When the ICA Cinema opened on The Mall in 1968, it did not open to the public. Instead, under the guise ‘Club Deluxe’ it operated as a film club screening new works evolving outside the mainstream, for ICA Members only. This conception was a sign of the times, both in tune with the unabashed enthusiasm for a medium in the midst of revolution and in opposition to a rampant censorship that meant new revelatory works like Jean-Luc Godard’s Weekend were deemed un-rateable and thus illegal to show to the general public.

Cinema in 2025 finds itself in a very different position than it did in 1968. Amidst a rampant corporatisation and generally insipid and risk-averse spirit, it is easy to become despondent about the future of cinema today, to wonder if we are in that ‘ignominious, irreversible decline’ that Susan Sontag wrote about more than two decades ago. In a time of artistic uniformity, of remarkably style-less house styles, the need for spaces dedicated to truly independent and original voices is as desperate in 2025 as it was in 1968. The obstacles may have changed but the necessity of overcoming them has not.

As the spaces dedicated to showcasing work outside the commercial sphere continue to shrink, the life cycle for a film beyond its festival run remains uncertain. In the same spirit with which Club Deluxe was founded, Off-Circuit aims to provide a platform to new films that have yet to receive a proper spotlight in the UK, facilitating a continuous connection between these profoundly rich works and audiences on the lookout for something new and different.

Off-Circuit offers audiences a chance to encounter this generation's landmark films on screen for the very first time, carving out a much-needed theatrical space for this generation's seminal and medium-redefining artists.

Programme



Until 2 April
MACDO
Drawing on telenovelas and home movies, the debut feature from Mexican filmmaker Racornelia incisively unravels the shifting power dynamics underlying a young family’s Christmas dinner in Mexico City.



Until 2 April
UK PREMIERE
Bouchra
In Orian Barki and Meriem Bennani’s debut feature, a queer Moroccan coyote navigates distance and family in a genre-blurring animated journey through New York’s emotional landscapes.



Friday 10 April, 7pm
LONDON PREMIERE
Dracula
Radu Jude resurrects Dracula, dissecting modern Europe and its myths through a collision of AI mischief and pornographic absurdity.

More screenings from 11 April.



Friday 1 May, 6.30pm
UK PREMIERE
Phantoms of July
Julian Radlmaier's fifth feature brings together an East German waitress with a broken heart and an Iranian YouTuber with a broken arm, in an enigmatic comedy about the ghosts of the past and the mysteries of the present.

More screenings from 2 May.



Friday 22 May, 6.30pm
UK PREMIERE
Tycoon + Q&A
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 ICE raids, meat shortages and cockroach infestations on the eve of the 2028 Olympics.

More screenings from 23 May.



Thursday 4 June, 6.30pm
UK PREMIERE
Fuck The Polis + Q&A
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.

More screenings from 5 June.



From 18 June
Dry Leaf
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.

Past Programme

#46

Gangsterism

dir. Isiah Medina

#45

Do You Love Me

dir. Lana Daher

#44

Escape

dir. Adachi Masao

#43

I Only Rest in the Storm

dir. Pedro Pinho

#42

Fiume o morte!

dir. Igor Bezinović

#41

Fantaisie

dir. Isabel Pagliai

#40

Levers

dir. Rhayne Vermette

#39

Invention

dir. Courtney Stephens

#38
Afternoons of Solitude
dir. Albert Serra

#37
Measures for a Funeral
dir. Sofia Bohdanowicz

#36
Việt and Nam
dir. Trương Minh Quý

#35
What Does That Nature Say to You
dir. Hong Sangsoo

#34
The Tree of Authenticity
dir. Sammy Baloji

#33
The Triptych of Mondongo
dir. Mariano Llinás

#32
When the Phone Rang
dir. Iva Radivojević

#31
Spring Night
dir. Kang Mi-ja

#30
Bury Us in a Lone Desert
dir. Nguyễn Lê Hoàng Phúc

#29
Caught by the Tides
dir. Jia Zhangke

#28
DIRECT ACTION
dirs. Guillaume Cailleau & Ben Russell

#27
Jimmy
dir. Yashaddai Owens

#26
bluish
dirs. Lilith Kraxner & Milena Czernovsky

#25
By the Stream
dir. Hong Sangsoo

#24
Favoriten
dir. Ruth Beckermann

#23
C'est pas moi
dir. Leos Carax

#22
True Chronicles of the Blida Joinville Psychiatric Hospital in the Last Century, when Dr Frantz Fanon Was Head of the Fifth Ward between 1953 and 1956
dir. Abdenour Zahzah

#21
Matt and Mara
dir. Kazik Radwanski

#20
I'm Not Everything I Want to Be
dir. Klára Tasovská

#19
Last Things + Memories of an Unborn Sun
dir. Deborah Stratman
dir. Marcel Mrejen

#18
Our Body
dir. Claire Simon

#16
Outside Noise
dir. Ted Fendt

#15
A Prince
dir. Pierre Creton

#14
Foremost by Night
dir. Victor Iriarte

#13
You Burn Me
dir. Matías Piñeiro

#12
Regardless of Us
dir. Yoo Heong-jun

#11
Mambar Pierrette
dir. Rosine Mbakam

#10
Grace
dir. Ilya Povolotsky

#9
The Human Surge 3
dir. Eduardo Williams

#8
Music
dir. Angela Schanelec

#7
Inside the Yellow Cocoon Shell
dir. Phạm Thiên An

#6
Unrest
dir. Cyril Schäublin

#5
A Woman Escapes in 3D
dirs. Sofia Bohdanowicz, Burak Çevik, Blake Williams

#4
Mal Viver
dir. João Canijo

#4
Viver Mal
dir. João Canijo

#3
Pictures of Ghosts
dir. Kleber Mendonça Filho

#2
Human Flowers of Flesh
dir. Helena Wittmann

#1
Man in Black
dir. Wang Bing