Tickets are now on sale for the HSBC Spanish & Latin American Film Festival and there’s so much to see in this year’s program.
Screening across Luna Leederville and Luna on SX, the lineup brings together the best and most creative works from filmmakers across the world of Spanish language cinema.
Featuring in the 2026 program are three special retrospectives, shining a spotlight on three iconic directors who shaped the world of filmmaking for years to come.
First is Luis Buñuel’s surreal satire The Exterminating Angel, where guests are mysteriously unable to leave a dinner party. As the evening unravels, the film dives deeper into a broader exploration of daily minutia, social restrictions and savagery beneath civility.
25 years after its release, Guillermo del Toro’s political allegory The Devil’s Backbone fuses together elements of the uncanny with the cinema of war. Set in a haunted orphanage during the Spanish Civil War, the film explores how children inherit the violence of the older generations.
Finally, Victor Erice’s directorial debut The Spirit of the Beehive is set in the after math of that same Civil War. Here we meet a young girl who is mesmerised by the film Frankenstein, leading to a search for meaning that blurs reality with her imagination.
Other highlights in this year’s program include Another League, based on the true story of pioneering young women carving their own space in the male-dominated world of football; Narciso, a seductive neo-noir unravelling the mysterious death of a charismatic radio host in 1950s Paraguay; simmering high-society drama Ladies’ Hunting Party starring the legendary Rossy de Palma; and Breaking Walls, a light-hearted dramedy about a group of dads supporting their daughters to learn rhythmic gymnastics.
The HSBC Spanish & Latin American Film Festival runs from 11 June – 1 July. For more, head to lunapalace.com.au
