Once again, the Crossing Europe Festival in Linz, Austria, offers a deep dive into contemporary European cinema from across the continent. Unspooling from 28 April-3 May under the motto “Family Ties”, the programme includes 13 world, two international and 68 Austrian premieres, spread across a total of 148 screenings. “Family stories feature very prominently in this year’s programme,” co-director Katharina Riedler explains as she describes this year’s theme. “That’s why we’ve chosen this name.”

Opening the festival are four films: Massimiliano Battistella's documentary Dom, following a woman who returns to Sarajevo 30 years after being evacuated during the siege; the Dutch-German family drama Donkey Days by Rosanne Pel; Chantal Akerman's 1986 musical-comedy Golden Eighties; and Gábor Holtai's autocracy-critical debut feature, Feels Like Home, hailing from Hungary.

Central themes at this edition are war and political conflict. Apart from Holtai’s opening film, there are new takes on the conflict in Ukraine, with Yulia Lokshina's documentary Active Vocabulary; Anton Shtuka's The Last Prometheus of Donbas, which follows the staff of a power plant under constant bombardment; and Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk's Silent Flood. Talking about the overarching family theme, co-director Sabine Gebetsroither points out, “It’s interesting that the family dynamic is used, particularly in fiction features, to explore these major conflicts.”

The Arbeitswelten section, this year titled “At the Limit – and No End in Sight”, turns its attention to those who are often overlooked: people who toil with their hands and fight for better conditions in precarious circumstances. Highlights include Kilian Armando Friedrich's I Understand Your Displeasure, Anastasiya Miroshnichenko's Welded Together and Srđan Kovačević's The Thing to Be Done, which is about the successful labour struggle of shipyard workers in the Slovenian port of Koper.

A particular highlight is this year's Tribute, which for the first time honours not a single filmmaker, but an entire decade. Curated by the Diskollektiv collective, it traces European cinema of the 1980s through a primarily feminist lens, featuring movies such as Marleen Gorris's A Question of Silence and Menelik Shabazz's Burning an Illusion.

The Local Artists Competition encompasses 46 works with an Upper Austrian connection, including six feature films. A special strand honours internationally acclaimed artistic duo PRINZpod (Brigitte Prinzgau and Wolfgang Podgorschek), accompanied by an exhibition at Galerie MAERZ.

In terms of gender-focused programming, Crossing Europe again strives to strike a balance. Approximately 47% of directing credits go to women, 41% to men, 1% to non-binary individuals and 12% to mixed co-directing teams.

On a less hopeful note, the total budget for 2026 stands at around €980,000, with the festival organisers citing a strained financial situation and initial funding cuts from individual supporters. This, coupled with the loss of a number of sponsors, is casting uncertainty over its future.