30TH PHILADELPHIA FILM FESTIVAL PROGRAM

In this ingenious one-shot dramedy, the past and present collide unexpectedly when a dysfunctional theater troupe in Tehran scrambles to rehearse MACBETH, sans director.

Oklahoman auteur Mickey Reece defies genre expectations with this audacious and idiosyncratic film about the exorcism of a young nun and what is left behind for her best friend.

Lights! Camera! Xenomorph! A loveable ragtag group of bus drivers from Dorset, England attempts an amateur stage adaptation of sci-fi classic Alien, chestburster and all.

Over several years, Temple grad assistant Wang Qiong focuses the camera on her family, exploring the deep-seated pain and lingering effects of China’s devastating one-child policy.

In this charged drama of identity and belonging, a Palestinian girl’s world is turned upside down when she learns the man she grew up idolizing is not her real father.

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Winner of the top prize at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, director Radu Jude’s latest is a raunchy, ingenious comedy about the fallout after a schoolteacher’s sex tape goes viral.

While documenting a controversial tragedy that shook her community, a filmmaker must put her morals to the test when a perverse secret in her own life is revealed.

This searing Iranian drama follows a widowed mother whose husband was wrongfully executed and the stranger who enters her life bearing an unexpected connection to her past.

This intimate look at one of the towering figures of 20th-Century music highlights the storied career, vigorous activism, and tumultuous private life of Leonard Bernstein.

A downtrodden cafe owner’s life is thrown into hilarious chaos for one night after he discovers a bizarre time loop that allows him to see two minutes into the future.

Pulitzer Prize-winning satirical cartoonist Bill Mauldin is the subject of this new insightful documentary from acclaimed local filmmakers Don Argott and Sheena M. Joyce.

Two young and carefree aspiring actresses chase their theater dreams in the streets of Paris until sudden hardship threatens their plans and tests their sisterhood.

Set over the course of a tense day at an isolated boarding school, this moral drama follows a boy’s desperate fight to save his sick friend in the face of a rigid bureaucracy.

An Italian teenager’s discovery of the true nature of her father’s work leads to a riveting descent into the crime world of Calabria that threatens to tear her family apart.

A Costa Rican woman believed to possess mystical healing powers begins to resist the strictures of her repressive family and community in this atmospheric drama.

The meteoric rise and dramatic fall of “Father of Claymation” Will Vinton is the subject of this fascinating portrait of one of cinema’s unheralded innovators.

The beloved children’s book character comes to the big screen in this big-hearted story of a young girl whose life changes forever when she’s gifted a 10-foot red dog.

German director Anne Zohra Berrached’s scorching romantic drama follows the passionate but turbulent relationship between two young people at the close of the 20th Century.

A family’s peaceful life is disrupted when a landfill is placed next to their mountain home, polluting their land and throwing their idyllic refuge into chaos.

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CLICK HERE to return to the complete 30th Philadelphia Film Festival schedule.

Embarking on a new play, a downtrodden theater actor-director bonds over past tragedies with his rebellious driver in this emotionally stirring, sensual Cannes award winner.

Romance and heartbreak are sown across this achingly beautiful drama, about a migrant worker whose search for his lost love brings him into collision with a farming family.

Breaking up is difficult enough, but for Leah and Nick it’s made infinitely more complicated when the end of their relationship coincides with the COVID-19 lockdown in this hilarious anti-romantic comedy.

All sales are final. Admission is not guaranteed after scheduled start time.

CLICK HERE to return to the complete 30th Philadelphia Film Festival schedule.

Progressive political commentator Van Jones weathers criticism from both sides of the aisle as he pushes for a bipartisan prison reform bill during a moment of intense polarization.

Matthew Heineman’s timely documentary follows a group of New York nurses, doctors, and patients on the frontlines as they navigate the unfolding COVID-19 health crisis.

In this brilliant animated feature, a man recounts his enthralling story of survival as an Afghan refugee, revealing an extraordinary secret that he’s kept for over 20 years.

A stargazing teenager puts his cosmic dreams and engineering skills to work when he and his friends band together to save their beloved housing project from demolition.

Franz Rogowski (UNDINE, PFF29) stars in this tough yet tender drama about a German man repeatedly jailed over three decades due to the country’s anti-homosexuality laws.

Winner of the Golden Lion at this year’s Venice Film Festival, Audrey Diwan’s searing drama details a young woman’s efforts to get an illegal abortion in 1960s France.

A simple visit to the hair salon unexpectedly embroils two women in a perilous struggle for survival in this gripping thriller from Palestinian auteur Hany Abu-Assad.

Over the course of a bright Norwegian summer, the seemingly innocuous play between children takes on dangerous dimensions in this disturbing supernatural thriller.

