A continuing series spotlighting new films that expand the possibilities of the medium and provide a vision for its future.

A continuing series of in-depth retrospectives exploring the work of cinema's great artists, both past and present.

From a distinctive period in a filmmaker or actor’s career to the varied cinematographic interpretations of a great novelist's work, this continuing series offers an opportunity to draw connections across mediums and to narrow in on the details.

An opaque journey through the Georgian countryside, Alexandre Koberidze's latest film is a remarkable exploration of absence, as a father traces a path through villages and football fields in search of his missing daughter.

One of the most original, self-assured, yet undersung voices of the French New Wave, Jacques Rozier crafted, across a career spanning five decades, a cinema attuned to the beauty and heartbreak of chance encounters, improvised days and spontaneous play.

Capturing both the giddy thrill of innocent flirtation and the anguish of youth faced with an uncertain future, Jacques Rozier's debut feature was championed by his contemporaries François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard.

Perfectly capturing both the liberating promise and melancholic effervescence of summer, Near Orouët is a masterpiece of the post-New Wave era and a beautiful meditation on the fleetingness of youth, love, and time.

One of the most notorious J-Horror films ever made, Takashi Miike's Audition exploded onto the festival circuit at the turn of the 21st century to a chorus of awards and praise. The film catapulted Miike to the international scene and paved the way for such other genre delights as Ichii the Killer and 13 Assassins.

At once a landmark of 1980s Hong Kong cinema and the harbinger of John Woo's future star-studded career, A Better Tomorrow broke the mould with its kinetic action sequences, razor sharp script and breakout performance by Chow Yun-Fat.

On Vancouver Island in the late 1990s eight-year-old Sasha and her Hungarian immigrant family attempt to build a new life, only to be destabilised by the increasingly dangerous behaviour of her older brother, Jeremy.

A coming-of-old-age film following an older woman’s transition into assisted living as she contends with her conflicting relationship with herself and her caregivers amidst her shifting memory, age identity, and desires.

One morning, Nino attends a doctor’s appointment where he is given some upsetting news. The treatment will start on Monday morning, but there is a high chance that it might leave him infertile, so the doctor tells him to consider freezing his sperm. 

With its highly charged hallucinogenic quality and its atmosphere of lush decadence, Pink Narcissus is a landmark of gay cinema.

Paul Thomas Anderson's San Fernando Valley-set tale of the rise and fall of a dishwasher turned porn phenom is a bravura exploration of family, fame and the American dream in all its excess.

A girl called Moon adventures in a world without adults in Mare’s Nest, the latest feature by acclaimed British artist and filmmaker Ben Rivers.

A drama of broken-hearted cowboys and broken-down marriages, Clark Gable and Montgomery Clift co-star as an aging cowboy and a rodeo-rocked bull rider in John Huston’s swan song to the Western, and Marilyn Monroe’s final film.

Fifteen years after the original trip to Greece, with a cancer diagnosis once thought final, a filmmaker retraces her journey through the Greek islands – this time with a group of young friends, filming, reading, singing, and moving from ferry to roadside to ruin.

Charlotte Zhang's mesmerising debut feature effortlessly merges forms and formats to craft a paranoid spiral into a city on the brink, as Los Angeles is encircled by militarized policing, meat shortages and cockroach infestations on the eve of the 2028 Olympics.

Armenian Film Society London and Armenian Heritage Month campaign present the long overdue UK premiere of Komitas, a haunting and unconventional film by Don Askarian centred upon one of Armenia’s most significant cultural figures, the pioneering composer and musicologist Komitas Vardapet.

A haunted young man travels to a remote island to reconnect with his father and confront the traumatic experience they shared ten years prior that transformed their relationship.

A London-based Lebanese journalist and a Syrian activist and cameraman retrace their love story over thirteen years of war, revolutions and exile. Drawing on intimate personal archive, Birds of War asks what it means to build a life together in a world shaped by conflict.

Inspired by Mia Couto's tale A Morte, o Tempo e o Velho and Aristophanes' play The Birds, this surreal fable delves into the relationship between humans, gods, and time, exploring the cycles of life and the quest for freedom.

