Thessaloniki International Film Festival 2026: 67th edition runs 5 to 15 November

During the main event the festival screens fiction films from different countries alongside recent production from Greece, and its programme also carries tributes, honorary ceremonies for invited filmmakers, masterclasses and open discussions.

The guest curator of the 2026 edition is the director Oliver Laxe, who made Sirât. He has chosen 17 films for a tribute built around the desert as a film setting. Laxe also gives an open talk on his career and his working methods, and the festival publishes a bilingual book for the tribute titled Welcome to the Desert.

As part of the same tribute, the MOMUS experimental arts centre at the port of Thessaloniki is turned into a desert environment. At its centre stands a three-channel video installation produced by the Reina Sofia museum, using footage Laxe shot in the desert. The museum's head of film and new media, who co-curated the installation, also sits on the jury of the Immersive competition section.

The festival presents an honorary award for his overall contribution to cinema to the director and screenwriter Nikos Grammatikos. A tribute screens seven of his feature films and four of his rarely shown short films, and he takes part in an open discussion about his creative process. A special edition of the festival's own publication is devoted to him, with rare photographs, a long interview and original texts.

The posters of the 67th edition are based on spatial affects, a 2026 work in acrylics and watercolour pencils on canvas measuring 150 x 180 cm, which draws on the cinema auditorium and on the desert tribute. The painting itself is exhibited at one of the edition's venues.

The festival is held every November. It began in 1960 as a national festival, kept that status until 1991, and has been international since 1992.