San Francisco Film Festival Screenings Weekend

San Francisco’s film festival starts Friday, April 24, with opening-night screenings at the Castro Theatre and a weekend slate spread across San Francisco and Berkeley. (sffilm.org) The 69th San Francisco International Film Festival runs April 24 through May 4, 2026, with 79 programs from 40 countries, according to SFFILM. The festival says tickets for the full program went on sale to the public on April 3. (sffilm.org) Friday’s opening night is a Castro Theatre double feature: Kent Jones’ “Late Fame” at 5:30 p.m. and Olivia Wilde’s “The Invite” at 8:30 p.m. SFFILM says the Castro is back in the festival this year after recent editions were centered elsewhere. (sffilm.org; kqed.org) The weekend matters because the festival is no longer concentrated in one neighborhood or one theater. KQED reported that most of the 2026 program remains in the Marina and Presidio, with additional screenings at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. (kqed.org) SFFILM says this year’s venues span San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley, including the Premier Theater at One Letterman, the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco, the Phyllis Wattis Theater at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art for school programs, and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. The organization also says no public programs are streaming this year, so the festival is entirely in person. (sffilm.org; sffilm.org) Saturday’s posted schedule includes the family-oriented Shorts Block 5 at 11 a.m. at the Marina Theatre and “Renoir” at 11:30 a.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. The public schedule also lists repertory screening “The Wages of Fear” at noon Saturday at the Marina Theatre. (sffilm.org; sffilm.org) The program is built in sections rather than one single lane of premieres. SFFILM’s 2026 guide groups films into international and U.S. documentaries, international and U.S. narratives, short and mid-length films, and spotlights including Bay Area Voices, Family Friendly, and From the Vault. (sffilm.org) That “From the Vault” label is new enough to stand out this year. SFFILM says the retrospective draws on titles previously presented at the festival and ties into the organization’s history ahead of its 70th anniversary next year; the festival was founded in 1957 and calls itself the longest-running film festival in the Americas. (sffilm.org; sffilm.org; sffilm.org) For moviegoers, the practical detail is that there is no single “festival campus” to show up at this weekend. SFFILM tells ticket holders to check each event page, arrive 30 to 60 minutes early, and not count on late seating if they show up within 15 minutes of showtime. (sffilm.org)