Named after the practice of clandestine dissemination of censored and forbidden texts in communist states, Samizdat Eastern European Film Festival is an audience-focused film festival based in Scotland. The festival takes place annually, with a main programme of screenings in Glasgow taking place over a week in early autumn, and selected screenings in other locations: in 2026, returning to Edinburgh and Aberdeen, and, for the first time, travelling to Cromarty and Dunfermline. With a diverse programme of meticulously curated retrospectives and new films, as well as special events such as animation collections and short film showcases, Samizdat is the first Scotland-based festival dedicated exclusively to cinema from Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and the Caucasus.

“Delphine Seyrig’s prescient and passionate 1981 documentary both critiques the cinema and seeks to change it.” The New-Yorker In 1975 Delphine Seyrig recorded interviews with twenty-four actresses in France and the US, including Maria Schneider, Jane Fonda, and Shirley MacLaine, about their experience across the industry. Through their words, Seyrig reveals the frustrations of working within the patriarchal studio system.

Join us for a Halloween screening of this 90s horror classic which combines scares with rich social commentary. Tickets £3/£5/£7 on a sliding scale, with free entry for Grassmarket Community Project Members, open door meal attendees, and anyone else in need of a free ticket. Please select the ticket price that feels right to you; all income from tickets will be directly used to support the continued running of our cinema screenings. Notes Duration: 99 minutes Certificate 15 -strong violence, horror, gory images The film will screen with English descriptive subtitles, transcribing both dialogue and key audio information from the film The film will start promptly at 7pm without trailers The Grassmarket Community Project is a wheelchair accessible venue

Jali Film Weekender returns 28 October – 1 November 2026 for its second edition, presenting a five-day celebration of Black, African and diaspora film, extended realities and more. This year’s programme theme is Rebellion, which manifests across both cinematic forms and narratives told, as well as who audiences will be introduced to both on and off screen. The programme probes what it can mean to do things differently; to create work that is unexpected, to journey through lives that do not fit into long established cinematic gazes, and to carefully hold the multiplicities of Black, African and diaspora experiences. Rebellion runs through our expansive screen programme, spanning narrative, documentary, animation, experimental and short film, and continues through filmmaker Q&As, panel discussions, gatherings and workshops, as well as our Extended Realities (XR) Exhibition of virtual and expanded reality works. For full programme details visit: www.jalicollective.co.uk Jali Film Weekender 2026 is supported by the Screen Scotland National Lottery Film Festival & Screening Programme Fund and by Film Hub Scotland (part of the BFI’s Film Audience Network, awarding funding on behalf of Screen Scotland and the BFI National Lottery), and other partners. Spotlight: Geração 80 is made possible through the support of Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation UK Branch’ and their Gulbenkian Exhibitions Fund.

As part of the Spotlight: Geração 80 programme we welcome Ery Claver from Geração 80 for a special Lunchtime Talk Masterclass. Founded in 2010 by Tchiloia Lara, Jorge Cohen and Mário Bastos, Geração 80 was born from a burning desire to tell Angolan stories with authenticity, innovation and vision. A film production company dedicated to connecting generations and strengthening Angolan cinema, their mission is to bring Angola to the screen, tell African stories and collectively make films. Geração 80 has played a key role in shaping contemporary Angolan cinema, with productions spanning feature films and documentaries, showcasing at major international film festivals across five continents. Every Thursday, they transform their backyard into Cine Geração, where they’ve been screening films for over 200 weeks. This Masterclass is an exciting opportunity to deeply explore Geração 80’s extensive archive. Where did it all begin; how has the shape of their work, and the context(s) they navigate changed over a decade and a half; what does collective filmmaking look like in practice; and how they continue to create space for Angolan talent and audiences.

Special collaboration between Peacock Cinema and the 2026 Samizdat Film Festival. This film will take place in the Studio at Carnegie Hall. We’re excited to be collaborating with Samizdat in presenting their first-ever screening in Dunfermline: a Halloween special of a landmark of Polish cinema, Mother Joan of the Angels – an austere religious horror that follows a priest sent to a remote 17th-century convent following reports of demonic possession. This screening will be preceded by a short in-person welcome and a pre-recorded introduction. Dir: Jerzy Kawalerowicz Cast: Lucyna Winnicka, Mieczyslaw Voit Country of production: Poland Production Year: 1961

