Cartagena: The International Film Festival of Cartagena de Indias (FICCI), the oldest in Latin America, celebrated its 65th edition with a historic record of more than 80,000 spectators and a program that included more than 150 films from 45 countries. The festival, held from March 3 to 8, 2026, consolidated its position as the most important film event in the Spanish-speaking world.
The winner of the Grand Prize Fierro Colombia was El último río, a Colombian-Brazilian co-production that narrates the story of an Amazonian indigenous community facing the advance of illegal mining. The jury, chaired by Peruvian director Claudia Llosa, highlighted the film's visual strength and its political relevance in the context of the regional environmental crisis.
Latin American Cinema Flourishing
The 65th edition of FICCI reflects a moment of effervescence of Latin American cinema globally. Films from Mexico, Argentina, Chile, and Colombia have won awards at Cannes, Venice, and Sundance in the last three years, and streaming has exponentially amplified the reach of these productions to global audiences.
Netflix, Amazon Prime, and the regional platform Mubi have significantly increased their investment in Latin American cinema, with more than 400 million dollars committed to local productions for 2026 across the region. This investment is transforming the film ecosystem, creating jobs, training new talent, and diversifying the narratives that reach screens around the world.
Cinema and Historical Memory
A special section of the festival was dedicated to documentary cinema on historical memory in Latin America. Documentaries about Southern Cone dictatorships, the Colombian armed conflict, Venezuelan repression, and Central American migrations offered a raw and necessary look at collective traumas that continue to shape the region's societies. The FICCI dedicated the section to victims of the Colombian conflict, in the year marking 10 years of the Peace Agreement with the FARC.
