Cinequest 2026 Is Here! Boasting 268 Films From 44 Countries

San Francisco Bay Area filmgoers who don’t mind traveling to the South Bay should check out the 2026 Cinequest Film Festival (hereafter “Cinequest”).  Running from now to March 22, 2026, Cinequest will be screening in both San Jose (at such venues as the California Theatre and the Hammer Theatre) and Mountain View (at the Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas).  Boasting 268 films from 44 countries, the festival brings everything from (the expected) new films to personal appearances by such stars as Vivica A. Fox and Steve Zahn.

By the time this piece comes out, the festivities will have kicked off with John M. Keller’s comedy “Her Song,” executive produced by the legendary James Ivory.  Franco-American novelist Olivia has returned to her family’s ancestral village in the French Pyrenees to find inspiration to finally write about her grandmother’s life during the Nazi Occupation.  But local uber-confident artisan Madeleine soon provides better inspiration for the novelist.  Yet why does it seem there are parallels in the lives of both Madeleine and Olivia’s grandmother?

Another mix of returning to one’s roots and comedy takes place in Helen Zhu and Naum Milyavskly’s semi-personal local documentary “Comedy Family Style.”   Zhu and her son Evan Ho are San Francisco-based comedians.  When Helen decides to do a comedy tour of Beijing with Evan, it turns out there’s a personal angle: the mother wants her son to learn about the connections between his current lifestyle and her humble beginnings in Beijing.  But the trip’s also an opportunity for Helen to finally deal with her father’s death.

A far different Asian-American experience takes place in the episodic pilot “Snafu,”  Ben Ding is a truck driver in 1970s Detroit.  On a stop at his sister’s dumpling shop while doing a legally dubious side hustle, he makes an unwelcome discovery.  He’s transporting Jimmy Hoffa…and there are more than a few armed underworld types looking for the labor leader.  Ding and his family wind up getting caught in the middle.

1970s crime dramas, “Snafu”’s inspiration, were the “B” movies of their day.  For those who love the modern version of those wonderfully trashy films, they’ve probably heard of The Asylum production company.  Anthony Frith’s documentary “Mockbuster” takes viewers behind the scenes of The Asylum as it follows a struggling filmmaker whose dreams of making a creatively audacious movie crashes against the realities of insufficient money and dueling egos.

Ben Wheatley is one of those directors with a track record of making great genre work on limited budgets.  His newest film is the comic thriller “Normal.”  “John Wick” creator Derek Kolstad’s script takes on the “small sleepy town with a big illicit secret” story.  It follows Bob Odenkirk’s Sheriff Ulysses’ anything but quiet assignment to the small Minnesota town of Normal.  A failed bank heist reveals Normal has a dark, dangerous secret that’s roped in both crooked deputies and townsfolk with a stake in keeping the secret.  To survive the night, the new Sheriff will need to rely on wits, charm, and some surprising allies.  

On the other hand, small-time criminals Clare and Danny Accardi have none (or at least very few) of Sheriff Ulysses’ assets.  That’s a big problem as the robbery they tried to pull off goes so badly wrong that one of them has just hours to live.  Sibling loyalty demanding quick action to increase the odds of survival is one thing.  But what happens when doing so means taking increasingly serious illegal actions?  Find out in Scott Anthony Cavalheiro’s race against time noir thriller “Plan C”. (Vivica A. Fox, one of this year’s Maverick Spirit Award recipients, has a visible role in the film.)  

Caroline Daniels (Samara Weaving) has different reasons than the Accardi siblings for being on the road and committing crimes.  She just wanted to leave small-town Texas in her rear-view mirror.  That opportunity arrives in the form of a charismatic con man who takes Caroline on a series of increasingly thrilling schemes and close calls across the American Southeast.  But will Kyra Sedgwick’s character provide the hard reality check Weaving’s character ultimately faces?   Find out in Adam Carter Rehmeier’s crime romance “Carolina Caroline,”

The titular character in Sivaranjini j’s drama “Victoria” also wants to escape from many things in her life, such as an arranged future and overbearing parents.  Yet her surprising catalyst turns out to be the arrival in her beauty salon of a rooster intended for a church festival.

Nuria, the heroine of Diego Toussaint’s comedy “No Thanks, I Quit Smoking,” doesn’t need a rooster to have a hectic day.  Not only has she just lost her job, her rent’s overdue, and her already precarious life is this close to completely falling apart.  Such things as flat tires, nosy relatives, and a really uncooperative pair of pants don’t make her day any easier.  Given all these problems, can she resist the siren call of taking up smoking again?

