IndieLisboa 2026 — IndieLisboa

29 APRIL — 09 MAY 2027

INDIELISBOA 2026

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IndieLisboa 2026

Backstreet Birds

That time of day has arrived: time to stretch one’s legs and switch on the television. A penguin wants nothing more than to watch his favourite show in the comfort of his armchair. But a pigeon, newly moved into the building, is determined to throw the best party in the neighbourhood.

Gertrūda Nemčauskaitė

2025, 7'

IndieLisboa 2026

Baião d’intérieurs

From the window, a bird observes the world outside. Soon, what it sees seems overtaken by what it imagines, a clear reminder that the gaze is almost always defeated by reverie. A film about the possibilities of music, through the flute of Amina Mezaache and the longing for freedom.

Héloïse Dorsan-Rachet

2025, 4'

Mouth of Madness

IndieLisboa 2026

Balearic

Luxury swimming pools and overheated teenagers trespassing have always gone hand in hand. This time, however, “beware of the dog” hardly suffices: cornered by the water, the youths come face to face with three fearsome beasts. Next door, tradition holds steady — a group of friends from another generation welcomes the arrival of summer. Yet despite the screams and desperate cries for help, no one seems to hear. On the eve of St. John’s Day, everything is bound to turn bizarre.

2025, 74'

IndieLisboa 2026

Banjo Girl

With a banjo tucked under her arm, a young woman walks through a long train in search of self-understanding. In each carriage, an encounter; with every meeting, new realizations.

2024, 6'

Cinema at the Pool

IndieLisboa 2026

Barbarella

The cosmos needs Barbarella. Always in revealing outfits, the futuristic heroine sets out on a mission to defeat a villain. But much happens before she gets there. A science-fiction classic by Roger Vadim, the film stands as an important milestone in the careers of both Jane Fonda and the director himself. It’s time to watch it — or revisit it — with your feet in the water.

1968, 98'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Barrio Triste

Strange lights are said to be falling from the sky. When a reporter arrives in a neighbourhood on the outskirts of Medellín, four marginalized youths who live there steal his camera and begin documenting their lives of violence and solitude — perhaps because, all too often, despair finds its outlet in delinquency. The debut feature by STILLZ, best known for directing music videos for artists such as Bad Bunny, with a soundtrack by Arca.

Colombia / United States

2025, 89'

IndieLisboa 2026

Bats & Bugs

Whenever a light flickers on in the darkness, insects lose their heads. On a back road by the edge of a forest, the ritual remains unchanged — and a family of vampires dwelling in a nearby cave begins to scheme over the different fates awaiting those creatures.

Lena von Döhren

2026, 11'

Mockumentary Retrospective

IndieLisboa 2026

Best in Show

The Mayflower Dog Show is unquestionably one of the most important events in America. A film crew follows the backstage preparations of each champion dog and their eccentric owners. The tricks, the rivalries, the superstitions. As in any respectable dog show, the strangest creatures walk on two legs.

Christopher Guest

2000, 90'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Blue Heron

A Hungarian family of six relocates to Vancouver Island. Jeremy, the eldest brother, is distant and withdrawn, his gaze erratic. Through the eyes of Sasha — the younger sister and a secondary character — Sophy Romvari brings us face to face with the aftershocks of this intimate earthquake. Blue Heron, her feature debut, intertwines the sounds of childhood and the slow aging of memories with the utopia of understanding imposed by adulthood.

Canada / Hungary

2025, 90'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Bouchra

How far is it from New York to Casablanca? Bouchra, a 35-year-old Moroccan queer coyote and professional filmmaker, spends hours on the phone with her mother. Between them lies far more than an Atlantic Ocean — there are silences, traumas, and deeply buried repressions. The feature-length debut by Orian Barki and Meriem Bennani employs 3D animation as a vehicle for an intimate essay on affection.

Meriem Bennani, Orian Barki

Italy / Morocco / United States

2025, 83'

IndieLisboa 2026

Bubbling Baby

It was one night at Club Voltage, in The Hague, Netherlands, that DJ Moortje — born on the island of Curaçao — invented bubbling, after accidentally setting a dancehall LP spinning at the wrong speed. In that instant, the soundtrack — and perhaps even a way of being — of the Caribbean diaspora so present in that Central European country was born. Sharine Rijsenburg’s film traces the genre’s origins while exploring its vibrant contemporary scene, so powerfully shaped by feminist energy.

