Crime 101
2026-02-05 19:00 - 21:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | AMC Kabuki, 1881 Post St, San Francisco, CA, 94115, United States
Set against the sun-bleached grit of California coast, Crime 101 weaves the tale of Mike, an elusive jewel thief (Chris Hemsworth) whose string of heists along the 101 freeway have mystified police. As Mike plots his next move, one that could result in walk away money, , his path crosses that of a disillusioned insurance broker (Halle Berry) who is facing her own crossroads. Meanwhile a relentless detective (Mark Ruffalo) is closing in on Mike’s movements, and a former associate has sent a volatile criminal (a scene stealing Barry Keoghan) to destroy Mike’s plans. Director Bart Layton wrings tension from every frame as the line between hunter and hunted begins to blur. As these four lives collide, each individual’s morality and endurance will be pushed to the brink.
Adapted from Don Winslow’s acclaimed novella of the same name, the film is written and directed by Layton (American Animals, The Imposter). Monica Barbaro, Corey Hawkins, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Nick Nolte round out the cast.
ATTENDEE INFORMATION
This event is a benefit of SFFILM Membership. Please make sure you are signed in to your SFFILM account before clicking “RSVP.” Not a member? Join or renew today for access to this screening! Please note this screening will be overbooked to ensure full attendance; we recommend those attending arrive early to secure their seat.

Midwinter Break
2026-02-19 19:00 - 21:00 | AMC Metreon, 135 4th St #3000, San Francisco, CA, 94103, United States
Midwinter Break is a stirring meditation on faith, commitment, and the enduring power of love, as a longtime couple takes a life-changing trip to Amsterdam.
ATTENDEE INFORMATION
This event is a benefit of SFFILM Membership. Please make sure you are signed in to your SFFILM account before clicking “RSVP.” Not a member? Join or renew today for access to this screening! Please note this screening will be overbooked to ensure full attendance; we recommend those attending arrive early to secure their seat.

Sinners
2026-02-24 19:00 - 22:00 | Grand Lake Theatre, 3200 Grand Avenue, Oakland, CA, 94610, United States
After chasing success in the North, twin brothers Smoke and Stack (Michael B. Jordan) return to their hometown of Clarksdale, Mississippi to open a juke joint. As music and dance meld in celebration of artistry, culture and history, an evil descends, threatening to devour the heart and soul of the community.
This special screening will be presented in 70mm.
ATTENDEE INFORMATION
This event is a benefit of SFFILM Membership. Please make sure you are signed in to your SFFILM account before clicking “RSVP.” Not a member? Join or renew today for access to this screening! Please note this screening will be overbooked to ensure full attendance; we recommend those attending arrive early to secure their seat.

Cartoon Saloon Shorts
2026-03-01 11:00 - 13:00 | SFMOMA, 151 3rd Street, San Francisco, CA, 94103, United States
Here at SFFILM we have been long time admirers of Cartoon Saloon, the renowned Irish studio known for their beautifully crafted hand drawn animation for more than 25 years. Our first program was back in 2010 with The Secret of Kells and studio co-founder Tomm Moore. Since then we’ve been able to present almost every subsequent feature film that they have produced, which have collected a total of four Academy Award nominations. As we start up the month of St. Patrick’s Day, we’d like to further shine a spotlight on the studio’s celebration of Irish culture, by showcasing a selection of shorts that are a true testament to the incredible storytelling and artistry found in all of their work. The collection will include past favorites, including two co-productions with Mordán Films and TG4, as well as the studio’s newest award winning short, Éiru.
ATTENDEE INFORMATION
This special event, hosted by SFFILM Education under its Family Programming initiative in collaboration with SFMOMA, is free and open to the public. Advance RSVP is required. Recommended for ages 7 and up. The shorts are not MPAA rated, but some contain brief sequences of action, thematic elements, and brief smoking that may not make them suitable for the very youngest ages. Seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis.
The film program is about 60 minutes. Plus a Q&A of around 25 minutes.
PRESENTED IN COLLABORATION WITH

Two People Exchanging Saliva & Butterfly
2026-03-01 14:30 - 16:30 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
Join us at the Marina Theatre in San Francisco for a special screening of the Academy Award Nominated short films Two People Exchanging Saliva and Butterfly, followed by a Q&A with Two People Exchanging Saliva co-writer and co-director Alexandre Singh.

