The Festival Internacional de Cine de Morelia (FICM, the Morelia International Film Festival) opened its 24th edition on Friday 16 October 2026, running to 25 October in the capital of Michoacán state. The opening night, at the Teatro Mariano Matamoros, screened "Campeón gabacho", directed and co-written by Jonás Cuarón, with Guillermo del Toro and Alfonso Cuarón in the audience alongside a cast led by Juan Daniel García Treviño and Leslie Grace.
This year's official selection holds 96 titles: 64 Mexican short films, 12 Mexican documentaries, 12 Mexican features and 8 works in the Sección Michoacana, the strand reserved for the host state. Spain's Juan Antonio Bayona chairs the jury for the Mexican feature competition.
Two medals, two days
The centre of the tributes is the Medalla Filmoteca de la UNAM (Filmoteca Medal of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México), awarded since 1987 to figures including Francis Ford Coppola, Juliette Binoche, Isabelle Huppert, Béla Tarr and Willem Dafoe. This edition gives it to two Mexican directors: Guillermo del Toro, on Sunday 18 October at 3pm, and Alfonso Cuarón, on Tuesday the 20th at 5.30pm.
The festival's statement calls Del Toro "one of the most creative and visionary artists of his generation", and points to Cuarón's body of work, acclaimed "by critics and audiences", including the directing and cinematography Oscars for "Roma" (2018).
Del Toro will also present a restored version of "Pan's Labyrinth" — released in Spanish as "El laberinto del fauno" — for the film's 20th anniversary, as part of its worldwide re-release in 4K and 3D.
What competes, and what screens
The programme mixes recent national production with international titles. Gael García Bernal brings his third film as a director, "Hombre al agua"; Diego Luna competes in the Mexican feature category with "Ceniza en la boca". Foreign titles on the schedule include James Gray's "Paper Tiger", Markus Schleinzer's "Rose", Luis Gnecco's "Borges and Me", Beth de Araújo's "Josephine", and "Killing Castro", with Diego Boneta. Documentaries include "Marcos. Otro mundo es posible" and "Mujer santuario", the latter presented by Demián Bichir.
The weight of Mexican names across both the programme and the tributes is what the festival itself highlights about this edition, which it presents as one of the most Mexican in its history.
With information from the Festival Internacional de Cine de Morelia, La Voz de Michoacán, Forbes México, El Informador and Chilango.
