Edinburgh International Film Festival reveals full programme for 2026
Special guests at the festival will include Kenneth Branagh, Ewan McGregor, Christine Vachon and Bruce Dern
The Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF) has announced the full programme for its 2026 edition, which features 38 new feature film presentations and 21 feature film world premieres, including ten world premieres competing for The Sean Connery Prize For Feature Filmmaking Excellence.
In a press conference for the festival, CEO and festival director Paul Ridd stated that this year’s edition of EIFF contains more UK-produced work than ever before, and championed the festival's continual platforming of indie cinema, which he called ‘a reflection of our collective experience.’
This third edition since EIFF’s revival will be bookended by opening film The Incomer, a small island dramedy featuring Domnhall Gleeson; and closing film Bel, a documentary profiling the Scottish musician Beldina Odenyo. Joining them are retrospectives, new films, shorts, discussions, industry talks and specials events.
The EIFF’s Outstanding Contribution To Cinema Award will be given to Kenneth Branagh for his varied life in acting and directing. He will also participate in a wide-ranging discussion of his career to date, and host a screening of his classic Shakespeare adaptation of Hamlet. Other notable guests attending the festival include Bruce Dern, Christine Vachon, Ken Burns and (separate to the Trainspotting screening) Ewan McGregor.
In competition, the Sean Connery Prize For Feature Filmmaking Excellence will feature a vast array of international films competing for £50,000 to support their future projects. A few standout entries include Capsized, a debut feature from Lindsay Ryan featuring Rhys Ifans as a hapless holidaymaker on a houseboat; Pretty Babies, a debut from Tyler-Marie Evans about two young women who find themselves increasingly stuck in the seedy underbelly of Hollywood; Out There, which stars Michael Sheen as part of a gang of Welsh UFO hunters; Snapshot, an interesting twist on a found footage thriller about an all-ladies ghost-hunting society in the late 19th century; and Skintown, about two young men dreaming of escaping 1990s small-town Ireland.
The programme’s out-of-competition screenings include a mix of established names and newcomers, including Abdolreza Kahani’s Empty Heaven, which will pick up where he left off with his EIFF Award-winning Mortician last year; Her Private Hell, a subversion of the slasher genre from Nicolas Winding Refn which promises more of his trademark neon bleakness; I Want Your Sex, a provocative Gregg Araki drama starring Olivia Wilde, Daveed Diggs and Charli xcx; and Mi Amor, an atmospheric thriller from Guillaume Nicloux.
Meanwhile, the Midnight Madness strand will return with the world premiere of Chee Keong Cheung’s POV thriller Bad Day At The Office and the UK premiere of Daniel Goldhaber’s wildly inventive new take on Faces Of Death, as well as screenings of Rise Of The Footsoldier: Retribution, the UK premiere of Caleb Phillips’s mind-bending thriller Imposters, and more.
Retrospective screenings include a showing of Trainspotting at Leith Theatre featuring live cast and crew commentary followed by a club night with DJs Irvine Welsh and Darren Emerson paying homage to the iconic soundtrack. Other retrospective screenings include Little Miss Sunshine, Sexy Beast, A Personal Journey With Martin Scorsese Through American Movies, Visitor Q, The Rock and Hal Ashby's perennially underrated Coming Home.
These tentpole strands will be joined by the The Thelma Schoonmaker Prize For Short Filmmaking Excellence Competition, which presents world premieres of new exciting work from across the world including Scotland, Lithuania, Iran and France all competing for a £15,000 cash prize; the NFTS Sean Connery Talent Lab, which platforms emerging filmmakers from across Scotland; a series of short film festival strands in the fields of live action, animation and experimental; and a special live recording of the 90 Minutes Or Less Film Fest Podcast at Monkey Barrel Comedy.
Ridd said: ‘Heading into the third edition of our revamped, reimagined and reinvigorated Edinburgh International Film Festival feels like hitting a stride we have been working towards since the start of 2024. With stellar competitions, fantastically varied and essential new films from Scotland, from the wider UK and from the rest of the world, and more world premieres than we have ever screened before, this year’s line-up offers a panoramic vision of cinema at its most exciting, dynamic and full of potential. Edinburgh is quite simply the only place to be in August. Bring it on.’
For a fuller rundown of the EIFF programme, check out Friday's edition of the Road To Edinburgh Festival, which will be an EIFF special.
Edinburgh International Film Festival, various venues, Edinburgh, Thursday 13–Wednesday 19 August.