Two People Exchanging Saliva
Natalie Musteata and Alexandre Singh (France 2024, 36 min)
In a society where kissing is punishable by death, and people pay for things by receiving slaps to the face. Angine, an unhappy woman, shops compulsively in a department store. There, she becomes fascinated by a playful salesgirl. Despite the prohibition of kissing, the two become close, raising the suspicions of a jealous colleague.

Butterfly
Florence Miailhe (France 2024, 15 min)
Butterfly is an animated short film inspired by the life of Alfred Nakache, a French swimming champion who participated in the 1936 Berlin Olympics and set numerous records in this discipline. Facing antisemitism during the Second World War, he was deported with his family to Auschwitz. Only survivor at the end of the war, he resumed competing and participated in the first post-war Olympic Games in London in 1948.

ATTENDEE INFORMATION
This free event is a benefit of SFFILM Membership. Please make sure you are signed in to your SFFILM account before clicking “RSVP.” Not a member? Join or renew today for access to this screening! Please note this screening will be overbooked to ensure full attendance; we recommend those attending arrive early to secure their seat.
Film Details

Two People Exchanging Saliva
Butterfly

Language
French
French, Arabic, German

Year
2024
2024

Runtime
36 minutes
15 minutes

Country
France
France

Director
Natalie Musteata, Alexandre Singh
Florence Miailhe

Producer
Violeta Kreimer, Valentina Merli, Natalie Musteata, Alexandre Singh, Zar Amir Ebrahimi, Carol Cohen
Ron Dyens, Luc Camilli

Editor
Hanna Park
Nassim Gordji Tehrani

Cinematographer
Alexandra de Saint Blanquat
Florence Miailhe

Music
Bobak Lotfipour
Pierre Oberkampf

André Is an Idiot
2026-03-13 18:00 - 20:00 | Roxie Theater, 3117 16th Street, CA, 94103, United States
A celebration of life filled with raw honesty, surreal bursts of imagination, and brazen irreverence, André Is an Idiot shows us what it really means to live happily, truthfully, and hilariously. In this Sundance award-winning documentary, André Riccardi sets out to chronicle his final journey after receiving a diagnosis he could have prevented, through comedic vérité storytelling and fantastical stop-motion interludes.
ATTENDEE INFORMATION
This event is a benefit of SFFILM Membership. Please make sure you are signed in to your SFFILM account before clicking “RSVP.” Not a member? Join or renew today for access to this screening! Please note this screening will be overbooked to ensure full attendance; we recommend those attending arrive early to secure their seat.

Member Mixer + Festival Preview
2026-04-07 18:30 - 20:30 | Jewish Community Center of San Francisco, 3200 California St, San Francisco, CA, 94118, United States
Members of SFFILM and The JCCSF will be treated to a special preview of the 69th San Francisco International Film Festival lineup. Following a welcome reception, SFFILM’s Programming Team will show clips from featured films, show off special events, and highlight honored guests all from the newly renovated Kanbar Hall theater!
The Festival will take place from April 24–May 4.
Attendee Information
This event is a benefit of SFFILM Membership. Please make sure you are signed in to your SFFILM account before clicking “RSVP.” Not a member? Join or renew today!

Opening Night: Late Fame
2026-04-24 17:30 - 19:30 | Castro Theatre, 429 Castro St, San Francisco, CA, 94114, United States
The latest feature from Kent Jones (former director of the New York Film Festival) is a gently piercing dramedy about ambition, obscurity, and the echoes of youthful dreams. Ed Saxberger (a beautifully restrained Willem Dafoe) once arrived in New York determined to be a poet, publishing a slim volume before settling into the quiet routines of postal work. As his retirement nears, an ardent group of downtown bohemians, led by the captivating Gloria (Greta Lee), discover Ed’s long-forgotten book and insist on honoring him with a literary salon. What begins as flattery soon stirs doubt, longing, and unexpected desire. With a sharp, literate screenplay by Samy Burch, Jones crafts a wise, sparkling New York tale about reinvention and the courage it takes to be truly seen. —Jessie Fairbanks

