Final Girls Berlin Film Festival is back this March with five days of boundary-pushing horror by women and non-binary filmmakers. Now in its 11th edition, the festival continues to do what it does best: build a home for genre films that take big swings politically, aesthetically, and emotionally, to remind you why horror remains the most honest mirror we’ve got.
Across March 4–8, audiences can expect a packed programme of features, shorts blocks, live-scored silent cinema, talks, and workshops that dig into gender, rage, appetite, the body, and sound.
For anyone who can’t make it to Berlin, select screenings will also be available online via Vimeo On Demand during the festival.
Feature film highlights
This year’s features span fever-dream motherhood, folk dread, queer camp chaos, and undead mayhem with a program that moves from the intimate to the apocalyptic.
LA VIRGEN DE LA TOSQUERA (THE VIRGIN OF THE QUARRY LAKE) | Berlin Premiere
Laura Casabe’s sultry coming-of-age horror is set in 2001 Argentina, in a summer thick with heat, heartbreak, and looming crisis. When a curse meant to sabotage a romance sparks something darker inside its protagonist, the film turns jealousy into awakening, and desire into something completely feral.
HONEY BUNCH
Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli deliver an unsettling psychological spiral set inside an experimental trauma facility deep in the wilderness. The more memory creeps back, the more the foundations of a marriage begin to rot.
FREWAKA | Berlin Premiere
Aislinn Clarke’s eerie folk-tinged nightmare follows Shoo, a home care worker carrying her own grief, sent to a remote village to care for a woman who fears both her neighbours and the Na Sídhe — sinister entities she believes abducted her long ago. The connection between them becomes as intimate as it is dangerous.
Retrospective Screening: EVE’S BAYOU
A true classic: Kasi Lemmons’ Southern Gothic masterpiece returns to the big screen — a film about family secrets, betrayal, and the shadowy spaces between truth and belief. Sensuous, painful, and haunting in ways that linger for decades.
MOTHER OF FLIES | German Premiere
When a young woman seeks dark magic for a cure, the forest answers — with a price. A folk-horror-inflected story of devotion and consequence, created by John Adams, Zelda Adams, and Toby Poser.
QUEENS OF THE DEAD
Tina Romero brings the undead to Brooklyn on the night of a massive warehouse party — and throws drag queens, club kids, frenemies, and brain-thirsty zombies into the same glitter-slicked fight for survival. Funny, frantic, and built for a crowd.
DEAD LOVER | German Premiere
Grace Glowicki’s warped romance follows a lonely gravedigger who attempts to resurrect her drowned lover via madcap science. Tender, gross, hilarious, and tragic in equal measure.
CAMP | German Premiere
Written and directed by Avalon Fast (also on this year’s Short Film Jury), CAMP follows Emily, weighed down by early-life tragedy, as she arrives at a camp for troubled youth and is welcomed into something that looks like forgiveness — until the woods begin whispering. A “girl horror” coming-of-dread story with a slow, tightening grip.
IF I HAD LEGS I’D KICK YOU
Mary Bronstein’s whiplash comedy thriller is a portrait of parental anxiety, with Rose Byrne delivering a performance that’s both gutting and darkly funny. Missing people, absent partners, hostile therapy sessions, and a child’s mysterious illness collide as one woman tries to keep it together.
Shorts programs
Final Girls Berlin’s shorts programs remain the heart of the festival. Across the week, audiences can dive into a global selection of themed blocks, including:
Ambition (shorts)
Influencers, careerists, and athletes pushing themselves past the point of sanity.
Wassupkaylee – Dir. Pepi Ginsberg, USA/France · Cub – Dir. Sofia Rubin, USA · Los dientes largos (Long Teeth) – Dir. Lucía Zamora, Spain · The Smotherhouse – Dir. Fosca Aïdos Hope, France · Drosera – Dir. Maud Carpentier & Boris Tilquin, Belgium
Eco Horror (shorts)
Forests that watch back, survival that curdles, and land that bites.
Don’t Try This In The Woods – Dir. Emma Doxiadi, Greece · Época de plagas (Plague Season) – Dir. Gabriela Calvache, Ecuador/Spain/USA · Into the Stand – Dir. Mackenzie Hamilton & Taylor Fuchs, Canada · Waste – Dir. Paola Teran, Peru · Lethal Ethel – Dir. Elayna Einish, Canada · Dead Weight – Dir. Virginia Root, USA
Psychosexual (shorts)
Desire, grief, technology, and the body as a haunted house.
