Titles from both newcomers and experienced directors feature in this year’s Giornate degli Autori — and, unlike Venice Film Festival’s own main Competition, the independent sidebar includes multiple titles directed by women.
This year’s programme is dedicated to Giorgio Gosetti, the founder of Giornate (previously Venice Days) who died in the spring. There are 10 features in competition, of which five are directed or co-directed by women.
Opening film My Notes On Mars (sold by Paradise City Sales) is the first English-language film from Hungarian director Lili Horvat. It stars Mackenzie Davis and Rupert Friend in an eerie drama about a scientist who vanishes on a hiking trip with her husband turning up a few weeks later unable to remember anything except her research about Mars.
Marseille-based filmmaker Robert Guédiguian screens his latest feature A Woman Today (Playtime), produced by Agat Films — Ex Nihilo. Marilou Aussilloux stars as a successful woman whose world is knocked off its axis when she is subjected to a brutal assault.
Argentinian director Maria Aparicio premieres her Madrid-set drama Sometimes Sadness, Sometimes Rebellion (Paper Moon), which takes a quirky look at labour rights.
Sydney-based Polish director Kuba Dorabialski has Mia Wasikowska starring in his new Screen Australia-backed feature Agata The Writer, about a young author travelling from Sydney to Sarajevo to write a war novel.
From Italy, Nicola Sorcinelli brings his debut feature Balcanica (m-appeal), which follows an orchestra conductor and his son fleeing Afghanistan, where music is banned. Matilda De Angelis co-stars as an Italian doctor they meet on the journey. In his film Camouflage, also a debut, Ukraine-raised, Germany-based Mykyta Gibalenko explores a young man’s attempts to make sense of his Ukrainian roots after Russia’s invasion in 2022.
Music features prominently in Damilola Orimogunje’s second film Dear Ajayi (Luminalia), the first Nigerian movie chosen for the Giornate. The 1990s-set drama is about two estranged sisters looking after their ailing mother.
Gender relations feature in Berlin-set I Plant My Hand In The Garden (Square Eyes), jointly directed by Boris Hadzija and Hoda Taheri, about a pregnant Iranian refugee in love with a gay man from Serbia.
Les Indes (MoreThanFilms), from filmmakers/artists Pauline Julier and Nicolas Chapoulier, is a period drama about the journey across a war‑ravaged Europe to deliver a portrait of the Infanta of Spain to the French court of Louis XIV.
Mexican actress/filmmaker Nathalia Acevedo, whose credits include Post Tenebras Lux, presents her feature directorial debut Sálon De Belleza (The Pool Films), adapted from Mario Bellatin’s acclaimed novel about a beauty salon where people come to die.
Giornate’s out-of-competition closing film is Léa Domenach’s 15th century-set gender-bending drama A Man’s Skin (Playtime), about a princess being forced to marry a coarse army commander who is given the chance to disguise herself in a man’s skin and secretly learn more about her future husband. Claire Pommet and Catherine Deneuve star.
Alongside the competition are five special events, including Francesca Archibugi’s Carla Lonzi, A Feminist Story, a documentary about the Italian art critic and feminist, and The Massacre, a confessional documentary by Cosimo Messeri (a former assistant director to Nanni Moretti) in which he interviews women he met on dating apps. Mona Fastvold’s short Discipline will also screen as part of Miu Miu Women’s Tales 2026.
Words by: Ben Dalton, Tim Dams, Elaine Guerini, Jeremy Kay, Rebecca Leffler, Geoffrey Macnab, Lee Marshall, Thea Middleton, David Opie, Michael Rosser, Matt Schley, Mona Tabbara, Silvia Wong
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