Opening Night: The Invite
2026-04-24 20:30 - 22:30 | Castro Theatre, 429 Castro St, San Francisco, CA, 94114, United States
Nothing is off limits in Olivia Wilde’s (Booksmart, Festival 2019) taboo-smashing third feature where two San Francisco couples find themselves traversing surprising boundaries of intimacy and relationships. When his wife Angela (Wilde) informs Joe (Seth Rogan) that she has invited their upstairs neighbors Pina (Penelope Cruz) and Hawk (Edward Norton) to dinner, he smolders with resentment. In an outburst of passive-aggressive revenge, he seizes the opportunity to tell them how disruptive their frequent lovemaking is. What ensues in Will McCormack and Rashida Jones’s adaptation of a 2020 Spanish film is tremendously funny and poignant as the straitlaced Angela and Joe find themselves surprised and challenged by the far less traditional sexual mores of Pina and Hawk. All four actors are tremendous as the banter ranges from back trouble to butt plugs, but at its heart, this smart and hilarious movie is about the immense challenges of love and sex and how to set the groundwork for repair. —Rod Armstrong

Shorts Block 5: Family Films
2026-04-25 11:00 - 13:00 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
From intergalactic cardboard adventures to magical whales, stubborn staircases, and unexpected animal mishaps, this delightful collection of short films celebrates imagination, resilience, and the connections that bring us together. Animation giant Bill Plympton (The Fan and the Flower, Festival 2006), Academy Award®-winning actor Renée Zellweger (making her directing debut), and a cohort of talented independent filmmakers blend inventive animation with thoughtful live-action tales that span cultures and generations. Filled with warmth, wonder, and a touch of mischief, this program invites children, parents, and curious viewers alike to see the world through playful and heartfelt perspectives. —Chris Lawrence
Recommended for ages 5 and up. Films are in alphabetical order rather than order of play. Total runtime 64 min
The Apricot
Alex Z. Avila (USA, Mexico 2025, 9 min)
A young boy is eager to prove himself to his Mexican American family while working a long day on his grandfather’s apricot farm.
Cardboard
J.P. Vine (UK 2025, 8 min)
A struggling single dad pig fears he’s failed his piglets after moving them into a rundown trailer park—until a cardboard box launches them on an intergalactic adventure.
Duet
Léo Brunel (France 2025, 1 min)
Two movers struggle to haul a grand piano up a stubborn staircase—only to discover a passion neither of them saw coming.
First Winter
Schantelle Alonzo (USA 2025, 5 min)
While experiencing his first winter in Chicago, Ángel, a young immigrant, reminisces about his time at home.
Little Things
Noam Rignault Clement (France, Spain, USA 2026, 6 min)
Taking his mother’s advice to enjoy the little things in life, a nine-year-old boy in the charming French countryside embarks with a stolen garden gnome on an inquisitive quest to find just that.
A Pain in the Butt
Elena Walf (Germany, Croatia 2025, 5 min)
As a hedgehog prepares to hibernate, one of its quills lodges in a dog’s behind. Desperate for a solution, the animals embark on an unexpected journey.
Swim Sistas
Catherine Joy White (UK 2025, 11 min)
Four Black women, including Great Britain’s first Black female Olympian, explore healing, resilience, and their historical relationship to water through swimming.
THEY
Renée Zellweger (UK 2025, 8 min)
In a complaint-ridden town, a hopeful hero and his trusty dog hatch a plan to encourage a return to better days.
Whale 52 – Suite for Man, Boy, and Whale
Daniel Neiden (USA 2025, 11 min)
Drawing on the legend of the “loneliest whale,” a boy with selective mutism and an aging widower—bound by loss and sorrow—discover a magical pen and journal that allows them to hear each other’s unspoken cries and find healing.