Hôtel Acropole – Dir. Sarah Lasry, France · Spanked By A Ghost – Dir. Katelyn Douglass, USA · Martarella – Dir. MB Montes, Spain · Jeff – Dir. Julia Hebner, USA · Itty Bitty Betty – Dir. Laura Buchanan, Canada · Strawberry Shortcake – Dir. Deborah Devyn Chuang, Taiwan
Social Horror (shorts)
Bureaucracy, violence, post-partum alienation, and the everyday terrors we’re trained to ignore.
Civil Service – Dir. Tiffany Kimmel, USA · TOKUM AMA YERİM (I’m Full But I’ll Eat Anyway) – Dir. Bilge Olcay Yılmaz, Turkey · Absolved – Dir. Malindi Kindrachuk, Canada · Nothing Personal, Daddy – Dir. Tamara Pavićević, Montenegro · Pálpito (Hunch) – Dir. Marisa Crespo & Moisés Romera, Spain · Tea With Friends – Dir. Farah Halime Hope, UK · Take Care – Dir. Brittany Ashley, USA · Bear – Dir. Rebecca Parker, Australia
Folk Horror (shorts)
Offerings, traditions, witchcraft accusations, and landscapes that keep score.
Anticuerpo – Dir. Sofia Chizzini & Ludmila Rogel, Argentina · Hafermann – Dir. Helena Haverkamp, Germany · Mati Adat (Kill Tradition) – Dir. Juliana Reza, Malaysia · Lok – Dir. Mahmuda Sultana Rima, Bangladesh · Striya – Dir. Paige Campbell, USA · Barlebas – Dir. Malu Janssen, The Netherlands
Queer Horror (shorts)
Trans revenge, anarchic undead allies, gay urban legends, and futures that refuse heterocompulsory scripts.
If I’m Here It Is By Mystery – Dir. Clari Ribeiro, Brazil · TransVengeance – Dir. Kaye Adelaide, Canada · The Dysphoria – Dir. Kylie Aoibheann, Australia · Wall Udder – Dir. Alexandra Hayden, USA · Hopepunk – Dir. Vasiliki Lazaridou, Greece · Bloody Larry – Dir. Jillian Cantwell, USA · FIFI LA COMÈTE ET LES COSMIC DANCERS? – Dir. Jasmin Kadjou Jadot, Belgium · Psilocybin Babies – Dir. Sandra Lola Dada, Finland · Anniversary_6 – Dir. Carmen Perez, USA
Midnight Shorts
Time to get freaky! Loops, paranoia, mortician beauticians, egg monsters, and the weird stuff that hits best after dark.
Guilty Pleasures – Dir. Aidan Grossman & Abhinay Jakhar, Canada · Cut Me If You Can – Dir. Sylvain Loubet Dit Gajol & Nicolas Polixene, USA/France · Steal My Life – Dir. Annie Wren, Canada · Beauty Sleep – Dir. Jasmine Emma De Silva, UK · The Complete Package – Dir. Wyn Wallace, UK · Cringe – Dir. Lisa Ovies, Canada · Eggsecution – Dir. Japhet Velazquez, USA · Seen – Dir. Dhwani Shah, USA · We Don’t Know Our Neighbors – Dir. Noura bint Hussam B Al Saud, Saudi Arabia · Please Love Me – Dir. Lea Rose Sebastianis, Canada
Nightmares (shorts)
Sleep paralysis, uncanny hotels, cosmic reckonings, and the subconscious with its claws out.
Night Hags – Dir. Kiley Evans Mahoney, USA · The Occupant of the Room – Dir. Kier-La Janisse, Canada · A Seat at the Table – Dir. Lanese Love, USA · Yathoom – Dir. Hana Kazim, UAE · In Your Dreams – Dir. Mariah Larocque, USA · Baby Bird – Dir. Aris Liang, USA
Body Horror (shorts)
Hunger, fibroids, rashes, transformation, invasion, and bodily autonomy as a battleground.
