Osprey Short Film Awards 2023

Our judges have selected 10 films for the 2023 Osprey Short Film Awards which will be screened at the Theatre By The Lake on Saturday 25th February from 2pm. There'll be a chance to vote for the audience award on the day and we hope to be joined by directors Sarah Beddington (Fadia's Tree, showing before the Ospreys at 11am) and Hassan Nazer (Winners, Friday 24th at 9pm) to announce the winners.

The films all have a link to Cumbria and the selection includes animations, documentaries, dramas and comedies. Expect to see a flatulent wolf cub, mysterious strangers, explorations of memory through sound, running a Wainwright, dancing in nature, life contemplations, memories from artist Kurt Schwitters, an important look at virtue signalling and the work of the Wild Ennerdale partnership.

More details on all of the films can be found on our Shorts page.

Passes & Tickets Now On Sale

Just in time for Christmas, our Festival Passes and tickets are now on sale from the Alhambra Cinema.

To see what a pass will get you, you can now see the complete programme on our website – and what a programme it is!

Each day will be special but there are some real gems to look forward to. On Friday night, we have Winners, which is the UK entry in the Best Foreign Language Film category, which will be introduced by Director Hassan Nazer.

On Saturday we have the latest from Festival favourites the Dardenne brothers. Tori and Lokita is a masterpiece of social realism, loved by critics and the public alike.

Don’t be put off by the title of All the Beauty and the Bloodshed on Sunday. It is a documentary about Nan Goldin, a renowned photographer who led a bohemian lifestyle in New York but has recently led a campaign against the Sackler family, responsible for the opioid crisis in the USA that killed so many of her contemporaries.

So that is it – your Christmas dilemma solved. A festival pass and a link to the website – and a good excuse not to talk to the rellies as you browse and make your choices for February!

Glasgow Film Festival Comes To Keswick

To get you in the mood for a whole weekend of film, we have teamed up with the Alhambra and Glasgow Film Festival to bring three UK premieres to Keswick in the run up to our Festival. Starting with their opening film The Outfit on Wednesday 2nd March, followed by The Happening to recognise International Women's Day on the 8th and their closing film Murina on Sunday 13th, after the Film Club's screening of Lingui,The Sacred Bonds.

You can find more details on these films including links to book tickets on our Glasgow Film Festival page.

Greta Scacchi Comes To Keswick

We are thrilled to announce that Greta Scacchi will be our principal guest at the next February’s Keswick Film Festival!

Familiar to us all from the 2016 adaptation of War and Peace and fresh from the West End stage, where she appeared in The Kenneth Branagh Company's The Entertainer, Miss Scacchi will be presenting three of her most iconic films at the Festival - The Browning Version, from Carlisle born director Mike Figgis; White Mischief, the marvellous ensemble piece in which she co starred with Charles Dance and Joss Ackland and; Robert Altman’s The Player, surely one of the best films about Hollywood ever made.

She last appeared on screen at Keswick Film Festival in Ways to Live Forever, in 2012. That film and Alex Etel's appearance at the Alhambra were stand out moments from KFF's recent history.

Miss Scacchi's early appearances were opposite such greats as Laurence Olivier (The Ebony Tower) and James Mason (Doctor Fischer of Geneva) and she began her film career under the guidance of Ismail Merchant and James Ivory. Add Harrison Ford, Robert Altman and Gabriel Byrne to the mix and the opportunity to hear more about her career will be one of the highlights of the Festival.