Cinetopia Salon Halloween special: Häxan (1922) + Live music by Jane Gardner & Hazel Morrison This Halloween, experience one of early cinema’s most gloriously eerie and unsettling masterworks accompanied by an original live score from two exceptional Edinburgh-based musician/composers. Danish filmmaker Benjamin Christensen’s Häxan (Witches, 1922) – also known as Witchcraft Through the Ages is unlike anything else in the silent film canon: part scholarly dissertation, part fever dream, part full-blooded horror spectacle. Beginning as an illustrated lecture on medieval superstition and demonology, the film spirals into a series of increasingly lurid dramatisations of witchcraft, inquisition and hysteria, before arriving, with startling modernity, at the suggestion that those condemned as witches may simply have been women suffering from misunderstood mental illness. Shot in meticulous, sometimes scandalous detail, Häxan remains genuinely strange and disturbing a century on. Satan leers. The torture chambers unsettle. The nuns misbehave. It is, by turns, a work of serious inquiry and delirious provocation, and one of the most visually inventive films ever made. Jane Gardner is an Edinburgh-based pianist and composer with an extraordinary breadth of musical life behind her. She studied at York University and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland before completing a PhD in Composition at Goldsmiths College, London, and was awarded the prestigious Gullivar Bursary - nominated by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies - to study Indonesian music in Java and Bali. Her concert works have been commissioned by ensembles including the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Piano Circus, and she has composed for Shakespeare's Globe Theatre and acrobatic string group The Gogmagogs. As an orchestrator and music copyist, she has worked with composer and producer Jim Sutherland on the Disney Pixar soundtrack for Brave. As a silent film accompanist, Jane has performed at the BFI London, the Hippodrome in Bo'ness and at festivals and venues across the UK, bringing to each screening an instinctive feel for atmosphere and narrative that makes her one of the finest practitioners in the field. Hazel Morrison is a percussionist and timpanist who trained at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in the early 1990s. Her career spans an exceptional range: she has performed with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Orchestra Scotland/Brazil, toured with folk rock band Cantara, and appeared at Celtic Connections with PJ Moore of The Blue Nile. A Danny Kyle Award winner both as a solo artist and in ensemble, she released her own solo album and is currently at work on a new one. Hazel also teaches and coaches young percussionists for Edinburgh City Council. She and Jane Gardner are long-standing collaborators on silent film accompaniments, and together they bring a dynamic, layered presence to the screen that is very much their own. Cinetopia Salon is supported by Film Hub Scotland, part of the BFI’s Film Audience Network, and funded by Screen Scotland and National Lottery funding from the BFI.

Special Peacock Cinema Hallow'een screening of the 1975 musical comedy horror film The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Based on the musical by Richard O’Brien, the film follows a newly engaged young couple, Brad (Barry Bostwick) and Janet (Susan Sarandon), through the most unforgettable night of their lives. The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a hilarious romp filled with song-and-dance numbers – and enough horror to thrill you, chill you and fulfill you from start to finish. What better way to see this camp horror classic than on Halloween night and on the big screen in Dunfermline city centre. ** Dressing up for Halloween is actively encouraged. ** Dir: Jim Sharman Cast: Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon, Barry Bostwick Country of production: USA & UK Production Year: 1975

Richard Linklater's 2003 classic film feels like the perfect way to open this set of screenings, not only because its fun, feel good and inclusive message about how everyone has the potential to be brilliant is what we are all about at GCP, but also because it gives us a chance to present the fantastic work of the GCP Band. Led by volunteers Calum and Chris, the GCP band have been writing original songs and performing covers together for several years. They rehearse every Monday at GCP, and we are so excited to have them opening this special series of Sunday screenings! Part of I Like It Here: A New Season Celebrating Community, Human Connection and Love, a series of 8 screenings presented by Grassmarket Community Picturehouse and the Edinburgh Film Guild. Tickets £3/£5/£7 on a sliding scale, with free entry for Grassmarket Community Project Members, open door meal attendees, and anyone else in need of a free ticket. Please select the ticket price that feels right to you; all income from tickets will be directly used to support the continued running of our cinema screenings. Supported by Film Hub Scotland, part of the BFI’s Film Audience Network, awarding funding on behalf of Screen Scotland and the BFI National Lottery. Notes Duration: 109 minutes Certificate 12A - moderate bad language, discriminatory terms, rude humour The film will screen with English descriptive subtitles, transcribing both dialogue and key audio information from the film. The event will start promptly at 2pm without trailers The Grassmarket Community Project is a wheelchair accessible venue

Cinetopia presents this double bill of Ken Loach's Sweet Sixteen (2002) and Michael Caton-Jones' Our Ladies, as part of our Transmission: Youth Across Generations program, exploring youth culture movements, memory and identity in Britain across the decades. (This is a rescheduled screening originally due to take place on 25th October) Curated by two of our young programmers, Vama Urban and Eva Rodrigues. Sweet Sixteen (Ken Loach, 2002, 106 mins, cert 18) Sweet Sixteen is a gritty coming-of-age drama following a Scottish teenager, Liam from Greenock, trying to build a better life for himself and his imprisoned mother, despite having a troubled background and deprived environment. Sweet Sixteen explores how your surroundings and upbringing can shape your identity and your future, without necessarily determining it. Sweet Sixteen also marked the debut of renowned Scottish actor Martin Compston, who had never previously acted until this film. Our Ladies (Michael Caton-Jones, 2019, 100 mins, cert 15) Set in 1990s Scotland, Our Ladies follows a group of five teenage girls from a Catholic school in Fort William who travel to Edinburgh for a choir competition. Far away from the constraints of school, family and a small-town community, the trip becomes an opportunity to assert their independence and test the boundaries they grew up within. Between both screenings, audiences are invited to share their own stories in response to the themes that connect both films: rebellion, escape and belonging. Through an interactive sound and listening booth, audiences are encouraged to use their voices to reflect on experiences, share songs and contribute their own perspectives across generations to a collective sound archive.