But Nuria’s problems pale in comparison to what the titular subject of Pollyanna Hardwicke-Brown’s documentary “Bif Naked” endured.  She’s gone through such crises as kidney failure, sexual assault, and industry betrayal.  But instead of crawling into a mental hole, she turned the pain of these traumatic events into such songs as “Spaceman” and “I Love Myself Today.”  Hardwicke-Brown’s film takes viewers through the life of this uncompromising cult punk and alternative music singer.

Cheryl Gelover and Tom Murray, aka the musicians behind Tulipomania took an offbeat path leading to the creation of their animated music video “Tulipomania: I’ve Been Told.”  Noted writer of the fantastic Jeff VanderMeer was inspired to write Absolution by listening to Tulipomania’s album “Dreaming Of Sleep.”  While Absolution was still in the work-in-progress stage, the writer invited Tulipomania to create music inspired by his then-unfinished novel.  The result: this unusual animated look at degrees of disintegration.

Looking at things in a unique way underlies Audrey Whiteford-Woods' animated short “City In Observation.”   The film uses a mix of Super 8 footage, animation, and city imagery for this tale of a young researcher whose work on an observation project makes her philosophical.  She’s there to see how a city looks at its inhabitants, yet she realizes she, too looks at the city through a lens of isolation.

Observation of the enclosed garden at Saint-Paul-de-Mausole psychiatric hospital provided help to emotionally troubled painter Vincent Van Gogh.  Mustafa Eck’s documentary short “Van Gogh And The Hospital Garden” recounts both the story of that century-old inspiration and its modern day legacy.

Can a century-old wedding dress atelier metamorphose into an all-woman cultural hub?  Marta Gomez and Paula Iglesias’ documentary “Call Me Sinsorga” follows the efforts of an all-woman team led by Irantzu Varela and Andrea Momoitio to transform that atelier into the all-woman space La Sinsorga.  However, completing this building makeover means challenging the male-dominated construction industry.

Another challenge to male domination gets recorded in Grace T.S.P.’s documentary short “The Bride Of Mont Blanc.”  Modern-day adventurer Elise Wortley decides to recreate Henriette d’Angeville’s 1838 climb of Mont Blanc.  d’Angeville was the first woman to perform this feat, yet her accomplishment has been forgotten.  Wortley’s recreation involves using only the gear available to the 1838 climber.  This film, incidentally, was made by an all-woman crew.

Catherine Joy White’s documentary short “Swim Sistas” pays tribute to the sisterhood and strength of generations of Black women and is also a love letter to water.  Actress Naomie Harris’ voiceover connects such individuals as Great Britain’s first and only Black female Olympic swimmer and a woman learning to swim at age 54.

A far different tale of renewal and connection can be found in Dana Nachman’s verite documentary short “The Second Life Of Freddie Nole.”  The film follows grandfatherly John “Freddie” Nole and his friend Chilly over the course of a day as they give a newly released ex-convict not only a ride from the prison but also a chance at redemption.  Who Nole is, why he does this, and the long-term impact of Nole’s acts of kindness, viewers will learn for themselves.

The Silent Film Classic for this year is the 1925 version of “Ben-Hur.”  This epic tale follows the adventures of Jewish prince and merchant Judah Ben-Hur.   A betrayal by a former friend causes Ben-Hur to be sent to the Roman galleys while his family gets imprisoned.  Ben-Hur burns with the desire for revenge against his treacherous Roman ex-friend.  But could some new prophet who preaches love and forgiveness change Ben-Hur’s life?

Putting on a Passion play to save a small village’s local parish is a good-hearted but familiar situation.  What takes the Passion play at the heart of Alison Kuhn’s “Holy Meat” into decidedly uncharted territory are the type of play that gets produced and the people involved in the production.  Play director Roberto is fleeing cancellation in Berlin.  Young butcher Mia’s suddenly stuck with guardianship of her sister.  And why has Father Oskar Iversen abandoned his parish at this crucial time?

On the other hand, religious faith becomes a source of terror in Stuart Valberg’s horror short “And They Shall Handle Serpents.”  Bradley is a suburban food delivery driver who’s invisible to the rest of the world as he completes his gigs.  In his downtime, he listens to sermons that promise purpose and belonging in a world that doesn’t seem to make sense.  What does Bradley mean when he smiles and wants his deliveries to bring the recipients “closer to the Father?"

Are the unreliable memories of the lead character in Jennifer E. Montgomery’s “This Tempting Madness” a symptom of insanity?  Mia has just awakened from a coma.  She knows the man she loves has left her for reasons unknown.  But there are holes in her past and oddly misaligned pieces in her personal story.  Just how much of what she remembers is true and how much is a comforting invention?  And can she face the truth?

