Kids Like Me
Twelve-year-old Oliver lives with his seven-year-old-sister Willa, father Chad, and mother Casey in a small town in Massachusetts. Oliver’s obsession with mystery novels and detective shows inspires him to make his own movie. While his body finds physical challenges, the only real hurdle is the limits of his imagination. Welcome to Cynthia L and Jon Cohrs‘ Tribeca doc, Kids Like Me.
Oliver is a charming, endlessly creative, incredibly intelligent, brutally honest young man. You instantly fall in love with his infectious enthusiasm and acerbic wit. Chad and Casey have to navigate something I’m also very familiar with: a second child who is also an energetic and creative girl. The dynamics of fairness, attention, and concessions of a sibling who often feels second-rate to one with additional needs can be incredibly challenging, and, as a parent, you constantly feel like you are failing. Willa is unsurprisingly self-aware. The relationship between Oliver and Willa is complex in all the relatable ways.
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In this rhythmic psychological thriller, a lonely aspiring teen actress finds herself drawn to an acting teacher who pulls her into a web of desire and control, blurring the lines of seduction and obsession.
After backing out of a suicide pact that leaves her husband dead, a sheltered farmer’s wife flees the shame and hidden debts that destroyed their life together and disappears into the port city of Eilat, where an unexpected bond with migrants, refugees, and a compassionate hotel manager forces her to rebuild herself from nothing and discover a life beyond the one she was told to live.
After a crushing breakup, Lucy moves back in with her eccentric single dad and dives into bad dates, false starts, and growing pains. Big-hearted and sharply funny, Lucy Schulman is a charming comedic coming-of-age story from multihyphenate Tribeca alum Ellie Sachs.
Synopsis: When the buffet where Zeke’s mom works closes down, he’s forced to entertain the wild advances of a rich regular who is weirdly and vehemently obsessed with becoming his father.
After a breakup, rudderless millennial Jane hires a team of Gen-Z consultants to reinvent her life. But what begins as a makeover soon spirals into a sharp social media satire about image, app culture, and the cost of becoming someone else.
Seven years after her Grammy Award-winning Amidst the Chaos, Sara Bareilles reunites with her closest collaborators to record a new album. What emerges is an intimate, cinematic process that lays bare the musician’s deep connections and inspirations in Tribeca alum Josh Alexander’s moving music documentary.
Omaha
Molly Belle Wright and Wyatt Solis play Ella and Charlie. These two young actors will blow you away. Their chemistry with John Magaro is something from the movie gods. Wright bears the weight of being the eldest daughter, exquisitely. A performance immediately clocked by those who have lived it. 
Christopher Bear‘s music is akin to an American folktale, almost echoing Taylor Swift. Paul Meyers‘ camerawork and Jai Shukla’s editing create a tangibility that touches your soul. The film’s deliberate pacing and lingering shots allow the audience to be in the moments of realization, joy, and grief of this little family. 
Mabel
Nicholas Ma‘s darling coming-of-age film Mabel follows Callie, a 6th-grade botany-obsessed girl who struggles to adjust to her family’s move. 
Judy Greer is a gem. Having worked with and for scientists, Greer nails the bluntness and often curt tone in Ms. G’s delivery. It’s a performance that wins in its specificity. Newcomer Lexi Perkel‘s raw turn will undoubtedly hit the core of anyone raising a headstrong leader. Perkel settles easily into Callie’s hyper focus. You can see the light in her eyes as the two become one. Perkel is so effortless, you’d think she were the subject of a documentary. 
Mabel struggles slightly with pacing, even at a satisfying 84-minute runtime, but its relatable storytelling keeps it a breezy watch. Anyone who has ever felt different, misunderstood, or any parent of a child on the spectrum (even though Callie is specifically not) will relate to the desire to find connection and genuine friendship. Mabel is a solid family film. 
Sam finds musician David’s absence a subconscious excuse for connecting with the beautiful but aloof Dianne. As the months roll on, Dianne is working out her midlife crisis shit with Sam as her newfound bestie. Crashing out, and rightfully so, over aging, a waning acting career, and deepening depression. Sam, managing the eclectic needs of the three girls, a seemingly narcissistic husband, and his own feelings of inadequacy, must navigate new feelings and old fears.
Something that really stood out to me from an acting and writing standpoint in Fantasy Life warrants a mention. Eating scenes are actually quite rare in film. I don’t mean sitting at a table doing dialogue, I mean actually consuming food as the actors speak. It’s one of the most natural actions in our everyday lives, but we don’t often get treated to genuine relationship-building when actors have their mouths full of food. That simple and very specific choice by Shear has such an impact. It solidifies an immediate intimacy between Sam and Dianne. Bravo.
