wang’s auspicious, semi-autobiographical feature debut centers on a universally recognizable phase of adolescence — that moment we begin the lifelong process of self-determination. Set in 2008 Fremont, this Sundance audience award winner follows 13-year-old Taiwanese American Chris (Izaac Wang) in the fleeting months prior to freshman year as he clumsily pursues his first crush, nurtures his passions for filming and skating, and experiments with the dawning intensity of online relationships via AIM chat and MySpace. At home, Chris’ college-bound sister Vivian (Shirley Chen) and weary mother Chunsing (an illuminating Joan Chen) annoy him, while his acerbic grandma Nai Nai (Chang Li Hua, the director’s real-life grandmother) frets over his diet. All three women draw his ire as Chris stumbles through a series of hilarious coming-of-age situations. Nuanced and tender, Wang’s film is a layered exploration of learning to love oneself against the Darwinian backdrop of teenage cliques, cultural conformity, and the maddening frustrations of growing up.
Janet Planet
Annie Baker (USA 2023, 113)
Narratives: USA
In 1991, the summer before middle school, Lacy (Zoe Ziegler) brims with questions and gripes. Tightly bonded with her unmarried mom, Janet (Julianne Nicholson), she’s slowly moving from her parent’s orbit into her own, and this remarkable debut from prize-winning playwright Annie Baker portrays this shift with careful intimacy and a wonderfully askew visual eye. Living in rural Massachusetts, Lacy’s days are languorous but not without incident—she has piano lessons, races around the mall with the daughter of Janet’s boyfriend, and attends an odd outdoor “theatrical” headed up by a semi-guru type named Avi (Elias Koteas). The film is remarkably astute in illustrating how adolescent self-awareness builds from small life experiences and careful observation of adult behavior, and Ziegler perfectly captures the churning of Lacy’s brain and emotions. As Janet, Nicholson is equally astonishing, ever-so-slightly dissatisfied with her life but always there to be the gently listening ear for her unique child.
Sing Sing
Greg Kwedar (USA 2023, 107)
Narratives: USA
Colman Domingo dazzles as Divine G, an incarcerated man who finds purpose as an actor in Greg Kwedar’s entrancing drama. Inspired by Sing Sing Correctional Facility’s Rehabilitation Through the Arts Program and shot at a decommissioned prison, the story takes place as the group prepares a new production and Divine G girds himself for a clemency bid. A talented performer and a leader among the troupe, he is used to deciding what plays to mount only to find his authority challenged when tough new member Divine Eye (real-life RTA alumnus Clarence Maclin in an indelible debut) suggests they put on a comedy. Domingo delivers a soul-baring performance as a man putting in the work to redeem himself in a film that reveals the humanity of the incarcerated while celebrating the joy of performance. Domingo is joined onscreen by Paul Raci, RTA alumni, and Magic Theatre Artistic Director Sean San José, who is expected to be in attendance along with producer Monique Walton and director Greg Kwedar.
Sloan Science on Screen: “Mabel”
Nicholas Ma (USA 2023, 84)
World Premiere
Narratives: USA
Biracial Callie (Lexi Perkel) loves trees and plants and little else in Nicholas Ma’s warm debut feature. Surly with her parents and intolerant of people who don’t share her interest, she’s also unhappy about changing schools after her family relocates. But as luck would have it, substitute teacher Ms. G (Judy Greer) is starting a botany unit in science class, and Callie wangles her way in. Held rapt by Ms. G’s lectures and online speeches, Callie develops an experiment raising chrysanthemums in darkness and manages to lure Agnes, her ebullient younger neighbor, into working on the project with her. Precocious, determined, and wryly funny, Callie is a unique protagonist who leverages her love of botany to propel herself into adolescence.
Recommended for ages 8 and up.