RBG directors Julie Cohen and Betsy West bring to life renowned chef, cookbook author, and television personality Julia Child in this delectable documentary portrait.

The music of Verdi inspires a young boy living in the tenements of a French seaside town to question if life might have more to offer than just the daily struggle to get by.

THE BAND’S VISIT director Eran Kolirin returns with this gently satirical tale of a man and his family trapped by military blockade inside a tiny Arab village in Israel.

In a propulsive and surprisingly insightful documentary, Filmmaker Penny Lane takes a look at one of the most successful yet widely mocked musicians in recent memory: easy-listening saxophonist Kenny G.

All sales are final. Admission is not guaranteed after scheduled start time.

CLICK HERE to return to the complete 30th Philadelphia Film Festival schedule.

A traditional Maltese fisherman faces the end of the line as modern rigs threaten his ancestral vocation and finds himself risking everything to support his desperate family.

Virginie Efira shines as a married woman juggling a husband and sons in France with a lover and daughter in Switzerland. When her lies begin to unravel, her life threatens to fall to pieces in this searing character study.

Pete Buttigieg’s seemingly out-of-nowhere rise from obscurity to the forefront of American politics is tracked in this riveting behind-the-scenes campaign documentary from the makers of BOYS STATE.

The bond between an unorthodox teacher and his multicultural class of students is explored in this absorbing and inspiring documentary from German filmmaker Maria Speth.

Aspiring cartoonist Rakel has her carefree life turned upside down when she finds out that she is not only pregnant, but also seven months along.

An award-winning standout of this year’s Tribeca Film Festival, this blistering drama follows a young woman who will stop at nothing to ascend the ranks of her college’s rowing team.

An eerily deserted vacation town provides the memorable setting for this classically crafted supernatural thriller from horror maestro Mickey Keating.

With a star-gazing synth score and dreamy black and white cinematography, Jacques Audiard’s latest explores the interwoven lives of several millennials searching for sex, love, and purpose.

A Jewish prisoner survives a WWII Nazi internment camp by pretending to be Persian, but his lie begins to unravel when an officer demands to be taught the Persian language.

This engrossing, award-winning and globally relevant documentary follows activist Nelson Chamisa as he runs for President of Zimbabwe, campaigning against a corrupt regime that has held power for over 30 years.

Robert Greene’s latest self-reflexive documentary is a therapeutic collaboration with six adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse by Catholic priests.

Lynne Ramsay crafted one of cinema’s most indelible depictions of childhood with this heartbreaking story of one boy’s troubled youth in 1970s Glasgow.

This gloriously unhinged gorefest follows a young couple trying to reunite amid a city ravaged by a plague that turns its victims into deranged, bloodthirsty sadists.

Mercenaries transporting a fugitive and stolen bounty become stranded after their plane is grounded in a remote and mystical region of Senegal, home to dark ancestral forces.

New Yorkers from different walks of life describe the myriad complications of finding meaningful connection online in this perceptive, charming exploration of 21st-Century dating.

In this whimsical debut, a Swiss expatriate strikes up a storybook romance in 1950s Lebanon only to witness the country’s civil war, challenging her new family and spirit.

A follow-up to her 2019 breakthrough, Joanna Hogg’s latest semi-autobiographical drama captures a young woman channeling grief into creative expression.

Joanna Hogg’s masterful drama is the story of a young film student whose world is rocked by a tumultuous relationship with a charismatic but troubled older man.

A charming portrait of Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Art Cullen and his family as they fight for the survival of their politically influential small-town newspaper, The Storm Lake Times.

The unbelievable true story of 1983’s THE DAY AFTER, a rogue director’s “what if” post-nuclear war television film that shocked a nation and, maybe, helped bring an end to the Cold War.

This insightful documentary follows five students at an ultra-competitive high school, where the already stressful college applications process takes on frenzied dimensions.

Winner of Un Certain Regard at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival, Kira Kovalenko’s sophomore film details a young woman desperate to escape her controlling father and dull hometown.

With a clear-eyed view of how the past informs the present, former ACLU attorney Jeffrey Robinson takes us on a revelatory tour of 400 years of anti-Black racism in America.

A young writer struggles to balance his career ambitions, his increasingly demanding personal life, and his dwindling finances in this lowkey charmer from France.

In her last year of secondary school, a bright Indonesian student is determined to pursue her education and resist getting married, despite the expectations of her community.

After being called to an isolated village reportedly terrorized by a demon, a military officer must measure his skepticism against the paranoia of the superstitious townspeople.

The life of a flight attendant promises exotic adventures around the world, but for one lost woman it offers an escape from her past in this intimate character study.