Cinema St. Louis is approaching a milestone: the St. Louis International Film Festival will mark its 35th anniversary in 2027, bringing independent and global cinema to the region. The nonprofit arts organization has presented the festival annually since 1992.
A 35th Anniversary in 2027
Ladue News’ October 29, 2025, article describes the 2025 festival as running Nov. 6-16 with 271 films, including 142 features and 129 shorts, under the banner Film Without Borders.
SLIFF has elevated independent film through local presentations of global stories since 1992, and it is one of roughly 85 domestic film festivals sanctioned by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences.
Anniversary Celebration and an Independence Award
SLIFF is hosting a reception at Par Lounge.
Opening and Closing Night Draw Awards Buzz
Wild Horse Nine stars Sam Rockwell and John Malkovich and follows CIA agents dispatched from Santiago to Easter Island shortly before the 1973 Chilean coup.
The broader lineup includes Mike Leigh's Tender Loving Care, Tony Gilroy's Behemoth! and Elsinore, which stars Andrew Scott as actor Ian Charleson. Also on the schedule are I Play Rocky, directed by Peter Farrelly, and Seized and The Great Experiment, two True/False Film Fest titles making their St. Louis premiere. A repertory program spotlighting 1992 releases, including Reservoir Dogs and Daughters of the Dust, nods directly to the festival's own founding year.
International Films
All of a Sudden, directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi, follows an elder-care facility director whose life changes after meeting a terminally ill Japanese playwright.
La Gradiva, directed by Marine Atlan, won the Grand Prize for Critics’ Week at Cannes.
Comedy Entries Fill Out the Hi-Pointe Slate
Comedy fans have several options concentrated at the Hi-Pointe Theatre. Bob and David Climb Machu Picchu, directed by Michael Lahaie and starring Bob Odenkirk and David Cross, follows two comedians undertaking a difficult hike up Machu Picchu and screens there November 11. Hag, directed by and starring Jackie Kelly as a sex worker turning 30, screens at the Hi-Pointe on November 14, the same night as Club Kid, written and directed by Jordan Firstman, about a club promoter who discovers a previously unknown 10-year-old son.
Short Films and an Oscar Pathway
SLIFF's annual Short Film Spotlight is a juried competition in which filmmakers are selected for Best of awards, and winning one of those awards makes a filmmaker eligible for an Oscar nomination, according to the festival's official site. That Academy sanction is part of what has made the short-film program a draw for emerging filmmakers well beyond the St. Louis region.
New AI Policy Takes Effect Next Year
Cinema St. Louis has also set new ground rules for future submissions. As reported by STLPR, SLIFF and the St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase will stop showing films made with generative AI starting in 2027, though the festivals will still accept films that benefited from other forms of artificial intelligence. Williams told the station that conventional digital editing, like changing the color of someone's shirt, remains permitted under the policy. The move followed the July screening of St. Louis filmmaker Jack Snyder's short film Anomaly, whose visuals were created entirely with AI, the station reported.
The festival's recent programming has also leaned into themes of connection across difference. Last year's 34th annual event, branded the Whitaker St. Louis International Film Festival, ran Nov. 6-16 with screenings across the region, according to the St. Louis American. That edition's Race in America: The Black Experience sidebar, then in its 11th year, featured twenty films and shorts, and Cinema St. Louis partnered with the International Institute on a new film called the St. Louis Immigration Project that debuted that November.
Full ticket, pass and lineup information for this year's festival is available at cinemastlouis.org, according to St. Louis Magazine.
