SBIFF

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival put out the following list of notable events for Saturday, February 17th, 2024. Read More

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival put out the following list of notable events for Friday, February 16th, 2024. Read More

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival opened tonight with the US premiere of Henry-Alex Rubin's "Disconnect". A sold out Arlington Theatre played host to the film and red carpet event Read More

2015 Santa Barbara International Film Festival Award Winner for Best Animation Short Film! Sinking under the weight of his own memories, a man confronts the questions: Is our past more important than life? What would we give up in order to keep on going? Read More

The freedom to speak out, to express one’s individual ideas, and to be accepted for being different resonates at the heart of “HUGH HEFNER'S AFTER DARK: SPEAKING OUT IN AMERICA.” This documentary features the most cutting-edge personalities and the best and most captivating performances from Hugh Hefner’s landmark TV Series, “Playboy’s Penthouse” and “Playboy After Dark”. Read More

When Alessandro wears his shiny, lucky shirt, he feels stunning. He doesn’t feel his fifty years. After singing for an ungrateful audience, almost every Saturday night, he starts his day at Blu Star Disco. When his mother refuses to lend him some money to impress two young girls, Alessandro loses his mind.... Read More

An actress plans to commit suicide to finally make something of her life and meets a funeral parlor employee who proposes to help her… for better or for worse. Read More

More free films, Q&As and events including the always popular Virtuosos Awards as the SBIFF continues! Read More

Sometimes the most beautiful forms of life can thrive in the most unfavorable conditions. Born in the backwoods of Kampala, Uganda, Brolin Mawejje was expected to be nothing more than a shopkeeper like his father. At the age of two, his mother left the family and reappeared nine years later, arranging Brolin’s emigration to the United States to join her in Boston’s suburbia. Read More

2015 Santa Barbara International Film Festival winner of the Documentary Short Films Award! Rhythm & Hues Studios, the L.A.-based visual effects company, won an Academy Award for its work on LIFE OF PI just two weeks after declaring bankruptcy. Read More

In this hilarious romantic comedy, Max is a young man involved in a relationship he’s unable to end. After using up all possible resources to break up with his girlfriend, he decides to hire an agency that specializes in ending relationships. Read More

Inspired by the 1987 true story, MCFARLAND, USA follows high school coach Jim White (Kevin Costner), whose job-hopping leads him to predominantly Latino McFarland High School, located in an agricultural community in California’s farm-rich San Joaquin Valley. Read More

SBIFF 2015 Santa Barbara Features Award Winner - Celebrated actor Hal Holbrook has carved out a prolific career in film, television and theater, but one role, which he has played since 1954, has become indelibly associated with him: Mark Twain. Read More

SBIFF 2015 Audience Choice Award Winner - Who said your grandmother couldn’t be a hip-hop star? These senior citizens may each be almost a century young, but for Kara, (94) Maynie, (95) and Terri, (93) the journey to Las Vegas and the World Hip Hop Dance Championship is just the beginning of a life’s journey. Read More

The Fund for Santa Barbara Social Justice Award Winner - A diverse group of South African actors tours the war-torn regions of Northern Ireland, Rwanda, and the former Yugoslavia to share their country’s experiment with reconciliation. Read More

2015 SBIFF Best Documentary Film Award winner CHILDREN OF THE ARCTIC is a portrait of five Native Alaskan teenagers growing up in the northernmost community in the United States. As their climate and way of life undergo profound changes, they strive to be both modern American kids and the inheritors of an endangered whaling culture. Read More

2015 Santa Barbara International Film Festival Best International Film Award Winner! Paul is a detective in his forties. Dorothy, almost 16, is going through a serious identity crisis. Paul lives on the fringe of Brussels’ self-righteous society, while Dorothy has grown up in the heart of this wealthy milieu. What connects them? Read More

Why did a successful Dallas businesswoman leave her charmed life to bake pie in a remote, dusty town in New Mexico? For Kathy Knapp, pie equals love. Read More

Nova Scotia-based filmmaker Andrea Dorfman (PARSLEY DAYS, LOVE THAT BOY) returns with HEARTBEAT, a tender and charmingly offbeat portrait of a musician’s bumpy road to self-discovery set against the backdrop of Halifax’s lively arts scene... Read More

One of the most brazenly original cinematic voices to emerge from Canada in the last decade, Jeffrey St. Jules is known for his unusual, highly stylized short films, which are stacked with wry humour and cheeky experimentation with form... Read More

Questioning the role of technology in our private and public lives,THE NAKED SCREEN is a relevant portrait of modern day intimacy. When Alex videotapes his girlfriend, Esperanza, as they are making love, an undeniable sense of unease pervades the scene.... Read More

There have been Estonian settlements on the Caucasian Black Sea coast for over a hundred years. The 1992 outbreak of the bloody conflicts between Georgia and the Russia-supported republic of Abkhazia forced the majority of Estonians to return to the country of their forefathers. Read More

1993, after the Siege of Dubrovnik. Fourteen-year-old Linda has moved back to Croatia from Switzerland with her father. Her new best friend Eta takes her up to the forbidden forest above the city... Read More

In January 2013, filmmaker Laura Poitras was in the process of constructing a film about abuses of national security in post-9/11 America when she started receiving encrypted e-mails from someone identifying himself as “citizen four,” who was ready to blow the whistle on the massive covert surveillance programs run by the NSA... Read More

In A BETTER YOU, Dr. Ron Knight is a hypnotherapist in Los Angeles with a self-published book, cheesy late-night TV commercials, and his face on bus bench ads... Read More

Canadian master David Cronenberg strips Hollywood bare in this wicked satire of the movie business. Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore, awarded Best Actress at Cannes Film Festival for this role) is a desperate middle-aged actress scheming... Read More

Directly inspired by HEARTWORN HIGHWAYS (1976), this documentary captures a new community of folk singer-songwriters whose work is heavily influenced by the artists represented in the original film.a Read More

2014 marked the 40th anniversary of the release of Kansas, the band’s debut album. To commemorate the occasion, the classic Kansas lineup reunited for the first time in more than 30 years at the place their incredible journey began: Topeka, Kansas... Read More

After graduating from law school, Cenk Uygur decided to create his own talk show on public access TV and became instantly hooked on political commentary. In an unlikely version of the American Dream... Read More

'Tiger Tiger' follows one man's personal battle to save tigers from extinction. The documentary had its world premiere January 30th at SBIFF. Read More