Renoir
2026-04-25 11:30 - 13:30 | BAMPFA, 2155 Center Street, Berkeley, CA, 94720, United States
Set in late-80s suburban Tokyo, 11-year-old Fuki is thrust into adolescence by the harsh realities surrounding her parents. Her father Kenji (Lily Franky) is suffering from a terminal illness, and her mother Utako (Hikari Ishida) is overburdened by the consequences. For Fuki (Yui Suzuki), the specter of death begins manifesting in various corners of her daily life, leading her to seek a respite from engulfing tragedy with her irrepressible imagination. Chie Hiyakawa expands on her meditation on mortality, first explored in Plan 75, offering a distinctly arresting perspective centered on Suzuki’s outstanding performance where she channels grief in ways that feels wholly new and hauntingly truthful. Renoir serves as a provocative meditation on the ponderosity of life and ultimately what imbues it with meaning. —Jordan Klein

The Wages of Fear
2026-04-25 12:00 - 14:00 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
Stranded in South America with no jobs and no money, four men risk their lives for a big payday when they agree to drive two trucks full of nitroglycerine to a far-off oil field. The treacherous road is windy, unpaved, and peppered with obstacles. The trucks lack shock absorbers and suspension, so the possibility exists that the loads might combust with only the slightest jostling. But the $2000 per man waiting at the end of the trip is too much to resist for Mario (Yves Montand), Jo (Charles Vanel), Luigi (Folco Lulli), and Bimba (Peter van Eyck). Henri-Georges Clouzot’s classic thriller is a masterclass in building and maintaining almost unbearable suspense. The first third of the movie sets the stakes as it creates emotional investment in the characters, especially Mario and Jo. Then the journey itself packs a wallop. Will it end in the money or this a drive straight into hell? —Pam Grady
The Wages of Fear screened at the 1978 Festival as part of a tribute to Yves Montand, with the actor in attendance.
Films from the Vault revisits previously presented titles at the San Francisco International Film Festival, highlighting the Festival’s role in championing emerging artists and iconic auteurs and inviting audiences to rediscover these films anew. —Jessie Fairbanks

Time and Water
2026-04-25 12:30 - 14:30 | Premier Theater at One Letterman, 1 Letterman Dr # B, San Francisco, CA, 94129, United States
Icelandic writer Andri Snær Magnason faces an unthinkable task: composing the eulogy for Okjökull, the first glacier declared dead due to climate change. In Sara Dosa’s (Fire of Love, Festival 2022) luminous documentary, Magnason confronts the disappearance of his country’s ice while preserving the stories of his grandparents, intertwining personal history with vanishing landscapes. Drawing from home movies, photographs, songs, and folklore, Dosa constructs an immersive portrait of loss and continuity. Moving seamlessly between intimate recollections and the monumental sweep of glaciers over millennia, Time and Water is a visually striking meditation on vulnerability, charting the fragility of the natural world and the urgent need to bear witness before vital elements of it disappear. —Jessie Fairbanks

Hair, Paper, Water…
2026-04-25 14:15 - 16:30 | BAMPFA, 2155 Center Street, Berkeley, CA, 94720, United States
Cao Thị Hậu and her family live in Vietnam surrounded by rolling green hills enveloped in mist. Here, she sits with her grandchildren tending to their pains and spinning stories of the cave in Quảng Bình where she was born. Folk tales, bees, tigers, and home remedies all braid themselves into her fables and the wisdom she imparts. As a storyteller and one of the few remaining indigenous Rục people, Hậu is the keeper of memories and knowledge. She is the steward of a fast-disappearing language, and it is her duty to fill the lives of her descendants with her words as she prepares to answer that last call from the faraway cave. Using Bolex cameras and a lush sound design, filmmakers Nicolas Graux and Trương Minh Quy deliver a visual treat along with an invitation to enter Hậu’s extraordinary world. —Bedatri Choudhury

The World of Love
2026-04-25 15:00 - 17:00 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
Boisterous, mischievous, and seemingly unassailable, Lee Joo-in is the master of her world. Whether dancing with classmates, sparring with her charismatic brother and devoted mother (Parasite’s Jang Hye-jin), or sharing tender moments with her boyfriend, Joo-in’s life appears in harmony. That balance shatters after a public confrontation and a series of unsettling anonymous messages compel her to confront difficult truths long buried. Bong Joon-ho hails director Yoon Ga-eun as a master at eliciting extraordinary performances from child actors, exemplified in newcomer Seo Su-bin’s achingly tender and multifaceted portrayal of Joo-in. The World of Love further establishes Yoon as one of the most exciting emerging voices in contemporary Korean cinema. —Jordan Klein

