Main Slate
Fatherland
Paweł Pawlikowski
Oscar-nominated director Paweł Pawlikowski (Cold War, NYFF56) won Best Director at Cannes for his most potent film yet, following novelist Thomas Mann (Hanns Zischler) and his daughter Erika Mann (Sandra Hüller) on a road trip across Germany in the aftermath of World War II. Poland’s entry for Best International Feature Film at the 2027 Academy Awards.
- Runtime
- 82 min
- Country
- Poland/
Germany/ Italy/ France - Language
- English,
Russian, French, German - Year
- 2026
- More information
- Official page
Screenings
Academy Award–nominated director Paweł Pawlikowski (Cold War, NYFF56) specializes in narratively economical yet emotionally and philosophically expansive historical drama, and his latest film, which earned him a Best Director prize at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, might be his most potent and provocative yet. Set in the aftermath of World War II, Fatherland follows the Nobel Prize–winning novelist Thomas Mann (Hanns Zischler) and his daughter Erika Mann (Sandra Hüller) on a fictionalized 1949 road trip across a torn Germany that’s at once reeling from the destruction of battle and in profound denial about its evils and culpability. As they move from the West to the East, Pawlikowski uses Thomas and Erika’s fraught interpersonal dynamics and own familial tragedies to reflect upon a country facing an ever-evolving moral urgency. Cinematographer Łukasz Żal’s beautifully stark black-and-white frames and Hüller and Zischler’s expertly restrained performances combine to evoke a Europe gradually awakening to a new historical reckoning. An NYFF64 Main Slate selection. A MUBI release.
CCAP and Audio description available.
Explore more on Film Comment:
Academy Award–nominated director Paweł Pawlikowski (Cold War, NYFF56) specializes in narratively economical yet emotionally and philosophically expansive historical drama, and his latest film, which earned him a Best Director prize at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, might be his most potent and provocative yet. Set in the aftermath of World War II, Fatherland follows the Nobel Prize–winning novelist Thomas Mann (Hanns Zischler) and his daughter Erika Mann (Sandra Hüller) on a fictionalized 1949 road trip across a torn Germany that’s at once reeling from the destruction of battle and in profound denial about its evils and culpability. As they move from the West to the East, Pawlikowski uses Thomas and Erika’s fraught interpersonal dynamics and own familial tragedies to reflect upon a country facing an ever-evolving moral urgency. Cinematographer Łukasz Żal’s beautifully stark black-and-white frames and Hüller and Zischler’s expertly restrained performances combine to evoke a Europe gradually awakening to a new historical reckoning. An NYFF64 Main Slate selection. A MUBI release.
CCAP and Audio description available.
Explore more on Film Comment: