The official presentation of the 59th edition of the Sitges International Fantastic Film Festival of Catalonia took place at the Marché du Film’s Fantastic Pavilion during the Cannes Film Festival, where the poster was unveiled and the first details about this year’s event were shared. The festival’s artistic director, Ángel Sala, and the director of Fundació Sitges, Mònica Garcia i Massagué, led the presentation. The festival will be taking place from 8 to 18 October and will focus on films that explore the connection between horror and adolescence/childhood.

The official poster for the 59^th edition shows a female figure covered in red glittery strips, in a nod to the bloodbath the protagonist endures at the climax of Carrie, the classic 1970s US horror film directed by Brian De Palma. In Carrie, prom nights and student rituals, key leitmotifs for the 59^th edition of the festival, play a key role in the plot. This year marks the 50^th anniversary of the film’s premiere, making it the perfect choice for this year’s festival tribute. Once again, the creation is the result of a collaboration with the CHINA agency, which joined the LLYC brand at the start of the year.

The festival will also pay tribute to Narciso Ibáñez Serrador’s ¿Quién puede matar a un niño?, a seminal work of Spanish horror that is also turning 50 this year. In addition to this anniversary, the two films share a theme that will be another leitmotif this year: Evil in the youngest among us.

The festival will take a look back at pre- and post-1976 films that represented children under the influence of Evil. William Friedkin’s The Exorcist, Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby, Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining and Mervyn LeRoy’s The Bad Seed are among the leading examples of this genre.

First look at the WomanInFan documentary

The presentation of the Festival included a sneak peek of WomanInFan, a documentary directed by Mònica Garcia i Massagué and produced by the Sitges Festival and Catalan production company visualsuspects. The project brings together twenty-some actresses and women directors, researchers and festival programmers who will highlight the challenges women have traditionally faced in the fantastic film industry. The film will premiere out of competition during the festival’s 59^th edition.

Support for the 59^th edition

Sitges 2026 is made possible by Sitges City Council, the Government of Catalonia’s Catalan Institute of Cultural Enterprises, Sitges’s Cinema Prado and L’Escorxador – Centre d’Arts Vives. It has also received funding from the Spanish Ministry of Culture’s Institute of Cinematography and Audiovisual Arts, the Barcelona Provincial Council and the Department of Social Rights and Inclusion’s Carnet Jove youth card scheme.