Abducted, beaten and tortured for money on camera, the footage then shared online, destroying lives. This is the world of “kito” attacks in Nigeria: where members of the LGBTQ+ community are entrapped, humiliated and extorted by gangs in a rising surge in violence and hatred.

This programme brings together four shorts by Jacques Rozier from 1958's Rivera-set Blue Jeans to 1983's unique reflection on the state of contemporary filmmaking Lettre de la Sierra Morena

The festival returns for its 17th year with a rich selection of cutting-edge new cinema alongside restored classics celebrating the magnificence of Indian cinema.

Francesco Sossai’s dazzling sophomore feature is many things at once: a road movie, a casual caper, a tribute to a vanishing industrial Italy, a scruffy intergenerational odyssey, and free-flowing bender through time and space.

Sumitra Peries' groundbreaking Sri Lankan film offers a tender and transporting journey through young dreams and first loves.

PRESSURE explores the fetishism of bodies and the desire for no frills full body contact - stripped back to the sensation of flesh against flesh and the beautiful stink of sweat. Dust yourself off and get in the ring as we get physical with tickling, trampling, wrestling, and more than a few muscle mummies.

Having framed his first two features as seaside holiday films, Rozier used the third, The Castaways of Turtle Island, to mock the tourist industry in a hilarious comic send-up that could only have emerged from Rozier’s puckish imagination.

The River Douro in Porto is the area of Portuguese maritime territory with the highest number of suicides by jumping. Gastão has dedicated his life to recovering these bodies, not to try to save them, but to return them to their families, who can only move on once they have been recovered.

Artist Alexander Carey-Morgan buries himself within half a ton of clay for three days on a journey of self discovery and creative metamorphosis.

A subtle meditation on memory and performance, Hong Sangsoo's latest film unfolds through a series of increasingly intimate conversations, as he continues his exploration of the boundaries between lived experience and artistic creation.

A double bill of powerful features by Jean-Pierre Melville and Jean-Luc Godard that explore war, occupation, resistance and possible reconciliation. Accompanied by two sublime shorts, one co-directed by Simone Bitton and Godard’s nephew, Paul Grivas, who worked closely with his uncle from 2003 onwards. With an introduction by Paul Grivas, followed by discussion/Q&A.

The Synthetic Sincerity Lab based at the University of Southern England are trying to create authentic AI characters as part of a new research project and licence the films of Marc Isaacs' to better understand what his AI characters are lacking.

Andrei Tarkovsky's extraordinary and haunting exploration of exile, memory, and faith returns to the big screen in a new 4K restoration.

12-year-old best friends Ish and Maram wrestle to hold on to their friendship in the wake of a police stop and search. As the ripples take hold, the boys try to make sense of the men they are becoming – and how ‘letting go’ can be the hardest part of growing up.

Vladlena Sandu, a survivor of the war in Chechnya, studies her traumatic memories in order to transcend and transform them via cinema in her poetic debut feature.

30-year-old Danielius returns to his hometown to sell his parents’ flat, but the visit lasts longer than expected in Vytautas Katkus' delicate study of homecoming, fatherhood, and belated farewells.

A playful spin on theatrical adaptation, Alejo Moguillansky's latest film is a delightfully imaginative take on Samuel Beckett's Fin de Partie, punctuated by music, tennis, and another exceptional turn by Laura Paredes.

Nick Broomfield and Joan Churchill’s riveting documentary, shot over 3 months, following a group of women going through basic training for the US Army. Screening as a part of Contemporary Films 75th Anniversary celebration.

Weaving together oral histories, archaeological field notes, regional legends, poetry, and song, Maureen Fazendeiro's The Seasons is a remarkable portrait of the Alentejo region of Portugal, its people, and its stories.

Walerian Borowczyk’s critically acclaimed and influential medieval tale — a beautiful tragedy told with pitch-black humour and the director’s remarkable idiosyncratic inventiveness. Screening as a part of Contemporary Films 75th Anniversary celeberation.