The five participants in the International Directors Panel this year included an incredible number of awards and award nominees. Moderated by festival director Roger Durling, the panelists discussed the commonalities in their films, as well as their own unique film language.
Brazilian director Kleber Mendonça Filho: Among the awards The Secret Agent is nominated for is casting, in this first year of that Oscar category, and it was essential that the cast would reflect the diversity of Brazil. The film is set in Recife, Brazil, in 1977, during the military dictatorship. He is very interested in exploring memory, and stressed the importance of focusing on history to make sure events and facts are not erased or altered.
The trauma of that time is still alive in the consciousness of Brazil, and still being confronted. He talked about another film, Pictures of Ghosts (2022), which uses the cinema houses of Recife as a vehicle for exploring memory. A cinema house is central to this current film as well, and he compared it to the way the house is used in Sentimental Value as a way of carrying memory. The Secret Agent is Brazil’s entry to the Academy Awards Best International Feature Film category.
Iranian director Jafar Panahi (with his interpreter): It Was Just an Accident is one of several films Panahi has made that is critical of the Iranian government, using “socially engaged cinema”. He has been arrested numerous times, imprisoned or placed on house arrest, but continues to protest using film in creative and subversive ways.
In this very personal film, he uses sound to anchor the story of people trying to identify the person who tortured them in prison years before. Surprisingly he is able to incorporate humor in the story, which he asserts is an essential part of realism. He also notes that realistic characters are never all good or bad, and loves creating complex personalities. It Was Just an Accident is France’s entry to the Academy Awards Best International Feature Film category.
Joachim Trier: In Sentimental Value the house is an extraordinarily vivid character, carrying memories and emotions over generations. As Trier notes, it is a witness to conversation, and sees what is avoided. Memory is the central theme in this film, as each character confronts the past. He uses time shifts as another way to approach how (and what) people remember.
He also talked about his use of 35mm film, not because he’s a “film snob” but because it captures color in a truer way. As an example he talked about lead actress Renate Riensve’s skin tones, and how she blushes, which is not as evident on digital film. Sentimental Value is Norway’s entry to the Academy Awards Best International Feature Film category.
Oliver Laxe: Sound is a central focus of Sirāt (which had an all-female sound design crew). The filmtakes place in raves in the remote deserts of Morocco. Laxe considers a rave as a place of catharsis, where participants can lose themselves in the hypnotic dance music. He considers the film to be “anti-mainstream” in the way it deals with life and death.
The characters have chosen to put themselves in situations where death may be close. As he talked about the use of sound in the film, he said that the same words that describe images – texture, color – can be used to describe sound. Sirāt is Spain’s entry to the Academy Awards Best International Feature Film category.
Kaouther Ben Hania: Sound was central to the docufiction film, The Voice of Hind Rajab, as well. Actual recordings of a young girl trapped in a car that was bombed by Israeli forces are used in the film. The main action takes place in a Red Crescent emergency dispatch center, where a call is received from the girl, and the dispatchers try to get an ambulance to her through the perilous streets of Gaza.
Ben Hania described talking with the actual Red Crescent team in Gaza, and how they emphasized the agonizing dilemma they faced in trying to rescue the girl. She said one kept drawing huge loops in the air as they described the route an ambulance would have to take to get around areas being shelled, and she incorporated this into the film. She talked about the fine line of representing events accurately and filling in the rest dramatically. The Voice of Hind Rajab is Tunisia’s entry to the Academy Awards Best International Feature Film category.
The 41st Santa Barbara International Film Festival takes place from February 4-14, 2026. Official events including screenings, filmmaker Q&As, industry panels and celebrity tributes are held throughout the city, including at the historic Arlington Theatre and the new McHurley Film Center. Passes for the 2026 Festival are on sale now at sbiff.org.
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