Cambridge Film Festival - from Sunday on
Life begins at 45! Cambridge Film Festival's 45th birthday programme offers more than enough to keep even the most dedicated cinema-goer occupied. One of the pleasures of a film festival is discovering films you would almost certainly never have encountered otherwise. The difficulty, of course, is choosing
Here are some of the films that particularly catch my eye from Sunday 25 October onwards. I would begin close to home with Cambridge Connections (Sunday 25th), a collection of short films made by filmmakers with local connections. The nine offerings include Searching for Goshawks, Love in Three Acts and the intriguing Every Time I See a Yellow Car. Film festivals are important showcases for emerging talent, and here is an opportunity to discover what our own region has to offer.
For something altogether different, there is The Beauty of the Donkey (Sunday 25th and Wednesday 28th). Director Dea Gjinovci accompanies her father Asslan on a return to Kosova after six decades in exile. A daughter's exploration of her father's memories promises a moving meditation on displacement, family and the elusive meaning of home.
Sunday also offers a welcome return to Céline Sciamma's Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), the exquisite French period drama about love, art and the act of looking. Set on the Brittany coast in the eighteenth century, it is a film of extraordinary visual beauty and emotional restraint. One well worth revisiting on the big screen.
I am also tempted by Plácido (Sunday 25th), Luis García Berlanga's savage 1961 Spanish comedy. Respectable citizens organise a charitable Christmas campaign while a poor delivery driver struggles to prevent the repossession of his three-wheeled vehicle. Charity, it seems, is easier to advertise than to practise. The film was made during Franco's dictatorship, adding another dimension to its attack on hypocrisy.
From Spain to the Philippines, Filipiñana (Monday 26th and Wednesday 28th) takes us inside an exclusive country club where a teenage girl works as a golfing assistant. Beneath the perfectly manicured lawns lurks a less attractive world of privilege and exploitation. Rafael Manuel's debut feature sounds an intriguing mixture of social satire and mystery.
One film that particularly catches my eye is Artists in Residence (Thursday 29 October, 1.55pm), a documentary about three remarkable New York women artists, all now in their nineties. Here are lives devoted to creativity, with all the friendships, struggles and sheer persistence that entails. What interests me is not simply the longevity of these women, but the fact that they have continued making art across decades of extraordinary social and cultural change. At an age when society might expect them to have put away their brushes, they are still finding new things to say. Age should be no barrier – but believe this reviewer: it so often is.
For film historians there is a special treat on Tuesday 27th: The Lodger, Alfred Hitchcock's early silent thriller, starring Ivor Novello as a mysterious lodger suspected of being a serial killer. Released in 1927, it already displays many of the obsessions that would make Hitchcock famous. Film historian Henry K. Miller introduces the screening.
Among the documentaries, My Father and Qaddafi (Thursday 29th and Sunday 1 November) follows a daughter's investigation into the disappearance of her father, a Libyan opposition figure. Through family memories and state archives, personal grief becomes an exploration of political power and its consequences.
Finally, The Peace Particle (Sunday 1 November) takes us inside CERN, where international scientific cooperation faces the difficult realities of war and political division. Can science remain above politics? A timely question for Cambridge audiences.
That, of course, is only a small selection. The real joy of a film festival is taking a chance on an unfamiliar title and emerging into the Cambridge daylight having discovered something extraordinary. Now, where did I put the programme?
Cambridge Film Festival – Programme and Booking
The 45th Cambridge Film Festival runs from Thursday 22 October to Sunday 1 November 2026, with screenings principally at the Arts Picturehouse, 38–39 St Andrew's Street, Cambridge. The full programme, including screening times, film descriptions and a downloadable festival brochure, is available at www.cambridgefilmfestival.org.uk. Tickets can be booked online by selecting a film from the programme and following the link to the Arts Picturehouse booking page. Advance booking is recommended, particularly for popular screenings and special events.
Filipiñana