Issued: 30/May/2026, Variety. Online. United States.
The 28th Shanghai International Film Festival has unveiled the competition lineup for its Golden Goblet Awards, spanning five categories across fiction, documentary, animation, and short film. The festival runs June 12-21.
The main competition features 12 titles drawn from 15 countries and territories, all of them world premieres. Among the contenders are Indonesia’s “My Own Last Supper,” directed by Ismail Basbeth; “Night of Blindness,” a Turkey-Germany co-production from Reis Çelik; and Yassine El Idrissi’s Moroccan entry “Halima.” China is represented by two titles: “Atlantic Rhapsody,” directed by Zhong Kaifeng, and Liu Xiaoyang’s “The Great Skull.” The Chinese Mainland-Hong Kong co-production “Secret in the Box,” directed by Frankie Tam Gong-Yuen, also competes, alongside Nicolás Rincón Gille’s Belgian entry “Iluminada,” Alan Minas’s Brazil-U.K. co-production “Luiza’s Desert,” and Daniil Merkulov’s Russian entry “Sea Sons.” Germany appears twice in the lineup – Josef Brandl’s “Superbuhei” and Susanne Heinrich’s “The Miserable Mother,” the latter sharing its world premiere with the Munich International Film Festival. Louis Godbout’s Canadian entry “The Parking Spot” rounds out the section.
The main competition jury is chaired by Hong Kong actor Tony Leung Chiu-wai. The seven-member panel also includes Tunisian producer Dora Bouchoucha, Chinese director Guan Hu, Kyrgyz director Aktan Arym Kubat, Mexican writer-director-producer Fernanda Valadez, Chinese actor Xin Zhilei, and Georgian director Déa Kulumbegashvili.
The Asian New Talent section, which spotlights debut and second features by Asian directors, draws 12 titles from across the continent and beyond. India-Germany co-production “Hunter’s Moon,” directed by Ridham Janve, competes alongside Sompot Chidgasornpongse’s “9 Temples to Heaven,” fresh off its Cannes debut, and Kazakh director Alibi Mukushev’s “No Good in Sight: A Story.” Ishtiyak Ahmad Zihad’s Bangladesh-Germany co-production “The Blind Girl and an Elephant” is among the section’s world premieres, as are Büşra Bülbül’s Turkish entry “About the Mother,” Zaid Abu Hamdan’s Jordan-KSA co-production “Boomah,” and Narghiza Dotieva’s Kyrgyz film “Skylark.” China contributes four titles: “Cassowary” (Zhang Hanyi), “Her First Taste” (Gong Yiwen), and “No Hard Feelings” (Liu Shichuan), alongside Mak Tin Shu’s Chinese Mainland-Hong Kong co-production “Dog Day Evening.” Wan Bo’s “Strangers in the Mountain” also competes.
