A man and a woman standing next to each other outside draped in floaty clothes.
Image from The Odyssey

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Birds of War

Rated 15

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Until

Birds of War

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.

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Rosebush Pruning

Rated 18

Until

Rosebush Pruning

Underneath the Catalonian sun, a rich white American family lives in hedonistic isolation, seeking love and validation through one another, their designer wardrobes and pop music. But when an outsider infiltrates the family, buried tensions surface and blood ties are severed...

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The Last One for the Road

Rated 15

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Until

The Last One for the Road

Surviving bar-to-bar on anecdotes and the ‘good old days’, two blustery 50-somethings hatch a plan to change their luck by digging up the cash their old pal buried before he left for Argentina.

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Our Hero, Balthazar

Eager to impress his activist crush, a wealthy New York teenager follows an online connection to Texas, where he’s convinced he can stop an act of extreme violence.

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The Invite

Rated 15

Until

The Invite

Joe and Angela’s marriage is on thin ice. When they invite their enigmatic upstairs neighbours for a dinner party, the night spirals into unexpected places. Have they reignited the spark or lit the match that burns it all down?

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The Odyssey

Rated 15

The Odyssey

With a star-studded cast including Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, Lupita Nyong'o, Zendaya and Charlize Theron, Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey is the most anticipated film on Letterboxd for 2026.

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SENTIENTS: An Immersive VR & Video Game Exhibition

Open your animal eyes. A collection of groundbreaking video games and virtual reality. If you weren’t human - how would you see the world? From raging wildfire to the vision of an owl, from a river to multiple galaxies, SENTIENTS is about being something else.

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SENTIENTS: Launch Party

Join us to celebrate the launch of SENTIENTS! Open your animal eyes. A collection of groundbreaking video games and virtual reality.

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Blue Heron

Rated 12A

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Until

Blue Heron

In the late 1990s, a family of six settles into their new home on Vancouver Island, as internal dynamics are slowly revealed through the experiences of the youngest child, Sasha. Their fresh start is interrupted by the increasingly dangerous behavior of Jeremy, the family’s oldest child.

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Persepolis

Rated 12A

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Persepolis

As a tribute to the late Marjane Satrapi, we're screening the film adaptation of her graphic novel that follows a young girl in Iran during the 1979 Iranian Revolution.

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Reframing Film Sessions

Join some of the most inspiring voices in the worlds of exhibition, distribution and restoration to reflect on the rise of rep cinema over the past decade; and what that might mean for the future of cinema.

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Opening Conversation with Ehsan Khoshbakht

To celebrate Il Cinema Ritrovato turning forty and Cinema Rediscovered turning ten, we are delighted to welcome Il Cinema Ritrovato’s Co-director Ehsan Khoshbakht, for a conversation with our founder Mark Cosgrove hosted by film critic, historian and long-standing collaborator Pamela Hutchinson.

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Danger: Diabolik Hotline + Meet the Giussani Sisters

Relationship trouble? Choosing dinner? Look out for our Danger: Diabolik Hotline. Dial for Diabolik: the suave super-villain from the Giussani sisters’ camp 1960’s comic. To join in, find the phone booth in Watershed’s Café & Bar and ask for counsel from our very own agony-aunt. Warning - follow his advice at your own risk!

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UK Premiere: Danger: Diabolik

Rated 12A

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part of Comics Come Alive

UK Premiere: Danger: Diabolik

Based on an iconic Italian comic, Mario Bava’s stylish cult classic has been an inspiration to many from the Beastie Boys to acclaimed British filmmaker Edgar Wright, who will present a pre-recorded introduction to the film.

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Cinema Walk 1

Bristol has been an UNESCO City of Film since 2017, but Bristol and cinema have been entwined since – some would say before – the beginning of moving pictures. Join local enthusiast and historian Mark Fuller for the first of three gentle walks.

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UK Premiere: Nostalgia

Rated 12A

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part of Restored & Rediscovered

UK Premiere: Nostalgia

Deeply personal, beautifully realised, and symbolically obscure, Andrei Tarkovsky’s first film directed outside of his home country stands as a testament to his own conflicting thoughts regarding Russia as he considered a self-proclaimed exile.

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Inside the Archive

Come and find out how a film archive works in this new exhibition on display in W1 throughout the festival. All welcome including younger guests in this free drop-in space hosted by the BFI National Archive team.

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UK Premiere: The Sacrifice (Offret)

Rated 12A

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part of Restored & Rediscovered

UK Premiere: The Sacrifice (Offret)

Set in the final hours before a nuclear war threatens to wipe out humanity, Andrei Tarkovsky’s visionary final film is a visually breathtaking meditation on existential terror and a melancholic swan song from one of cinema’s true auteurs.

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Sweet Disaster

Join Aardman’s co-founders David Sproxton and Peter Lord for a rare 40th anniversary screening of Channel 4’s 1986 cult animated shorts programme Sweet Disaster which includes their rarely screened Babylon, amongst other bold experimental work from Aardman alumni and beyond.

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Goodbye, Dragon Inn

Rated 12A

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part of Vive Le Cinema!

