Cinema Against the Establishment: The Most Talked-About Premieres at the 17th FKA

The Camera Action Festival will feature two of Hirokazu Koreeda’s latest films: “Look Back” – straight from the Venice International Film Festival – and “Sheep in the Box” which premiered in the Main Competition at the Cannes International Film Festival. Both films form a poignant double portrait of relationships that defy simple definitions – family, friendship, or artistic partnership. In the “Critical Premieres” section, politics meets genre cinema, rebellion clashes with the need for security, and family ties intertwine with the struggle for one’s own identity. In Paul Greengrass’s “Uprising“, starring Andrew Garfield, the peasant uprising of 1381 serves as the starting point for a story about social frustration, violence, and the right to resist. James Gray’s “Paper Tiger“, starring Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver, uses gangster cinema to explore family, loyalty, and the price one pays for trying to break free from imposed roles.

Straight from the Toronto International Film Festival, Guy Nattiv’s “The Liberation“, starring Carrie Coon, Lily James, and Bella Ramsey, will also be featured in the 17th FKA program. The film tells the story of a woman who, after difficult experiences, finds herself in a closed community that promises her safety and a new life. It quickly becomes clear, however, that a high price must be paid for that sense of belonging. Carrie Coon’s performance is already generating buzz ahead of awards season – Screen Daily has placed her at the center of Oscar discussions. The section’s program will also feature genre-bending films: Valeska Grisebach’s “The Dreamed Adventure“, in which observational realism meets the Western and the crime thriller, Jonas Ulrich’s “Wolves“, starring Bartosz Bielenia, which portrays the tension between the individual and the community; and Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel’s “The Loneliest Man in the City”, honored at the Berlinale – a film consistently focused on a person left on the margins of an ever-accelerating reality. İlker Çatak’s “Yellow Leaves“, winner of the Golden Bear, examines artists operating under the pressure of the political system. Andrei Zvyagintsev returns after nine years with”The Minotaur“, winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes. The film enters into a dialogue with Claude Chabrol’s “The Unfaithful Wife” (screened in the Critics’ Classics section) – Zvyagintsev draws on the same narrative foundation but transposes it to a different historical and political moment.

The 17th Camera Action Festival will take place from October 22 to 25, 2026, in Łódź, and online from October 19 to 21, 2026, on the Think Film platform. This project is made possible thanks to funding from the City of Łódź’s budget. It is co-financed by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage from the Culture Promotion Fund – a state-administered special-purpose fund—as well as by the Polish Film Institute and the University of Łódź, the festival’s patron. The “Sound Direction” section is organized in collaboration with the Łódź Film School and the Embassy of the Kingdom of Spain in Poland. Filmweb is a partner of the section. The festival’s main partners are Monopolis, the Łódź Film School, and the Museum of Cinematography. The Camera Action Festival and the “Man in Danger” Media Festival form the “Łódź Film Festival” network.