Sharine Rijsenburg

2025, 19'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Buckskin

There are lives whose stories demand to be known. Carroll B. Williams Jr. was a pioneering forestry engineer, academic researcher, and entomologist — the first African American to be hired by the U.S. Forest Service — whose legacy within the American forest landscape is immeasurable. Mars Verrone, their grandson and the film’s director, dedicates this portrait to him.

2025, 17'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Buda

The color, one might say, is that fluorescent green so typical of the jackets worn by municipal waste workers. Raphaël Kaddour’s debut film guides us through the daily life of Recypark Buda: more about the people, less about the trash.

Raphaël Kaddour

2025, 24'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Busy Bodies

After buying a tuna wrap during a rushed lunch break, Kate Renshaw-Lewis found herself wondering how that product had made its way into her hands. Inspired by the logic of a Rube Goldberg machine, Busy Bodies explores the absurdity of our global supply chain.

Kate Renshaw-Lewis

2025, 6'

IndieLisboa 2026

Butthole Surfers: The Hole Truth and Nothing Butt

Almost always performing in full nudity, setting guitars on fire and bringing weapons onstage was all in a day’s work for the Butthole Surfers, the legendary Texas band formed in the early 1980s after two accounting students, Gibby Haynes and Paul Leary, crossed paths. Their psychedelic rock, steeped in radicalism, chaos and unpredictability, left a lasting mark on a generation of musicians, from Nirvana to The Flaming Lips, as well as the early era of the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

2025, 106'

IndieLisboa 2026

By Design

Camille (Juliette Lewis) enters a home décor store and becomes obsessed with a chair. Soon after, she swaps bodies with it and quickly realizes that everyone around her prefers this version of herself. Amanda Kramer’s film, which premiered at Sundance and is narrated by Melanie Griffith, is a dramedy with a strong physical component, repeatedly showing its protagonist trapped in space, at the mercy of her surroundings. It is impossible not to read it as a satirical commentary on the objectification of women.

2025, 91'

Mouth of Madness

IndieLisboa 2026

Camp

The past haunts Emily, who carries the guilt of tragedies that struck early in her life. A youth camp, her father suggests, might offer a fresh start—looking after children and finding redemption in the midst of nature. She is warmly welcomed by a group of counsellors she quickly grows close to, but a voice from the bushes urges her to leave.

2025, 111'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Certas Formas

Loss often takes the slow silhouette of apathy. As if the gaze drifts away, as if walking were suffering and speaking a mountain to climb, Miguel and Laura drag themselves through pain in search of an embrace. Youth is an unspoken sentence.

Luiz Afonso Morêda

2026, 16'

IndieLisboa 2026

Chica

In a rural region of Brazil, a family raises and sells chickens to make a living. Their mother sends Dadá and Tato to deliver one from their coop to Seu Vicente’s restaurant, where the pot awaits as its final destination. Along the way, a special bond begins to form between Chica, the chicken, and Tato.

Matheus Malburg, João Victor Silva

2026, 14'

IndieLisboa 2026

Cloud Fish

A very tiny fish sails in a vast underwater city. Is he too small to see the world like the big ones do?

Belgium / France

2025, 6'

IndieLisboa 2026

Cloudy

Mr. Gnome is sunbathing in his garden when, out of nowhere, a little cloud comes around and hides the sun. He gets very angry but luckily he knows exactly what to do.

Kateřina Čupová, Filip Diviak

2018, 5'

National Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Cochena

A chant from another time reveals the ancient everyday gestures of a Gypsy family, anchored by the errant couple Maria and Arménio. In the flow of days and life cycles, we find resistance and celebration.

2026, 92'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Cold Metal

Óscar escapes from rehab, and Mário wakes up with images that don’t belong to him — no memories of his previous life. Thus are separated the two brothers living on the outskirts of Mexico City. The latter encounters Lázaro, who becomes his mystic mentor: in the underground, countless portals open to the supernatural. Clemente Castor’s work has long explored Mexican youth and their tormented bodies — Cold Metal continues along that path.

Clemente Castor

2025, 103'

International Competition

IndieLisboa 2026

Conference of the Birds

A football team coach dies—but he is no ordinary man, leaving behind a trail of grief and disorientation. What follows is far from contractual disputes over his replacement; here, football (or its behind-the-scenes world) serves merely as the backdrop for devotion and the question of what comes next to emerge. A series of surreal encounters and situations unfolds.

Amin Motallebzadeh

2025, 79'