Full Lineup for the 83rd Venice International Film Festival Unveiled for 2026

According to CinemaDrame News Agency, the 83rd Venice International Film Festival will once again take place on the island of Lido, welcoming filmmakers and cinema enthusiasts from September 3 to September 13. The Italian festival has long been regarded as a vital launching pad for awards season contenders and, unlike other fall festivals, features an all-world-premiere lineup.

As previously announced, the film event will open with Danny Boyle’s new feature Ink, which delves into the early days of Rupert Murdoch’s career and his takeover of The Sun newspaper. Guy Pearce stars as Murdoch alongside Jack O’Connell as newspaper editor Larry Lamb. In addition to serving as the opening film, Ink will compete in the main Competition for the coveted Golden Lion. Furthermore, Honorary Golden Lions for Lifetime Achievement will be awarded to George Clooney and Ellen Burstyn.

Festival Artistic Director Alberto Barbera announced the full lineup across all sections, including the Main Competition, Out of Competition, Horizons (Orizzonti), Classics, and Documentaries. The Main Competition features several high-profile titles, including Lance Oppenheim’s Primetime, starring Robert Pattinson; Casey Affleck’s third directorial effort, The Company; Florian Zeller’s Bunker, starring Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem; Andrea Pallaoro’s Echo Chamber; Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Look Back; Ilya Khrzhanovsky’s Dove; Martin McDonagh’s Nine Wild Horses; Werner Herzog’s Rapid Battle; and Lee Chang-dong’s latest work, Possible Love. Notably, Mohsen Gharaei’s film The Caretaker has been selected for the Horizons section, while Ali Asgari’s Kami Noor (A Little Light) will compete in the Main Competition.

The festival’s documentary slate is particularly robust this year, featuring Luca Guadagnino’s seven-hour documentary on Bernardo Bertolucci titled Passion for Life; Alex Gibney’s four-hour documentary on Elon Musk titled Musk; as well as new works from acclaimed directors such as Victor Kossakovsky, Wim Wenders, Sergei Loznitsa, Takashi Miike, and Tsai Ming-liang.

The Out of Competition narrative section features Paul Schrader’s Elements of Philosophy; Barthélémy Grossmann’s Father Joe, starring Al Pacino and Kiefer Sutherland; and Kornél Mundruczó’s A Place to Be. Additionally, Maggie Gyllenhaal will present her new short film The Flesh Effect, centered on Marilyn Monroe, in the Out of Competition section.

Complete Lineup of the Venice Film Festival by Section:

Opening Film (In Competition)

• Ink (Danny Boyle)

Main Competition

• The Company (Casey Affleck)
• Kami Noor (A Little Light) (Ali Asgari)
• Return to Buenos Aires (Marco Bechis)
• A Good Little Soldier (Stéphane Brizé)
• The Fire Inside You (Edoardo De Angelis)
• The Unknown Woman (May el-Toukhy)
• Rapid Battle (Werner Herzog)
• 15/18 (A Place to Heal) (Cédric Kahn)
• Dove (Ilya Khrzhanovsky)
• Look Back (Hirokazu Kore-eda)
• Possible Love (Lee Chang-dong)
• Nine Wild Horses (Martin McDonagh)
• It Will Happen Tonight (Nanni Moretti)
• Primetime (Lance Oppenheim)
• Echo Chamber (Andrea Pallaoro)
• Just Before Midnight (Nicolas Pariser)
• The Stranger (Paolo Strippoli)
• Mr. Nelson, Did You Kill People? (Shinya Tsukamoto)
• Bunker (Florian Zeller)

Venice Spotlight

• Sumo: Weight Has No Soul (Erik Shirai) – Opening Film
• Dialogue with the Sea (Muayad Alayan)
• A Man in the Water (Gael García Bernal)
• Snakes (Roberto De Paolis Mino)
• The Rages (Rami Kodeih)
• Guria (Levan Koguashvili)
• Ground Floor (Gábor Reisz)
• I Matter (Alina Șerban)

Horizons (Orizzonti)

