Detroit Film Theatre

28-year-old Holly (Benedetta Porcaroli) spends day after day at her dead-end job, wondering where her life went wrong – at least so far. But after a chance encounter with Arabella (Lucrezia Guglielmino), an eight-year-old rebel hoping to run away from her self-absorbed father (a terrific Chris Pine), Holly becomes convinced their seemingly random meeting is actually some sort of cosmic sign, and that Arabella is, in fact, a younger version of herself. With charm, humor and honesty, this delightfully idiosyncratic homage to sisterhood becomes the tale of an oddly matched pair of adventurers on a most unconventional road trip, striving to make peace with their unsatisfying pasts and potentially bright futures. Best Actress Award, Benedetta Porcaroli, 2025 Venice Film Festival. In Italian with English subtitles. 

“The young leads show off terrific comic timing, while an assortment of mesmerizing character actors add sparkle.” –Leslie Felperin, The Hollywood Reporter

The all-new 2026 edition of the beloved CatVideoFest is a hand-selected, curated collection of the most entertaining, surprising and endearing cat videos of the year, together with some unique videos submitted directly to festival organizers. An underground sensation for years, CatVideoFest is now a national theatrical event and one of the DFT’s most reliably popular annual attractions. While you’ll have a great time, the CatVideoFest has a more serious purpose as well – the festival’s creators contribute a portion of ticket revenues each year to animal welfare associations, shelters and cat-focused charities in every state in which CatVideoFest plays. Tickets are available at the door, though advance ticket purchase on dia.org is the most convenient way to secure your seat without “having kittens” while waiting in line. 

“Watching cat videos is good for you.” –The Wall Street Journal 

As three lives from disparate parts of Mexico City converge in a single moment, their fractured stories unfold – revealing they are more connected to the urban underworld around them than they seem. After 25 years, the legendary, searing debut feature from Academy Award®-winning director Alejandro G. Iñárritu (Birdman, The Revenant) returns to the big screen in a new, complete and stunning restoration. A visceral, jaw-dropping reflection on human chaos, ruthlessness and tenderness, Amores Perros remains as bold, affecting and disturbingly mind-blowing as ever. Powered by the mesmerizing performances of Gael García Bernal, Goya Toledo and Emilio Echeverría, Amores Perros stands a quarter-century after its debut as a gritty masterwork. Critics Week Grand Prize, 2000 Cannes Film Festival. In Spanish with English subtitles. 

In a great historical coincidence, lumière, the French word for “light,” was also the last name of brothers Auguste and Louis, whose invention, the cinematograph, helped to inaugurate the most beloved art form of the last 130 years. In this magnificent documentary, Institute Lumière director Thierry Frémaux guides viewers through more than one hundred restored short films—some famous, some forgotten, some never before seen—created by Lumière and company. In the process, Frémaux illuminates how the brothers employed the camera as a creative tool as they mastered framing, staging, and subject selection for motion pictures of our world of more than a century ago, as well as the first ever fictional motion pictures. The result is not only a glorious big-screen depiction of the genesis of cinema but a profound meditation on the beautiful world captured—and the magical world imagined—by the Lumières. Narration in French with English subtitles. 

“A dazzling journey to the origins of cinema.”   –Wes Anderson

Summer 2004 on the glistening Galician coast: 18-year-old Marina (Llúcia Garcia), a confident, aspiring filmmaker who was raised by adoptive parents, needs to seek out her estranged paternal grandparents to obtain a signature required for enrolment at a university in Barcelona. Equipped with a camcorder and her deceased mother’s 20-year-old diaries, Marina drifts cautiously into the unruly lives of her uncles, aunts, and cousins, who superficially welcome her into the family fold while carefully evading her quest for direct answers. What were her biological parents really like? What was the cause of her father’s death? And what’s the real reason for the family’s evasiveness? It’s no surprise that families rarely have the courage to reveal or reconcile their secrets, yet this moving, precisely modulated new film brings us so close to reality of Marina’s dilemma that it feels as if our own futures, as well as our pasts, are linked to the outcome. In Spanish, Catalan and French, with English subtitles. 

“A vibrant, visually creative coming-of-age story… A stunning portrait of loss and recovery.” –Robert Daniels, RogerEbert.com

After the preventable maternal deaths of Shamony Gibson and Amber Rose Isaac, two grieving families transform unimaginable loss into a movement for change. United by tragedy, surviving partners Omari Maynard and Bruce McIntyre forge an enduring bond as they raise their children and fight for justice alongside activists, midwives, physicians, and community advocates. 

Intimate and deeply humane, the film follows their pursuit of accountability through legislation, medical reform, and collective action, illuminating the disproportionate toll of the U.S. maternal health crisis on Black families. As their stories intersect with a growing network of birth workers and bereaved fathers, the documentary becomes both a powerful portrait of resilience and an urgent call to reimagine maternal care. A moving testament to love, advocacy, and the transformative power of community, it bears witness to a movement demanding lasting systemic change. (86 min.) 

Following the screening will be an onstage discussion with Shawnee Benton Gibson and Omari Maynard, moderated by Danielle Atkinson, Executive Director of Mothering Justice 

This screening and discussion is the first event of In Her Honor-Detroit, a five-day experience of art, storytelling, remembrance and action dedicated to honoring mothers lost to maternal mortality and advancing the maternal health justice, organized by Mothering Justice – a nonpartisan grassroots, women-of-color-led multi-state organization working to shift policies and culture to create the conditions for mamas of color, birthing people, and caregivers in the US can thrive. 

Visit motheringjustice.org/inherhonor for more information. 

After learning of a Cinecittà Studios casting call for a child actor, working-class nurse Maddalena (Anna Magnani) transforms into a consummate stage mother, overhauling the life of her seven-year-old daughter (the astonishing Tina Apicella) and steamrolling everyone else to secure an audition. But Maddalena gets more than she bargained for when an industry insider asks for money (and more) in return for bribing studio heads—a deception that opens Maddalena’s eyes to the real price she and her daughter might pay for their dream. Magnani turns in one of the great performances of her legendary career in the rarely seen Bellissima—a newly restored masterwork by Italy’s Luchino Visconti (Death in Venice). Delivering humor, humanity, and a rare look at postwar Italy’s pursuit of movie celebrity, Bellissima is the sublime result of Magnani and Visconti discovering collaborative magic at their artistic peaks. In Italian with English subtitles.

“The great Magnani is at her most extraordinary in this satirical view of the movie-studio world… Visconti’s warmest comedy.” –Pauline Kael, 5001 Nights at the Movies

Dance on Screen provides a space for dance filmmakers to present their work. Presented in the Marvin and Betty Danto Lecture Hall, dance on screen highlights local, national, and international dance films in diverse styles of dance. (90 min.)  

Dance City Festival (DCF), formerly known as Detroit Dance City Festival, is an annual community building event that celebrates dance in its various forms and disciplines. Now in its fourteenth year in Detroit and second year in Chicago and New York, DCF includes performances, master classes, and networking opportunities all held in the vibrant cities of Detroit, Chicago and New York. With a mission to educate diverse audiences about the impact of dance, DCF provides opportunities for artists to share their work and create an artistic network linking the greater US and the world! 

In the DIA’s Lecture Hall. Capacity is limited, seating begins half hour before performance start.  

For full festival schedule visit: https://www.dancecityfestival.com/dance-city-festival-detroit