For all the reasons, Shear and Peet have the most electric chemistry. They share a beautiful, “will they, won’t they” energy, far beyond the trope itself. It’s so very easy.
SXSW 2026 true-crime doc I Got Bombed at Harvey’s tells the off-the-wall tale of a casino, a ransom note, a homemade bomb with 1000 pounds of dynamite, and 24 hrs. Your jaw will drop as one absolute narcissistic lunatic’s spiral brings his kids down with him.
SXSW 2026 Watchlist
100 NIGHTS OF HERO
Religious and political parallels are undeniable magic. The dialogue is a modern version of a bawdy Shakespeare comedy, cleverly tongue-in-cheek and playing right into toxic masculinity. Even our three main characters’ names are pure, double-entendre delight. 100 NIGHTS OF HERO weaves fable, witchcraft, and feminism seamlessly. 
Xenia Patricia
Maika Monroe
I ONLY REST IN THE STORM
Portugal-born, Brazil-based filmmaker Pedro Pinho tackles racism in an unfiltered, confrontational manner. The dialogue is no-holds-bar and yet entirely calm in its honesty. Alongside Sergio, the audience is thrust into a lively group of queer friends, who argue among their own ranks about blackness and identity. It feels very intimate to witness. It’s a head-on white savior complex reckoning. The longer you watch and learn, white behavior feels very self-congratulatory, regardless of true intentions. 
Performances are spectacular. The immersive cinematography is a character all its own. The film often feels like a documentary with elders casually dropping facts about colonialism in social settings. I ONLY REST IN THE STORM captures you in its boldness, if you can hold on for the three and a half hour runtime. While it would undoubtedly benefit to cut that time in half, you cannot deny the meandering plot points. Each is strong, but as a whole, the film is a five-course gluttonous meal. 
Before we were married, my husband and I abandoned our lives in New York and moved to Hyderabad, India, so that he could work for a local microfinance institution. He and I, both white, served more as a spectacle, fully owning our privilege as we navigated endlessly intrusive questions and the knowledge of our ability to leave the city on our own accord. To be the minority was an eye-opening experience. I ONLY REST IN THE STORM plays for a predominantly white NYFF audience. I would have loved to be a fly on the wall after yesterday’s premiere. One can only imagine the justifications over cocktails.
HAPPYEND
This predominantly young cast is incredible. Yukito Hidaka is captivating as Kou. His brooding aura and genuine wonder are the perfect foil for Hayato Kurihara‘s intense Yuta. Each actor wears their heart on their sleeve.
Based in part on her 2017 film BIRTH OF A FAMILY, Tasha Hubbard brings her scripted narrative debut to TIFF 50. MEADOWLARKS stars Michael Greyeyes, Carmen Moore, Alex Rice, and Michelle Thrush as four Cree siblings who were separated by the Sixties Scoop, who are meeting for the first time as adults.
Performances are fantastic. Each character is incredibly nuanced. Four siblings with varying goals for the trip and vastly different personalities. But what links them is far deeper than the ways in which they were raised by white families.
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As he prepares to self-fund his hefty two-act drama with his theatre “besties,” Griffin’s theatrical passion is further fueled by a tumultuous homelife. Colia delivers a truly tangible script. Griffin’s mom seems overwhelmed with her go-getter and rather demanding son, but under the surface, something else is simmering. She hires a neighbor’s son to help with yard cleanup. What begins as an annoyance to Griffin transforms into a sexual awakening, a test of relationships, and a piece of art that mirrors his unresolved trauma.
Owen Teague plays Brad with an initial aloofness that perfectly contrasts Griffin’s overzealous nature. As Teague taps into Brad’s motivation, *no pun intended,* the performance captivates in an entirely unexpected way. Everett Blunck is a star. His portrayal of Griffin feels like a documentary rather than a performance. It is one well beyond his years. He exudes fierce confidence that is infectious. Teague and Blunck have magnetic chemistry. Colia skillfully creates a subtle doppleganger effect between the two. It is an incredibly nuanced balance of characterization and performance.
Colia cleverly speaks to art as catharsis, the plight of a tortured artist, and the meaning of authentic friendship. Existing between childhood and adulthood is wrought with emotional chaos, impossible questions, self-loathing, fear, and awkwardness. GRIFFIN IN SUMMER playfully touches on each of these with unfiltered heart and humor.
After a bus ride on her way out of town gets cut short by a sighting of her local crush, Cleo’s infatuation becomes a way of life that maybe isn’t what she intended. Her mother, Lady Andre, comes looking for her and mistakes a passing moment for the end of her legacy.
Jessica Paré delivers a vivacious performance as Lady Andre. She is eccentric and demanding, but is undoubtedly battling unresolved wounds. Skylar Radzion is Josephine, the hairless sibling in the bearded family. She is a spitfire and a slick foil for Cleo.
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