• The Girl with the Leica Camera (Alina Marazzi) – Opening Film
• Burning Giants (Phuttiphong Aroonpheng)
• What Belongs to Others (Grzegorz Dębowski)
• A Story (Ana Folentha)
• City of the Living (Edoardo Gabriellini)
• The Caretaker (Mohsen Gharaei)
• Too Much Sugar (Robert Greene)
• Strict Bride (Rubaiyat Hossain)
• House of the Wind (Auguste Bernard Kouemo Yangou)
• Monkey Children (Tommaso Landucci)
• A Day in the Life of Joe (Jacqueline Lentzou)
• Oasis (Yannis Lentz)
• Until the Day Passes (Jelena Maksimović)
• La Mula (Jérôme Pitorre)
• Lovers in the Blue Night (Annapurna Basu)
• A Path Through Dion (Anne Siret, Raphaël Balboni)
• Color of the Sun (Xavier Tear)
• Eclipse (Manuel Vacher)
• Big Little Things (Michel Zhou)

Special Screenings

• Our Reporters: RAI’s Venice Chronicle (Giuseppe Giannotti, Enrico Salvatori, Nicoletta Bernardi)

Out of Competition – Short Films

• The Flesh Effect (Maggie Gyllenhaal)
• Wild Asparagus (Avi Mograbi)
• They Are Here (Laura Poitras, Rachel Lauren Mueller)

Out of Competition – Series

• Sin (Valerio Vestoso)

Out of Competition – Documentaries on Cinema

• Holiday Guest (Karen Di Porto)
• Nino: A Film About Nino Rota (Walter Fasano)
• The Pervert’s Guide to Utopias (Sophie Fiennes)
• Passion for Life (Luca Guadagnino)
• Pan and Shoot, Mr. Suzuki (Yves Montmayeur)
• Interlude (Yonfan)

Out of Competition – Documentaries

• Be Brave (Francesco Carrozzini)
• What Love Makes (Russell Crowe)
• Burgundy (Michael Dweck, Gregory Kershaw)
• Musk (Alex Gibney)
• The Jericho Road (Amos Gitai)
• Citizen Osama (Ahmed Hassouna)
• Union City (Barbara Kopple)
• Sacred Dust of Cinema (Victor Kossakovsky)
• Letters from a Silent Country (Andrei Kutsila)
• Biography of Jorge Luis Borges (Mariano Llinás)
• My Undesirable Friends: Part II – Exile (Julia Loktev)
• Boatbuilders (Luke Lorentzen)
• The Empire (Sergei Loznitsa)
• Shumi: The Living Legacy of Kabuki (Takashi Miike)
• Queer Edward II (Theo Rollason)
• Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger (Dylan Southern, Will Lovelace)
• Dust (Tsai Ming-liang)
• Everest: The Other Side (Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin)
• From the Inside Out: The Architecture of Peter Zumthor (Wim Wenders)

Out of Competition – Fiction

• God Laughs (Giovanni Veronesi) – Closing Film
• Painless (Gianni Amelio)
• Let Us Pass, Dear Ancestors (Lav Diaz)
• Father Joe (Barthélémy Grossmann)
• A Little Joke (Mario Martone)
• A Place to Be (Kornél Mundruczó)
• There Is No Heaven If Killed by a Woman’s Hand (Hassan Mustafa)
• Detained Memory (Sabu)
• Elements of Philosophy (Paul Schrader)
• A Good Lawyer (Tristan Séguéla)
• Jupiter (Alexander Semia)

Venice Days – Competition

• My Notes on Mars (Lili Horvát) – Opening Film
• Sometimes Grief, Sometimes Rebellion (María Aparicio)
• Agata, the Writer (Kuba Dorabialski)
• Balkanika (Nicola Sorcinelli)
• Camouflage (Mykyta Gibalenko)
• Dear Ajayi (Damilola Orimogunje)
• I Plant My Hand in the Garden (Boris Hadžija, Hedi Taheri)
• Indies (Pauline Julier, Nicolas Chaupoolier)
• Beauty Salon (Natalia Asbedo)
• A Modern Woman (Robert Guédiguian)

Venice Days – Out of Competition

• Man’s Skin (Léa Domenach)

Venice Days – Special Events

• Al-Barraniyah (Ashjan El-Hamus)
• Carla Lonzi: A Feminist Story (Francesca Archibugi)
• The Ghost (Ignacio Masllorens, David Lamelas)
• The Slaughter (Cosimo Messeri)
• Even If Hell Breaks Loose (Samuele Rossi)

Women’s Tales Project

• Discipline (Mona Fastvold)
• With Kim (Claire Denis)