Risa and the Wind Phone
2026-04-25 15:30 - 17:30 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
An abandoned telephone booth calls out to 10-year-old Risa. After a tragic fire devastates their small town, residents take to calling the dead on an out-of-order telephone high atop a hill. But only Risa can hear the voices from the other side. Hoping to finally contact her mysterious father somewhere in this crowd of impatient spirits, she starts to take on the unfinished business of departed loved ones. Continuing a game of chess, locating life insurance policies, and finding a new home for a lost dog all become part of Risa’s daily to-do list. What starts as a simple set of tasks aided by a well-meaning neighbor, turns into a life-defining search for love and acceptance in this charming storybook romp from acclaimed director Juan Cabral. –Amber Love

Joybubbles
2026-04-25 15:30 - 17:30 | Premier Theater at One Letterman, 1 Letterman Dr # B, San Francisco, CA, 94129, United States
An extraordinary man deserves an extraordinary documentary, and director Rachael J. Morrison delivers exactly that with this lively portrait of Josef Carl Engressia, also known as Joybubbles. In the era of analog telephones, when long-distance calls were prohibitively expensive, Engressia—born blind and gifted with perfect pitch—discovered he could whistle the precise tones that unlocked the phone network, allowing him to place free calls around the world. His unusual talent as one of the earliest “phone phreaks” brought both notoriety and an arrest. Yet Joybubbles’ greatest gift was his desire for connection. Later in life, he created whimsical recorded stories that anyone could access by phone, forming lasting friendships and taking calls from anyone who reached out. The film uses archival footage, audio interviews, and poppy graphics to capture the whimsy and ingenuity of Joybubbles’ life. He was a man who lived to bring happiness to the world. He is still doing it through this irresistible film. —Pam Grady

Blue Heron
2026-04-25 16:30 - 18:30 | BAMPFA, 2155 Center Street, Berkeley, CA, 94720, United States
A masterful debut, this depiction of a young girl whose family is contending with a challenging older sibling weaves autobiographical and documentary elements seamlessly into a singularly poignant package. Sasha’s family emigrated from Hungary to Vancouver Island in the 1990s. Life there is pretty bucolic—outdoor swims, watching cartoons—but there are outbursts of increasingly odd, antisocial behavior from her older brother Jeremy. Sasha takes these moments in stride but notes her parents’ conversations in their native tongue that suggest something more serious and worrisome is happening. Director Sophy Romvari captures the sights and sounds of adolescence impeccably and, when the film employs a brave narrative gambit around its halfway point, she ineffably delineates the blur of memory and the tragic inability to avert crisis where one’s personal history is concerned. The extremely intentional camerawork by Maya Bankovic is vibrant but unobtrusive, observing the family (and especially Sasha) with a gentle but probing eye. —Rod Armstrong

Cookie Queens
2026-04-25 18:00 - 20:00 | Premier Theater at One Letterman, 1 Letterman Dr # B, San Francisco, CA, 94129, United States
Ara, Shannon Elizabeth, Nikki, and Olive live by the mantra, “Sell! Sell! Sell!” Each Girl Scout in this diverse group has her own sales goal to reach or maybe even surpass during the short cookie-selling season. The race to become the Cookie Queen is not for the faint of the heart with a surprising amount of money and rewards like summer camp and European trips on the line. In between lugging wagons piled high with boxes across town and weekends spent manning cookie booths, the girls find themselves pulled between their ambition to succeed and the desire to just be a kid and play. This adorable coming-of-age story—a Sundance hit—follows the highs and lows of a single season, illuminating both the pressures of entrepreneurship at such a young age, and the empowerment of nurturing their aspirations. —Amber Love