Goodbye, Dragon Inn

Tsai Ming-Liang's poignant love letter to cinema is an exquisite, wryly funny and tender tribute to the experience of cinemagoing, to cinemas as spaces, and to the people in the audience and behind the scenes. 

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Leaving Las Vegas

Mike Figgis’ beautifully lurid descent into Las Vegas oblivion is anchored by two career defining - and award winning - performances from Nicolas Cage and Elizabeth Shue.

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Projection Tour

Join Watershed’s Charlotte Bendrey and BFI National Archive Curator Rosie Taylor on a tour of Watershed’s projection booth and discover how the films screening at the festival make it to the screen during a festival like Cinema Rediscovered.

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Les Sièges de l’Alcazar

Rated 15

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part of Vive Le Cinema!

Les Sièges de l’Alcazar

A humorous insider critique of 1950s Parisien cinephile scene by filmmaker, critic, and producer Luc Moullet who began writing for Cahiers du Cinéma at the age of 18 alongside figures like Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut.  

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The Liberation Films of Southern Africa

Join Professor Shawn Sobers, Simon Bright (Zimbabwe) and fellow filmmaker Martin Mhando (Tanzania) to watch Corridors of Freedom (1987) and reflect on the vibrant collaboration and resistance of the Southern African Transnational Cinema movement that emerged in the 1980s and 90s to counter South Africa’s apartheid propaganda and the media biases of former colonial powers.

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Lunchtime Talk: Other Ways of Seeing

Interested in meeting some of the film curators involved in Cinema Rediscovered and getting insights into how the festival gets programmed? For those of you interested in pitching an event or season for next year’s edition of the festival, this is also a great opportunity to pick up practical tips from those involved in our Other Ways of Seeing commissions supported by BFI awarding funds from National Lottery.

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Fri 24 July 13:00

Adventures in the Absurd

In this Lunchtime Talk, mechanical sculptor Nik Ramage will present a collection of his useless machines and absurd devices, revealing the stories behind their creation - and the ideas that never made it off the drawing board.

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UK Premiere: The Butcher (Le Boucher)

Rated 15

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part of Restored & Rediscovered

UK Premiere: The Butcher (Le Boucher)

Claude Chabrol’s masterful thriller hinges on the unlikely bond between a schoolmistress and a butcher and the unsettling possibility that all might not be what it seems as a wave of murders grip their small idyllic French village.

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UK Premiere: Accident

Dirk Bogarde and Stanley Baker star in a study of masculine malaise among the academic elite told through the elliptical rhythms of Harold Pinter's’ script and cool and penetratingly detached direction of Joseph Losey.

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Looking for Mr. Goodbar (35mm)

A schoolteacher (the late Diane Keaton in one of her most striking performances) living alone spends her evenings frequenting late-night bars and picking up men in this dark complex drama.

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The Movie Orgy

Rated 18

part of Reframing Film

The Movie Orgy

Before the era of YouTube mashups came The Movie Orgy (1968), an immense found footage cultural catalogue curated by legendary director Joe Dante in his debut feature.

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Hardcore

Rated 18

part of Rogue Hollywood

Hardcore

A conservative Midwestern patriarch has his world shaken when he must search for his missing daughter in the seedy underworld of the California sex industry in this bleak psychological neo-noir from Paul Schrader.

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UK Premiere: Nadja

Set against the gritty backdrop of 1990s New York City, this postmodern reimagining of the Dracula myth, executive produced by David Lynch, follows estranged vampire twins as they reunite after their father’s death.

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Closed Circuit Murder Mystery

Join us before the screening of Closed Circuit (1978) in Cinema 2, for a murder mystery inspired by the film. This interactive event will be taking place in Waterside 1, and will pull details from the film, but without giving away whodunit!

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Closed Circuit

Rated 15

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part of Vive Le Cinema!

Closed Circuit

Fiction becomes reality for an audience quietly watching a matinee of a spaghetti western at their local cinema when suddenly one of the patrons dies…

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Cinema Walk 2

Bristol has been an UNESCO City of Film since 2017, but Bristol and cinema have been entwined since – some would say before – the beginning of moving pictures. Join local enthusiast and historian Mark Fuller for the second of three gentle weekend walks.

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Big Films on Small Gauges 9.5mm

BFI National Archive Curator Rosie Taylor presents two rare comedies of farcical romance, weddings and tomfoolery from the early period of British Lion and Hammer, now only viewable on 9.5mm film. 

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Matinee

Rated PG

part of Vive Le Cinema!

Matinee

B-movie director Lawrence Woolsey rolls into a Key West cinema with his new film Mant (half man, half ant - all terror) whilst the Cuban missile crisis cranks up nearby.

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50 Years of  Morph

Join Aardman co-founders David Sproxton and Peter Lord for a deep dive into the world of Morph, one of the first characters created by the Bristol based studio, who would go on to entertain generations with his slapstick antics.

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UK Premiere: Mikey & Nicky

Back on the big screen on its 50th anniversary, Elaine May’s neglected mid-1970s gem is a dissection of masculinity and male friendship anchored by mesmerising performances from John Cassavetes and Peter Falk.

