Sydney’s leading festival for cult, underground and independent films, the Sydney Underground Film Festival (SUFF), returns next month to bring back the excitement of festival going and revitalise Sydney’s culture calendar, with a packed program from Thursday 8th to Sunday 11th September. For the first time ever, this year’s Festival moves to a new location, Event Cinemas George Street, for the Festival’s first in-person edition since 2019, complete with the launch of a brand-new Festival Hub.
“It’s exciting to announce that the annual SUFF pilgrimage is back! There has never been a better time to come and discover new films alongside like-minded people. We’re also proud to platform the immense talents of independent and alternative filmmakers from Australia and around the world, and we have a tonne of quality hilarious, offbeat and horrorific films not to be missed on the big screen this September”.Katherine Berger, Festival Director, commented. Berger went on to explain that the festival Features a full-scale program of compelling feature and documentary films from around the globe, exciting Australian premieres and a smorgasbord of shorts and live events, SUFF has become an important annual event for both local and nationwide audiences and filmmakers, and this year’s program continues to carve out a much-needed space for the independent film community in Sydney.

• Opening night film I Love My Dad (International Premiere), inspired by writer, director and star James Morosini’s true life experience as a hopelessly estranged father (Patton Oswalt) catfishes his son in an attempt to reconnect;
• Closing night film, the latest from Iranian-American director Ana Lily Amirpour (A Girl Walks Home at Night): Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon, a mind-bending adventure set in the swampy neon-lit streets of New Orleans. Led by a ferociously bewitching Jeon Jong-seo (Burning), it features Kate Hudson as an exotic dancer and an unusually straight-faced Craig Robinson (This Is The End);
• Bodies Bodies Bodies, a bloody, wildly funny Gen-Z horror-comedy remixing Clue, Scream and Mean Girls for the digital age. Starring Amandla Stenberg (The Hunger Games), Maria Bakalova (Borat Subsequent Moviefilm) and Pete Davidson (Saturday Night Live), this whip-smart smash hit out of SXSW is directed by Dutch filmmaker Halina Reijn, working from a story conceived by Cat Person author, Kristen Roupenian;
• The NSW premiere of the DIY sci-fi mind-bender, Something in the Dirt, from filmmaking duo Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, hot on the heels of their Marvel debut directing episodes of Moon Knight and Loki;
• On the Count of Three, a tragicomedy feature film debut from comedy’s rising star, Jerrod Carmichael (acclaimed special Rothaniel);
  
  
  
  
  
• The world premiere of Pig Killer, directed by Chad Ferrin, one of the most prolific Horror film directors working today. The film stars Jack Busey (The Frighteners) and Bai Ling (Red Corner);
• A celebration of independent film from around the world, including The Civil Dead (US), and Sick of Myself from Norwegian director Kristoffer Borgli (Former Cult Members Hear Music for the First Time);
• Eye-opening music documentaries set to stir minds, in I Get Knocked Down, featuring Chumbawamba singer Dunstan Bruce; In the Court of the Crimson King, on cult rock band King Crimson; and Pub: The Movie, about Melbourne ratbag troublemaker and cultural provocateur Fred Negro: artist, satirist and musician, featuring music legends Tim Rogers (You Am I), Greg Macainsh (Skyhooks), Paulie Stewart (Painters and Dockers) and many more;
• Special charity event of Ukrainian film Rhino by renown Ukrainian filmmaker (and once a Russian political prisoner), Oleg Sentsov, currently still in Ukraine fighting on the front line;
• SUFF’s selection of eyeball-bursting, finger-twitching and soul inspiring short films: a collection of animation, from the comic to the existential in RE:ANIMATION; expressions of sexuality in all its forms in LOVE/SICK; SUFF’s annual celebration of home-grown shorts from the best emergent Australian talent in HOMEBAKED
• AUSSIE SHORTS; engaging real-life narratives in bite-sized pieces in documentary shorts program REALITY BITES; short films designed to have you check the door is locked and that there’s nothing behind the sofa before you watch, in SH!T SCARED; and WTF, a package of confounding curiosities for the cinematically adventurous at heart;
• The return of much-loved filmmaking competition TAKE48 Film Challenge for its fourth year, putting filmmakers’ abilities to the test. TAKE48 takes place for 48 hours from 19th to 21st August, with over $10,000 in prizes to be won.