If I Go Will They Miss Me
2026-04-25 18:00 - 20:00 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
Walter Thompson-Hernández’s stunning feature debut is a coming-of-age story set in South Los Angeles, blending social and magical realism, Greek mythology, and vérité observation into a poetic reflection on family, legacy, and dreams. Adapted from the writer-director’s acclaimed short, the film follows 12-year-old Lil Ant, a sensitive, artistic boy navigating life in the shadow of his father, Big Ant, recently released from prison. The filmmaker charts the emotional journey of father and son as they struggle to reconnect, balancing youthful imagination with the rhythms of their neighborhood. A cast of nonprofessional actors join Danielle Brooks and J. Alphonse Nicholson, bringing raw immediacy to Thompson-Hernández’s vivid narrative. Streets and alleys become spaces of discovery, offering a tender, inventive portrait of adolescence and the fragile bonds that anchor us to family, community, and inheritance. —Jessie Fairbanks

Ghost School
2026-04-25 18:15 - 20:30 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
For many kids, the idea of never having to go to school again may seem like a dream come true, but 10-year-old Rabia (Nazualiya Arsalan) loves learning. Despite growing up in rural Pakistan, where educating girls is not much of a priority, the child eagerly attends to feed her endless curiosity. But then her school shuts down suddenly, supposedly because the teacher became possessed by an evil spirit. Rabia is not convinced and when her mother lacks clear answers, the determined girl sets out to uncover the truth. Undeterred by eerie occurrences, she finds a web of patriarchy, bureaucracy, and corruption responsible for the closure not just of her school but of others like it. Wrapped in a children’s fable, Ghost School paints a bleak picture of a society that ignores its daughters, leavened by Rabia’s unrelenting determination that shines through like a beacon. —Bedatri Choudhury

It Would Be Night in Caracas
2026-04-25 19:15 - 21:15 | BAMPFA, 2155 Center Street, Berkeley, CA, 94720, United States
The lawlessness afoot in Venezuela’s capital city is vibrantly captured in this gripping adaptation of Karina Sainz Borgo’s novel by the filmmaking team behind Bad Hair (Festival 2014). It’s 2017, and Adelaida (Natalia Reyes) returns to Caracas to bury her mother and finds a metropolis teeming with chaos. While she huddles in the apartment she shared with her mom, memories of childhood and a doomed romance as a young adult flood back in flashbacks. Leaving one day for a brief foray for supplies, she returns to the building and finds the flat forcibly occupied by armed members of the resistance. Relocating into the abandoned apartment of a neighbor, she also rescues Santiago, a former colleague who has been jailed, and they shelter together to plan next steps. With violence at their doorstep, Adelaida and Santiago must attempt to escape from a building (and a city) that holds them captive. —Rod Armstrong

Give Me the Ball!
2026-04-25 20:30 - 22:30 | Premier Theater at One Letterman, 1 Letterman Dr # B, San Francisco, CA, 94129, United States
Billie Jean King changed the game of tennis — on the court and across sports culture. Liz Garbus and Elizabeth Wolff’s documentary presents the legend in full, combining rare archival footage with candid interviews to reveal the human behind the icon. King’s groundbreaking fight for equity in professional women’s sports came at personal cost: hiding her sexual orientation, struggling with eating disorders, and subordinating her own well-being to advance the cause. The filmmakers capture both her indelible victories and the challenges she endured with clarity and immediacy, presenting a portrait that is as fierce and uncompromising as King herself. Told in her own words, Give Me the Ball! is a vivid, electrifying meditation on competition, courage, and the transformative power of one fiercely determined individual. —Jessie Fairbanks

Sender
2026-04-25 20:30 - 22:30 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
Severance’s Britt Lower stars as Julia, a young woman whose online shopping habit takes an alarming turn in this quirky thriller. Fired three weeks ago and now three weeks sober, Julia fills her endless days with internet buying sprees. But then boxes start to arrive that contain uncomfortably personal items that she didn’t order. Enlisting the help of delivery driver Charlie (David Dastmalchian), Julia tries desperately to discover who the sender is, and how whoever it is could know her exact shade of lipstick. The search sends her spiraling down a paranoid rabbit hole, as the packages keep piling up. Russell Goldman’s debut feature, produced by Sender costar Jamie Lee Curtis, is a wildly imaginative send-up of our infatuation with online shopping and a disturbing commentary on what can happen when personal details become company knowledge. Rhea Seahorn also stars. —Amber Love