A timely sort of madness gets a nice grilling in “Good Luck To You All,” the new animated short from Cordell Barker (“The Cat Came Back”).  The short looks at the dubious nature of humanity’s relationship to AI.  Could a little girl innocently playing with shiny new toys be a metaphor for the wisdom of humans handing power (and connection) over their lives to machines?  

Different problems with technology occur when sex work meets a gig economy app.  In Jason Avezzano’s episodic pilot “Daddies Boi,” making its Bay Area theatrical debut fresh off its Slamdance premiere, the titular app promises quick cash and new opportunities for sex work.  Trying out the app are a pair of aging queer best friends needing new cash infusions like yesterday.  But using the app can’t conceal the truth that Los Angeles’ queer nightlife scene exalts youth.

An artistic queer experience is the subject of Tina Mascara and Guido Santio’s documentary “Face To Face: Don Bachardy.”  The film takes viewers inside the life of famed portrait artist Don Bachardy.  A fascination with Hollywood and its stars provided the flame for Bachardy’s passion.  But it was the encouragement from Bachardy’s late lover writer Christopher Isherwood that would set him on his portraiture career.  Key to Bachardy’s work are his willingness to work face to face for hours at a time and his avoidance of idealizing his subjects.

The two troubled individuals at the center of Fia Perera’s drama “Mermaid ” lack guidance in dealing with life's messier realities..  One is 10-year-old Cassie Daniels, who feels she was born in the wrong body even if family and schoolmates deny that.  The other is barely surviving drag queen Pepper.  When the two meet one late night by the lake, it’s the start of a relationship that could help both of them to thrive.

Elderly Nora Neily figures her life is toast now that she’s stuck in Shady Rest Retirement Home.  Encountering former acquaintance Edna Buchanan at the home shows Nora her assessment might be premature.  Edna recruits Nora to help engage in such antics as angling for bathing assistance from the hunky male nurse and livening a boring game with a bit of betting.  Everybody else at Shady Rest may think Edna’s just a troublemaker.  But as Julia Neill and Jacob Smith’s dramedy shows, Edna’s giving Nora lessons in “Dancing On The Elephant.”

Unlike Nora and Edna, Samgyi and his young friends may be beginning their lives relatively speaking.  But they’re caught between tradition and modernity.  In Kangdrun’s drama “Linka Linka,” viewers travel to contemporary Lhasa, a Tibetan city in the process of change.  There, the young characters are followed over three life-changing summers.

A very long summer awaits the Westernized sisters Alia and Simi in Eisha Marjara’s drama “Calorie.”  The two sisters (one a calorie counter, the other rebellious) are spending the whole summer alone with their Indian relatives.  The withering heat is bad enough, but add into the mix very inquisitive aunties and traditions stiffer than a starched collar and the girls’ adventure in a foreign land winds up being anything but fun.  What happens, though, after Alia and Simi accidentally uncover a long buried family secret?      

Henry Griffin’s comedy “Brenda” centers on the family of glass artist Dennis, piano tuner Valerie, and their five-year-old son (and aspiring sleuth) Roscoe.  When the child hears his parents talking about “Brenda,” he becomes curious about this mysterious friend who’s a big part of Mom and Dad’s lives.  However, Brenda isn’t a person but Dennis and Valerie’s codeword for the marijuana they deal on the side to make ends meet.  But deciding to get Brenda out of their lives isn’t as easy as the adults hope, especially as Dennis hasn’t yet sold his newly acquired five-pound brick of pot for quick cash.

One of the Cinequest Closing Night Films is comedian John Early’s directorial debut “Maddie’s Secret.”  When dishwasher Maddie Ralph (Early) becomes the new face of food content production company Gourmaybe, it seems her skills as a talented chef will finally be recognized by others.  But her picture perfect life starts unraveling under a combination of job stress and lingering psychological trauma from her mother.  The result: her never-fully-banished eating disorders start surfacing again. 

The other Closing Night Film is Steven Soderbergh’s “The Christophers.”  Lori (Michaela Coel, “I May Destroy You”) is a gifted but sidelined artist who agrees to take part in an art con.  Legendary painter Julian Sklar (Ian McKellen) has a large number of uncompleted canvases.  Lori’s job is to complete those paintings so they can be passed off as original Sklars and sold before the artist dies.  But the con soon runs into a number of human problems…

Incidentally, many of the Cinequest films will be available for streaming via the Cinejoy festival, which runs from March 24 to 31, 2026.  As a heads up, the Marquee films such as “Her Song” and “Maddie’s Secret” will not be available. .