MONSTRA | 26th Lisbon Animation Festival

MONSTRA 2027 will take place from 11 to 21 March and, as is now customary, the festival will choose a central theme for its programme, around which the film screenings, workshops and discussion series will revolve. 

Accordingly, for 2027, we have taken three masterpieces that redefined the modern audiovisual imagination as our starting point to arrive at the theme: the 125th anniversary of A Trip to the Moon (Georges Méliès), the 100th anniversary of Metropolis (Fritz Lang) and the 50th anniversary of the premiere of the fourth instalment of the Star Wars saga, as starting points for Science Fiction. 

This choice, whilst evoking the past, also responds to the urgency of the present, which is the future. We are living in a time of upheaval and scientific and technological paradigm shifts, with the consolidation of Virtual and Augmented Reality, the dizzying expansion of Artificial Intelligence and the increasingly widespread use of the moving image as a tool for research and simulation in practically all areas of science and artistic expression. It is at this intersection between the founding legacy of cinema and the creative revolutions of our time that the theme and programme are situated, examining and discussing science fiction as realities of the present and the future.

Thus, the programme will not be restricted to science fiction as a rigid genre, but will encompass a wide range of films, debates, meetings and round-table discussions that approach science in a creative, speculative and poetic manner. 

To strike a balance between heritage and the avant-garde, the festival will feature retrospective programmes reviving key historical works, as well as sections entirely dedicated to the most daring and avant-garde contemporary animation. 

The film programme is at the heart of MONSTRA’s offering, bringing together the guest country, the eight official competitions, and a wide range of retrospectives and screenings of historical significance. Centred around this core, the festival develops an extensive programme that includes exhibitions, workshops, training sessions, talks, immersive installations, cross-disciplinary programming, industry meetings, concerts and live performances. These activities are not merely supplementary; they are essential extensions that expand the experience of animation beyond the screen and the cinema auditorium, transforming each edition into a space for discovery and dialogue centred on the films, the guest country and the festival’s annual theme. 

With a well-established yet growing structure, MONSTRA takes place across various venues in the city of Lisbon, ensuring a decentralised programme that is accessible to a wide range of audiences.

In each edition, MONSTRA pays tribute to a country’s animated cinema, highlighting its history, aesthetic diversity and most significant filmmakers. The choice of guest country is guided by various criteria, such as the celebration of symbolic dates or historical and cultural ties with Portugal. 

In 2027, MONSTRA’s guest countries will be Greece and Cyprus, celebrating two film industries which, despite their size, have been making their mark through artistic quality, aesthetic experimentation and the growing international recognition of their filmmakers. The programme dedicated to the guest countries will provide a comprehensive overview of Greek and Cypriot animation, fostering encounters between creators, professionals and audiences, and strengthening cultural dialogue between Portugal and the Eastern Mediterranean.