Bad Blood
2026-04-25 20:45 - 23:00 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
This stunning film by Leos Carax has earned him comparisons with such virtuoso filmmakers as David Lynch and Martin Scorsese. Awarded France’s Prix Delluc as Best Film of 1986, it more than confirms the promise of Boy Meets Girl (The Festival 1985), made when he was only 24. Like Godard’s Pierrot le Fou, Bad Blood’s poetic fireworks are suspended from a noir-ish plot involving a robbery and a doomed love triangle. Declaring its passion for cinema with every frame, the film recalls the best New Wave films of the 1960s but is firmly rooted in a palpable love of working with actors. And Carax is rewarded by magnificent performances from his central trio—Denis Lavant, the versatile mime introduced in Boy Meets Girl, Juliette Binoche (star of Philip Kaufman’s forthcoming film of Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being) and veteran character actor Michel Piccoli. The camerawork of Jean-Yves Escoffier is nothing short of dazzling. —Peter Scarlet
Star Juliette Binoche attended the 1987 Festival screening.
Films from the Vault revisits previously presented titles at the San Francisco International Film Festival, highlighting the Festival’s role in championing emerging artists and iconic auteurs and inviting audiences to rediscover these films anew. – Jessie Fairbanks

Shorts Block 6: Youth Works
2026-04-26 10:30 - 12:30 | Premier Theater at One Letterman, 1 Letterman Dr # B, San Francisco, CA, 94129, United States
Young filmmakers from across the globe showcase their daring creativity and craft in this collection of films that address the complexity of growing up and the innocence of youth. Employing animation, narrative, and documentary, these shorts embrace emotion, curiosity, and risk-taking to experience the fullness of life. Among the films are a vivid hand-drawn animation ode to ‘80s culture, a tale of effortlessly composed charm in the French countryside, a short demonstrating art as a form of healing after disaster, and a story expressing the power of never giving up on your dreams. Let us introduce you to the next generation of storytellers. —Soph Schultz Rocha
Recommended for ages 11 and up. Films are in alphabetical order rather than order of play. Total runtime 74 min
Cindy Undead

Mariella Gutiérrez (USA 2025, 3 min)

Mysterious and sensational ’80s supermodel Cindy Devereux reaches a breaking point when she can no longer keep herself sewn together.
Dandelion Child

Isabella Montesi (USA 2025, 6 min)

A daughter moves into her freshman college dorm, parting ways with her mother and recalling their precious years spent together.
Fishbowl

Hana Taylor (USA 2025, 8 min)

A young artist, eager to win the top prize for her aquatic painting, buys a fish for inspiration that might just help break her creative block.
Little Things

Noam Rignault Clement (France, Spain, USA 2026, 6 min)

Taking his mother’s advice to enjoy the little things in life, a nine-year-old boy in the charming French countryside embarks with a stolen garden gnome on an inquisitive quest to find just that.
Out of the Blue

Vivian Nguyen (USA 2026, 3 min)

A lonely grocery store cashier daydreams of true love at the checkout counter.
Paper Boat

Yeobin Park (South Korea 2025, 10 min)

Two siblings bond by floating paper boats down a tranquil stream as their family life begins to crack.
Rewinded

Aaliyah Idrissa (USA 2025, 7 min)

A Black woman who gave up on her science dreams as a teen gets a second chance when she unexpectedly time-travels to the ’90s to live one day with her younger self.
Rising Above the Ashes

Cade Savage Schwartz (USA 2025, 15 min)

In the aftermath of the devastating LA fires, community members and artists express their resilience and offer ways to heal together after disaster.
Sonder

Lancey Quan (USA 2025, 9 min)

Seven poetic stories of belonging and growing up, told through seven colors, encompass shifting perspectives and landscapes.
Tropical Fish

Shirley Xie (China 2025, 7 min)

Young Xiao Su has one big wish, to see the tropical fish by the sea. With his best friend, the two go on an arduous journey to turn this dream into a reality.

