Palm Springs International Film Festival Recap

Sinjin Dixon-Warren | Secretary, NIFSS | January 18, 2025

The Palm Spring International Film Festival (PSIFF) is held during the first two weeks of January in Palm Springs, California. It is a smaller festival than NIFSS’s partner, the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF); however, it has the benefit of being located in the Coachella Valley, one of the sunniest places in North America. They are known for their curation of the best in international cinema. The festival included all the films nominated for the Best International Feature, including the Canadian entry Universal Language, which we will be screening at NIFSS in April.  Apparently PSIFF has come to be known as the first stop on the road to the Academy Awards®.

We attended the entire festival. Since accommodation can be expensive in southern California, we chose to stay at a Thousand Trails RV camping park, in our small teardrop trailer, about 30 minutes away from downtown Palm Springs, where most of the film venues were found. Palm Springs is quite good for cycling and we used our folding bikes to get between the venues. The older parts of Palm Springs are quite lovely, with beautiful gardens and mid-century modern homes, with a backdrop of stunning mountains. There is a rather magnificent statue of Marylin Munroe in the downtown area, near the art gallery.

The festival lasts twelve days, in this case from January 2 to January 13. There are various options for tickets, including individual tickets and 5 day passes, and full passes with several levels. We opted for the basic (or platinum) full pass, which gave admission to all the film screenings, including those where the Director, Producer, writer or some of the actors were present. It was a real treat to hear these creative people discuss their work, right after seeing the film. Seating is not guaranteed with the platinum passes, but we were able to get into all the films that we selected. Line ups started about 45 minutes before the screenings, and we found that arriving 20-30 minutes early was sufficient.  At $600 the pass was moderately expensive, so we worked quite hard at getting full value from the pass, and were able to see a total of 33 films, listed below.  The final day of the festival is devoted to the Best of Festival selections. The Best of Festival was included in our pass, but we decided to spend our final day exploring some of the other sites in Palm Springs, such as the excellent art museum.

PSIFF screens a mixture of more mainstream films that will receive wide distribution, such as Better Man and Nickel Boys, plus international and independent films that will have limited distribution to cinemas. Many will likely never come to Nanaimo, but fortunately, virtually all the films should be available on demand or on a streaming platform within the year.  It is possible that NIFSS will choose to screen one or two more of these films in our 2025-26 season. I have highlighted in bold the Best International Feature nominees that we were able to see. I also give my rating on a 1-5 scale, but really all the films were worth seeing (although I might not want to see those near the bottom of my ranking a second time).

My favourite film was likely There’s Still Tomorrow, which tells the story of a woman living with her children and abusive husband in post-war Rome. It is beautifully filmed in black and white and the plot includes some clever and surprising twists and turns.  My Favourite Cake from Iran is also a beautiful film, made especially poignant given the troubles the Director and other have faced in Iran for making the film. The festival ended with The Penguin Lesson, a very entertaining film, set in Argentina, and directed by the Director who made The Full Monty.

In closing, attending PSIFF is a very enjoyable experience. It is held at a great time of year for getting away from the coldest and wettest part of Nanaimo’s winter. The festival offers an amazing selection of films. The festival apparently screened 158 films from 71 countries, including 68 premieres.Start writing here...