Breeders – Dir. Suri Grennell, Ireland · FEMME – Dir. Nina Noël Raaijmakers, The Netherlands · Mango – Dir. Joan Iyiola, UK/France · ¡Abre las piernas! (Spread Your Legs) – Dir. Águeda V. Flores, Spain/Mexico/Switzerland · Rash – Dir. Lyssa Samuel, USA · Death Row Dog – Dir. Marinah Janello Phennicie, USA
Religious Horror (shorts)
You’ll find domineering parents, sinful confessors, and hypocritical miscreants here.
Open Wide – Dir. Sam Fox, USA · Pickled Rabbit – Dir. Julie Zhu, Canada · Keys – Dir. Mooreoluwa Natasha Wright, UK/Nigeria · Martyrdom de Sainte Dymphne – Dir. Sarah Bordji, France · Confession – Dir. Mai Nakanishi, Japan
Friendship (shorts)
Slumber parties, break-up parties, internet pals, nostalgia turned toxic, and the danger of wanting to belong.
Would You Rather – Dir. Sophie O’Donovan, Ireland · Call Earl – Dir. Jordan Pfeifer, USA · Blood Sisters – Dir. Muraya Moore, Australia · She Devil – Dir. Allie Perison, USA · Le Huard (The Loon) – Dir. Paula Bourgie, Canada · Internet Friend – Dir. Erica Orofino, Canada · Rot Girl Summer – Dir. Persephone Wood, UK
Beyond the screen
This year’s expanded talks and workshops program is for anyone who wants to think about horror (and make it) with more intention, clarity, and community.
To Eat Excessively: Female hunger, appetite, and consumption in the horror film
A deep dive into hunger as horror’s most loaded metaphor and most literal force, where appetite becomes transgression, power, shame, survival, and revolt.
“And just for a few hours we was free”: Black and PoC empowerment through horror
A dedicated workshop for Black people and People of Colour examining the empowering potential of horror stories, and how the genre can be used to process rage, injustice, and the desire for vengeance, while challenging the tropes that have historically limited marginalized characters.
Hysterics Unplugged: the sound of horror
A workshop exploring the figure of the “hysteric” in horror cinema through sonic representation. Explore how sound shapes fear, embodiment, control, and what we’re conditioned to hear as “madness.”
Make your own damn sounds: how to make sound effects and foley for your film
A practical workshop on building atmosphere and impact through sound, from DIY effects to the small, clever tricks that make a scene feel alive (or not alive, depending on your preference).
Horrors that matter: deconstructing binary conceptualisations of sex/gender and the body in contemporary horror shorts
A talk by Laura Stöckler (Vienna) that takes body horror seriously as a filmic medium, shifting focus from plot and symbolism toward framing, editing, colour, rhythm, and sound. In a moment of rising transphobia and regressive gender norms, this is a timely look at the body in horror cinema as mutable, malleable, and resistant.
Special event: live score to two landmark films directed by women
Berlin-based horror prog trio Pavone Cristallo (Bethany Barrett, Jules LaPlace, and FGB co-director Sara Neidorf) will live-score two seminal silent films:
The Seashell and the Clergyman (Germaine Dulac, 1928) — often cited as the first Surrealist film
Meshes of the Afternoon (Maya Deren & Alexander Hammid, 1943) — a foundational work of experimental cinema and the “trance film”
It’s a rare chance to experience these films as living objects: sound, image, and unease in perfect collision.
Ticket information
Individual Ticket: €9
Purchase at: citykinowedding.de/programm
Online Ticket: €6
Select screenings available via Vimeo On Demand during the festival
All Access Pass: €75
Purchase online at: finalgirlsberlin.com or in person at the festival
Venue: City Kino Wedding, Müllerstr 74, 13349 Berlin
About Final Girls Berlin Film Festival
Final Girls Berlin Film Festival is dedicated to showcasing horror cinema by women, trans, and non-binary filmmakers. Since 2016, the festival has become a global platform for marginalized voices in the genre, offering a space for radical storytelling and fearless horror filmmaking.
For more information about the festival, please visit finalgirlsberlin.com. For other questions, contact the festival directors, Elinor Lewy & Sara Neidorf at finalgirlsfilmfest@gmail.com
Instagram: @finalgirlsfilmfest · Facebook: /finalgirlsberlin · Bluesky: @finalgirlsberlin.bsky.social · Patreon: patreon.com/finalgirls
