Based by Geena Davis in 2015, the Bentonville Movie Pageant launches its 2026 version on Monday, resulting in per week of occasions, screenings, and cultural resonance within the heartland of the nation. Bentonville has quietly developed a repute for high quality, notably in its in-person panels and different distinctive alternatives. The place else may you go to a Espresso Speak with Bobby Flay or attend panels like “The Interactive Period” and “Main By Unsure Occasions”?
In fact, it’s nonetheless primarily concerning the movies, a confidently curated number of hits from fests like Sundance and SXSW alongside some native premieres. To present you a sampling of what to anticipate this yr, we thought we’d spotlight a couple of of probably the most attention-grabbing screenings. Get tickets right here.
“Road Good” (Centerpiece Movie)
Arguably the most important “get” of the Bentonville group this yr is the world premiere of the newest drama from Catherine Hardwicke, the acclaimed director of “13,” “Lords of Dogtown,” and “Twilight.” After a couple of years of strong work on TV, Hardwicke has returned to her indie roots, telling a narrative about younger folks on the sting of society. On this case, it’s an ensemble piece that facilities on a younger girl (Isabelle Fuhrman) who arrives in Venice Seaside with $20 in her pocket and a dream of turning into a musician. She stumbles right into a discovered household of unhoused younger folks that features characters performed by Yara Shahidi, Michael Cimino, Kaitlyn Kemp, Skeet Ulrich, MVP Miles McKenna, and promising breakthrough Isiah Hilt.
Hardwicke peppers the supporting forged with acquainted faces like Sally Struthers, Marcia Homosexual Harden, and Harvey Guillen, however her best asset stays her deep empathy for younger folks, one thing that has been there from her Oscar-nominated debut. The script that she co-wrote with Nic Sheff works higher in its quiet, character-based moments than in its plotting, however there are sufficient of these to make the film’s controversial manipulations tolerable. Hardwicke and Sheff clearly like these characters, and that compassion is contagious.
“Moonglow”
Isabel Sandoval’s “Lingua Franca” was a breakthrough indie drama, a very nice movie that promised a profession to look at. Sandoval went to TV, helming episodes of “Below the Banner of Heaven,” “Inform Me Lies,” and “The Summer time I Turned Fairly.” She returns to Bentonville, the place “Lingua Franca” received Greatest Narrative in 2020, along with her first movie since then, a film with echoes of “Double Indemnity” and “Within the Temper for Love.” Sandoval stars as Dahlia, who we see sneak right into a home in Manila in 1979 within the movie’s opening sequence, studying shortly thereafter that she’s a police officer who occurred to be robbing her corrupt boss. In fact, she’s assigned to analyze the crime, alongside her former accomplice Charlie (Arjo Atayde), and Sandoval delivers a movie that alternates between a moody character piece and one thing nearer to a slow-burning procedural.
The 2 movies don’t at all times coalesce in a script that typically slides from moody to sluggish, however she has such a assured eye that her framing and use of colour alone make this price a glance.
“When a Witness Recants”
The good Daybreak Porter is again with an unimaginable new documentary, a movie that simply so occurs to have received the Viewers Award for Greatest Documentary final month on the Chicago Critics Movie Pageant. The director of “John Lewis: Good Bother” collaborates right here with Ta-Nehisi Coates to adapt a New Yorker article by Jennifer Gonnerman concerning the convictions of Andrew Stewart, Ransom Watkins, and Alfred Chestnut for a 1983 homicide that they didn’t commit. The lads have been launched, and Porter’s movie culminates in an astonishing scene during which they meet with the person whose coerced testimony put them in jail. It’s as unforgettable as something you’ll see this yr.
Different Sundance repeats embrace the opposite CCFF Viewers Award Winner, “If I Go Will They Miss Me,” together with “Scorching Water,” “The Musical,” “American Pachuco,” “Cookie Queens,” “Jane Elliott Towards the World,” “The Brittney Griner Story,” “Give Me the Ball!,” and “Seized.”
“Maddie’s Secret”
Simply earlier than its restricted launch subsequent week, earlier than it expands throughout the nation, Bentonville audiences will get to see one of the distinctive directorial debuts of 2026. Since its premiere at TIFF in 2025, John Early’s comedy has steadily constructed buzz with a sturdy pageant tour (which additionally included a sold-out present at CCFF).
Early directed, wrote, and stars as Maddie Ralph in a movie that’s mainly a spoof of TV motion pictures about consuming issues, but it surely works due to how earnestly Early performs the bit. He’s not mocking consuming issues and even tacky TV motion pictures. It’s not a parody. It’s a loving ode to outsiders that will not at all times work, however the diploma of problem of it’s exceptional to contemplate. That he even will get as shut as he does makes Early a filmmaker to look at.
“The Dads”
The documentary program at Bentonville is extremely robust, however I needed to focus on this insightful movie, given the continued battle for trans rights on this nation, particularly throughout Satisfaction Month. “The Dads” began life as an enlargement of a brief movie a few dialogue group for dads of trans youngsters, however the manufacturing passed off throughout 2024, which included an election that ceaselessly modified the folks profiled. As some dad and mom take into account leaving america within the wake of Trump 2.0, “The Dads” turns into an unforgettably emotional and fraught private journey. It would virtually actually characteristic one of the attention-grabbing and highly effective post-film Q&As.
“Little Home on the Prairie” (Closing Occasion)
A movie pageant that features TV episodes is nothing new; Sundance and SXSW have made that form of programming an important a part of their occasions, however I’m unsure it’s as frequent to see one given the framing of closing evening. In fact, viewers of a sure age keep in mind the ‘70s adaptation of the hit books by Laura Ingalls Wilder, they usually can now introduce their youngsters to this world a half-century later with the Netflix model. It premieres on July 9, 2026, and has already been renewed for a second season. Get a sneak peek at Bentonville.
Notice: Should you’re desirous about bringing the youngsters out to extra than simply closing evening, there are free screenings of hits scattered by means of the fest, together with “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” “The way to Prepare Your Dragon,” 2025’s model of “Superman,” and “KPop Demon Hunters.”
