The 13th edition of the Aussie & Kiwi Film Fest returns to Prague from Nov. 6-12, bringing a selection of contemporary Australian and New Zealand cinema to Kino Lucerna, Edison Filmhub and Kino Ponrepo. This year’s lineup ranges from award-winning westerns and outrageous horror comedies to visually striking documentaries and a special screening examining Czech emigration to Australia.
Organized annually since 2014, the festival offers Czech audiences an opportunity to discover filmmaking from two countries whose cinematic identities extend well beyond the Hollywood productions and international stars typically associated with them. The 2026 program places particular emphasis on the distinctive humor, genre experimentation and social commentary that have helped Australian and New Zealand cinema attract international attention.
Among this year’s highlights are a fantasy comedy featuring the voices of Olivia Colman and Sam Neill, a body horror film exploring the pressures of physical perfection, and a new western from acclaimed Indigenous Australian filmmaker Warwick Thornton.
Talking animals, alien pregnancies and Australian westerns
The festival opens at Kino Lucerna on Nov. 6 with Chasing Millions, an Australian-Irish crime comedy directed by Stephen Burke and inspired by the 2004 Northern Bank robbery in Belfast, one of the largest cash heists in British and Irish history.
Starring Madeleine Madden, Christopher Eccleston, Amy Molloy and Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, the film follows an Australian police officer who joins forces with a cynical Northern Irish detective to investigate the disappearance of £26 million. Their pursuit of the thieves unfolds against the backdrop of Northern Ireland’s complicated political history.
One of the program’s most unusual offerings is The Fox (pictured above), Australian filmmaker Dario Russo’s dark fantasy comedy starring Jai Courtney and Emily Browning, with Olivia Colman voicing a mysterious fox and Sam Neill lending his voice to a magpie.
The film follows a wealthy but naive young man whose fiancée has been unfaithful. When a talking fox offers to transform her into his ideal partner, he accepts, only to discover that interfering with another person’s identity comes with unforeseen consequences.
Russo’s debut feature won the audience award for Best Australian Feature at the 2026 Sydney Film Festival and received further recognition at the Calgary Underground Film Festival. The Fox screens at Kino Lucerna on Nov. 8.
New Zealand contributes an especially outrageous entry with Mum, I’m Alien Pregnant, directed by filmmaking duo Thunderlips, Sean Wallace and Jordan Mark Windsor. The horror comedy follows two socially isolated young adults whose lives take a grotesque turn when an unexpected extraterrestrial pregnancy disrupts their already complicated relationships with their mothers.
Combining body horror with a satirical examination of reproductive autonomy and family expectations, the film screens at Kino Lucerna on Nov. 7.
A more serious exploration of Australian identity arrives with Wolfram, the latest film from Warwick Thornton, whose previous feature Sweet Country won the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival in 2017.
Set in the Australian outback in 1932, the western follows two Indigenous siblings forced to work in a tungsten mine. When one is abducted by violent outlaws, the other embarks on a dangerous journey across the desert. The film continues Thornton’s examination of Australia’s colonial history and its consequences for Indigenous communities.
Wolfram screens at Edison Filmhub on Nov. 9, accompanied by the New Zealand short Kurī, directed by Ana Chaya Scotney.
Science, body horror and a Czech-Australian connection
The festival’s second half offers a mixture of documentary filmmaking, psychological horror and more unconventional storytelling.
On Nov. 10, Edison Filmhub presents Phenomena, Australian director Josef Gatti’s visually immersive documentary exploring the hidden patterns of the natural world. Combining practical scientific experiments with music by Nils Frahm and Rival Consoles, the film transforms chemical reactions, light and physical forces into an audiovisual experience.
Rather than relying on computer-generated imagery, Gatti captured the extraordinary visuals through real-world experiments and innovative cinematography. The documentary previously won both the Audience Award and the Best Science Communication Award in the international competition at the 2026 Academia Film Olomouc festival.
Another highlight is Saccharine, the latest horror film from Australian director Natalie Erika James, whose previous work includes Relic and Apartment 7A.
Starring Midori Francis, Danielle Macdonald and Madeleine Madden, the film follows a medical student whose obsession with losing weight leads her to experiment with mysterious pills containing human ashes. The resulting supernatural nightmare explores body image, addiction and the extremes of contemporary beauty culture.
Saccharine screens at Edison Filmhub on Nov. 11, followed by a discussion with Czech singer and author Ridina Ahmed, whose work, including the Sádlo podcast and the book Moje tělo je moje (My Body Is Mine), has addressed body image and social expectations.
The festival concludes on Nov. 12 with Holy Days, a New Zealand comedy-drama directed by Nat Boltt and starring Miriam Margolyes, Jacki Weaver and Judy Davis.
Set in the 1970s, the film follows a young boy struggling with the death of his mother who joins three eccentric nuns on an unlikely road trip to save their threatened convent. The film blends family drama with the distinctive offbeat humor associated with New Zealand cinema.
The lineup also includes a particularly relevant film for Czech audiences. On Nov. 7, Kino Ponrepo presents Maria, a 1992 documentary by Czech-Australian filmmaker Barbara Chobocky.
Through family archives, letters and personal memories, Chobocky examines the life of her mother, who left Czechoslovakia following the communist takeover and established a new home in Australia. The screening will be followed by a discussion with the director, providing a personal perspective on Czech-Australian migration and the lasting emotional consequences of exile.
Beyond the main screenings, the festival includes short films preceding every feature, with tickets covering both presentations. Its accompanying program extends to school screenings, discussions and a contemporary Indigenous Australian art exhibition running through December at Create and Sip Art Café.
School screenings at Kino Lucerna include New Zealand director Rachel House’s The Mountain, which follows three children on an adventure toward Mount Taranaki, and Phenomena, with educational materials available for teachers.
The festival is organized by the volunteer-run AKFF association, which also maintains partnerships with Czech and Slovak film festivals in Australia, strengthening cultural exchange between the two regions.
The 13th Aussie & Kiwi Film Fest runs Nov. 6-12 at Kino Lucerna, Edison Filmhub and Kino Ponrepo in Prague. All films are presented in their original or English-language versions with Czech subtitles.
The full program, screening times and tickets are available on the official Aussie & Kiwi Film Fest website.