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Josie and the Pussycats

Beneath the glitter and pop lies a razor-sharp critique of corporate manipulation and manufactured fame, way ahead of its time. Gather your friends, cats and kitties and join Party Girl Productions to celebrate this classic on its 25th anniversary.

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La Paga

Rated 18

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part of Restored & Rediscovered

La Paga

This important rediscovery banned in 1963 by the Venezuelan government provides a striking snapshot of social disparity which draws on the director’s own childhood experiences.

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Cinema Year Zero Film Critics Salon

Cinema Year Zero will be hosting an open discussion of the contemporary film criticism landscape. Essayists Kirsty Asher, Ben Flanagan, Adam Murray, and Daisy Steinhardt will share readings from their new work, followed by a convivial conversation around their critical practice.

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Big Films on Small Gauges 28mm

A decade before 9.5mm and 16mm film, Pathé launched 28mm, one of the first non-theatrical film gauges. Explore this forgotten format, featuring original prints projected on a 28mm Victor projector.

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Ghost World

Rated 15

part of Comics Come Alive

Ghost World

Break-out roles from Thora Birch and Scarlett Johansson, and also starring Steve Buscemi, this cult classic adapted from Daniel Clowes’ graphic novel remains a sharp, funny, and deeply relatable portrait of youth, identity, and not fitting in.

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Taxi Driver

Rated 18

part of Rogue Hollywood

Taxi Driver

Fifty years after it picked up the Palme d’Or at Cannes, Scorsese’s chilling masterpiece has lost none of its power to shock and disturb in its visceral exploration of alienation and violence in urban America.

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The Arch (董夫人)

Rated 15

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part of Restored & Rediscovered

The Arch (董夫人)

Set in 17th-century China, T’ang Shushuen’s groundbreaking debut feature - one of the first independent films made in Hong Kong - traces the plight of a widow torn between passion and moral obligations.

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UK Premiere: Trees Lounge

Now newly restored for its 30th anniversary, Steve Buscemi’s debut feature is a still-largely unsung indie masterpiece capturing the chaos of hopeless loser Tommy (Buscemi) as he stumbles through life.

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Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

A twentysomething aspiring musician’s romantic life takes a dramatic turn when he meets the (literal) girl of his dreams, Ramona. Brace yourself for Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz)’s high energy adaptation of Bryan Lee O’Malley’s cult comic book.

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Cruising the Archive

Join us for an informal discussion before and after Friedkin’s film Cruising (1980) where archive materials will be provided to look through and Jim Hubbard's film Stop The Movie (1980) will be playing on the Café & Bar screen.

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Exorcist II: The Heretic

From the director of Point Blank and Deliverance comes this vision-like metaphysical thriller that confounded audience expectations by delivering something unique and entirely unexpected.

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Oldboy

Rated 18

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part of Comics Come Alive

Oldboy

Comic book Japanese style with a Korean twist: the Oldboy manga is brought to screen by maestro Park Chan-wook, a masterpiece of visceral violent vengeance.

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Cruising

Rated 18

part of Rogue Hollywood

Cruising

Controversial at the time of its release, William Friedkin’s nocturnal thriller which sees Al Pacino’s undercover cop descend into New York’s gay leather scene on the hunt for a serial killer is being reappraised by a new generation.

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Cinema Walk 3

Bristol has been an UNESCO City of Film since 2017, but Bristol and cinema have been entwined since – some would say before – the beginning of moving pictures. Join local enthusiast and historian Mark Fuller for the third of three gentle weekend walks.

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The Adventures of Prince Achmed & Lotte Reiniger Fairytale Films

To celebrate the centenary of Lotte Reiniger’s beautiful 1926 silhouette animation, The Adventures of Prince Achmed, The Little Film Society bring you an enchanting screening of these magical tales from the Arabian Nights showing alongside some her lesser known, but no less spellbinding, fairytale films.

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American Splendor

Real comic-book artist Harvey Pekar is brought to cinematic life in this sweet, funny and off-kilter take on his highly idiosyncratic, autobiographical work.

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World Premiere: Billy Liar

Few films tell a heartbreaking story as hilariously as this must-see 1960s British New Wave classic in which Tom Courtenay stars in this tale of a young clerk lost to daydreams in his Yorkshire hometown. But will they ever come true?

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Hustle

Rated 15

part of Rogue Hollywood

Hustle

Fresh off box-office comedy smash The Longest Yard (1974), director Robert Aldrich and star sensation Burt Reynolds ditched laughs for a gritty, uncompromising neo-noir set in the seedy underbelly of LA.

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Queen Kelly @ Curzon Clevedon

Take a trip out to the stunning Curzon Cinema in Clevedon (and a peek at their Christie organ) followed by a special screening of this lavish late silent masterpiece introduced by critic and film historian Pamela Hutchinson.

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Modesty Blaise

Rated 12A

part of Comics Come Alive

Modesty Blaise

Joseph Losey’s screen adaptation of the 1960s British comic strip Modesty Blaise is a camp, star-studded pop-art romp that brilliantly satirises the Bond-mania of the time.

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The Girls (Gehenu Lamai)

Rated 18 (CTBA)

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The Girls (Gehenu Lamai)

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

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