LOCARNO FILM FESTIVAL | Retrospective 2026: Red & Black – Hollywood Left and the Blacklist
THE HOLLYWOOD BLACKLIST is the subject of this year’s retrospective at Locarno Film Festival. At the famous Gran Rex cinema the programme will focus on the infamous Hollywood Blacklist, one of the most turbulent and politically charged periods in the history of American cinema.
Curated by Ehsan Khoshbakht and produced in partnership with the Cinémathèque suisse and with the support of UCLA Film & Television Archive, Red & Black – Hollywood Left and the Blacklist paints a complex portrait of an era in which creatives were confronted by unprecedented abuse of state and industry power and which they met, courageously, with fierce artistic resistance.
As the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union swelled into a defining feature of world politics, right-wing voices in the American political system alleged communist infiltration of Hollywood. Hearings that more closely resembled prosecutions followed, instigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). The industry responded in fear and enforced a blacklist that upended careers, forced artists to adopt pseudonyms, stifled free expression, and exiled creators overseas. Guilt by association tore families apart and films with left-wing ideas – real or imagined – were suppressed.
Red & Black – Hollywood Left and the Blacklist will re-examine this repressive yet defiantly creative era, which mirrors the political attacks on free speech and artistic freedom seen again today. The programme will highlight key films by directors, writers, and stars as diverse as John Garfield, Joseph Losey, Dalton Trumbo, Dorothy Parker, Richard Wright, and Charles Chaplin, and trace the Red Scare’s origins and aftermath across the United States, in Europe, and beyond.
Spanning fiction, documentaries, newsreels, and shorts from the U.S., Britain, Spain, Italy, France, Mexico, and Argentina, Red & Black will bring together digital restorations and archival prints for a unique examination of the films of the period and will be accompanied, as in previous years, by a comprehensive book featuring contributions from international film scholars and critics on the films of the Hollywood left and published by Les Éditions de l’Œil. For the first time, a podcast, written by Khoshbakht, will detail some of the history and context of the blacklist era.
The Sound of Fury (1950), directed by Cy Endfield
The North Star (1943), directed by: Lewis Milestone Wri: Lillian Hellman
Ruthless (1948), directed by Edgar Ulmer, writers: Alvah Bessie/Gordon Kahn
Intruder in the Dust (1949), directed by: Clarence BrownWriter: Ben Maddow
Crossfire (1947), directed by Edward Dmytryk
Amazing Mr X (1948), directed by Bernard Vorhaus
None But the Lonely Heart (1944), directed by Clifford Odets
España otra vez (Jaime Camino, 1969), written by Alvah Bessie (main pic)
79th LOCARNO FILM FESTIVAL 2026 | 5-15 August 2026