Yo (Love Is a Rebellious Bird)
2026-04-26 11:30 - 13:30 | BAMPFA, 2155 Center Street, Berkeley, CA, 94720, United States
One of director Anna Fitch’s closest friends, Yo was adventurous, self-assured, and headstrong. Before Yo passed away in 2013, Fitch spent countless hours capturing memories and anecdotes of Yo’s colorful life. That documentation became a broader project through which Fitch processed her grief as she crafted a meticulous miniature recreation of the home where Yo spent her final years. In Yo (Love Is a Rebellious Bird), Fitch and co-director Banker White meld together Fitch’s cherished vérité footage with stunning puppet recreations and the miniature home to memorialize Yo in all her highs and lows. By harnessing the craft of puppetry to explore Yo’s life in Switzerland, her struggles with motherhood, and experiences with aging on her own terms, this hybrid documentary becomes a whimsical record of friendship and the love that bloomed between Fitch and Yo. —Amber Love

Vagabond
2026-04-26 12:00 - 14:00 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
Agnès Varda’s new film, which not only won Venice’s Golden Lion but the awards of the international critics as well, has echoes of her earlier work, Cleo from 5 to 7 and also recalls Alain Tanner’s superb Messidor. Its central character, beautifully played by Sandrine Bonnaire, is a young drop-out who roams a wintry south of France with a knapsack containing a tent on her back. She sleeps and eats where she can, a fiercely independent character little understood by even those who know her best. What she seeks is freedom, and her tragedy is that society extracts from her too great a price for it. Varda tells her story with a strong and simple eloquence that is very moving, and searches not so much for explanations as for emotional understanding. This is a film of considerable resonance precisely because it seeks neither to praise nor condemn, but to comprehend a profound alienation. —Derek Malcolm
Vagabond screened at the 1985 Festival with Agnès Varda in attendance.
Films from the Vault revisits previously presented titles at the San Francisco International Film Festival, highlighting the Festival’s role in championing emerging artists and iconic auteurs and inviting audiences to rediscover these films anew. —Jessie Fairbanks

Black Is Beautiful: The Kwame Brathwaite Story
2026-04-26 12:30 - 14:30 | Marina Theatre, 2149 Chestnut St., San Francisco, CA, 94123, United States
For photographer Kwame Brathwaite, the camera served as an instrument of love for his people. From capturing the mirth flowing through the streets of 1960s Harlem to following the Jackson 5 on a tour of Africa, Brathwaite chronicled Black America in all its glory. It was Brathwaite along with his brother Elombe Brath who coined the now ubiquitous phrase, “Black is Beautiful.” Somewhere along the way, his grand achievements faded into a forgotten past until his family fought to resurrect his legacy and restore his place in the African American canon. His photographs—now collected by the likes of Gabrielle Union, Jesse Williams, and Alicia Keys and Swizz Beatz—are not just reflections of Black joy but serve as a defiant insistence on the beauty that is inherent in Black lives and experiences. Yemi Bemiro’s enthralling documentary celebrates Brathwaite’s life, art, and his monumental contribution to Black history. —Bedatri Choudhury

Tuner
2026-04-26 13:00 - 13:30 | Premier Theater at One Letterman, 1 Letterman Dr # B, San Francisco, CA, 94129, United States
Academy Award®–winning director Daniel Roher (Navalny, Festival 2022) makes a striking leap into narrative filmmaking with this stylish, genre-bending thriller. Leo Woodall plays Niki, a meticulous piano tuner whose hypersensitive hearing makes the world painfully loud—but also gives him an uncanny ability to detect the inner workings of locks. His quiet life tuning pianos across New York alongside his mentor, played with wry warmth by Dustin Hoffman, takes an unexpected turn when Niki’s rare talent draws the attention of criminals eager to exploit it. As he becomes entangled in increasingly dangerous safecracking jobs, a tentative romance with a music student (Havana Rose Liu) presents another path. Propelled by inventive sound design and sharp performances, Tuner blends crime caper, romance, and character study into a tense, darkly funny exploration of talent, temptation, and the fragile line between survival and self-destruction. —Jessie Fairbanks