The Idea of You
Michael Showalter (USA 2024, 115)
Narratives: USA
Unexpectedly stuck chaperoning her daughter’s trip to Coachella, the last thing on single mom Solène’s (a glowing Anne Hathaway) mind is romance. With everyone frantic over boy band August Moon, Solène escapes the crowds only to have a chance encounter with lead singer Hayes Campbell (Nicholas Galitzine). Their attraction is instant and undeniable, as is their 16-year age difference. Solène attempts to treat their liaison as a momentary affair but she is woefully unprepared for the spotlight that follows Campbell’s every move. Against the backdrop of zero privacy, Solène tries to balance the needs of her daughter and demands of her ex-husband (played with relished bite by a reliable Reid Scott), with the growing desires of her heart.
Thelma
Josh Margolin (USA 2024, 97)
Narratives: USA
A steely and hysterical June Squibb sinks her teeth into her first leading role as a 93-year-old widow proudly living alone who falls prey to a cash-grabbing hoax. Vowing to bring the perpetrators to justice, Thelma sets out on an odyssey across an evocatively lensed Los Angeles landscape, accompanied by her old friend Ben (a scene-stealing Richard Roundtree in his final performance). Together, the determined duo wield their charm, social invisibility, and elder-age devices to overcome numerous obstacles. Director James Margolin overtly and subtly draws on action-hero genre cliches, playing with traditional set-ups to illustrate Thelma’s agency while also placing Tom Cruise and Mission: Impossible directly into the plot. Margolin is firmly at the helm of this hilarious romp but the film belongs to Squibb, as the Oscar®-nominated performer imbues Thelma with a hunger to be seen and understood by those who love her most, something we never grow out of.
A Tribute to Chiwetel Ejiofor + “Rob Peace” (Sloan Science on Screen)
Chiwetel Ejiofor (USA 2024, 146)
Narratives: USA
Join us as we pay tribute to actor, director, and writer Chiwetel Ejiofor with an intimate conversation celebrating his new feature Rob Peace.
Chiwetel Ejiofor
Honoree + Director/Writer/Actor
BAFTA Award-winning actor, writer and director, Chiwetel Ejiofor has a breadth of critically acclaimed work across stage and screen. He was most recently seen in Rob Peace, a film he also directed and co-wrote with a script based on the bestselling book by Jeff Hobbs. In March 2019, Ejiofor’s critically acclaimed directorial debut The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, an adaptation of William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer’s book, premiered on Netflix.
In 1996, Chiwetel caught the attention of Steven Spielberg who cast him in his debut in the critically acclaimed Amistad. Since then, Ejiofor has amassed more than 60 film and TV credits over the years. A small sampling includes The Pod Generation (Festival 2023); The Man Who Fell to Earth (2022); The Lion King (2019); Doctor Strange (2016); The Martian (2015); 12 Years a Slave (2013), which garnered Chiwetel Academy Award®, Golden Globe, and SAG nominations and won him a Best Actor BAFTA; Talk to Me (2007), for which he won a best supporting male Film Independent Spirit Award; and Dirty Pretty Things (2002), for which he won British Independent and Evening Standard Film Awards for best actor.
In 2008, he starred in the Donmar Warehouse production of Othello, for which he won best actor Olivier and Evening Standard Theatre Awards. His other stage credits include A Season in the Congo (2013), Blue/Orange (2000), and Romeo and Juliet (2000).
Rob Peace
In an acting tour de force, Jay Will plays the talented titular character, a young New Jersey science prodigy headed for the Ivy League, but heavily impacted by his past. While Rob is still an adolescent, his father (another impeccable turn from writer-director Chiwetel Ejiofor) is convicted of homicide and the boy devotes himself to proving his dad’s innocence. As a budding scientist excelling in biophysics, Rob enters Yale, attempting to negotiate this elite new environment alongside his connection to family and community. Based on Peace’s Yale roommate Jeff Hobbs’ bestselling biography, Ejiofor’s exquisite drama details the collision of a life lived under immense pressure. The film features terrific supporting performances by Mary J. Blige as Rob’s caring mother and Mare Winningham as a Yale professor who grants him special lab access.