Running over eight days, the Mostly British Film Festival will unreel 26 films starting on February 5 with “Mr. Burton” a revelatory story of how Richard Burton got not only his start but also his last name. The festival closes a week later with “I Swear” – a funny, heartbreaking saga based on the real life of a young Scotsman who has Tourette syndrome but does not know it.

"Mr. Burton" - Thursday, February 5 at 7:30 PM

As the festival’s artistic director, I look over the website with pride in the process that brought me and my cinema-savvy board of directors to our 2026 program, the strongest one in our 18-year history.

My 50 years as the San Francisco Chronicle’s movie editor as well as an intrepid reporter taught me investigative skills that have been an enormous boon to hunting down films. Finding the right distributor is at the heart of it. This level of the movie industry consists of small distributors who change staff at a mind-boggling rate so just when you think you have made if not a friend at least a contact for next year, when 12 months come around that individual is almost always gone or working somewhere else.

While the festival’s goal is to find just the right combination of moving pictures to present on the Vogue theater’s big screen, it is the small computer screen in the office I share with my husband where the real work takes place.

Starting not long after the end of our 2025 festival I write missives to people whose information I find on IMDB Pro. And then I wait. And wait. As a reporter I was used to people responding to my requests even if their answer was “No comment.” But as just another festival director I don’t receive the same attention and many people don’t answer me at all. When that happens, I’ll look up the film’s producer or sometimes even its star, whose publicist has a vested interest in raising a client’s profile, especially here in the United States.

I am not going to belabor all the responses I still haven’t received but rather let you know about two truly exciting ones, the first which literally came out of the blue. It was from the British Film Institute saying they had heard about our festival and its emphasis on films from the UK and were wondering if we would like to partner with them in presenting our 2026 edition.

Would we ever! For those not familiar with the BFI, the much-esteemed organization is like a combination of what is best about the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Sundance Film Festival. The BFI works to protect classic films by overseeing their digital restoration. It also nurtures handpicked independent filmmakers by providing them with financial aid to get their dream projects onto movie screens.

"Brides" - Monday February 9, 7:30PM

Thanks to the BFI, our Mostly British Festival will show three films sponsored by their fairy godmothers across the pond. Each one is a miracle unto itself. “Brides” follows two alienated teenage girls, who lured by social media posts promising freedom, run away from Britain to marry Jihadis and join the Islamic State of Syria. Inspired by a real-life incident, director Nadia Fall attempts to understand the girls’ motivation and temper the rush to judgment.

"Urchin" - Tuesday, February 10, 5:00pm

“Urchin” also tries to understand the main character it follows: A homeless addict in East London. Director Harris Dickinson is better known as an actor (“Babygirl”) but judging from his first outing as a filmmaker he clearly has a future behind the camera. As the title character, Frank Dillane draws us in and makes us care about his plight with a raw openness and intelligence that won him Best Actor honors at the Cannes festival in May.

"My Father's Shadow" - Saturday, February 7, 7:45pm

Also do not miss our third film that came to us through the BFI, “My Father’s Shadow.” Set against the backdrop of the tumultuous Nigerian 1993 presidential election, it tells of a father who takes his young sons to Lagos for what they believe will be a day of fun. Instead, what they see going on, including their revered father acting awfully friendly to a beautiful woman, just confuses the boys. Sure to move you and stay in your mind’s eye long after the lights come on, “My Father’s Shadow” won Special Mention at Cannes this year.

"Wuthering Heights" - Wednesday, February 11, 7:30 PM

The second email that made my day requires a backstory. After I heard that “Wuthering Heights” was to be remade and released on Valentine’s Day right after our festival, I convinced myself that this was kismet, and we would surely premiere it at Mostly British. I was so sure that I moved the festival one week earlier so we could show it prior to its release.

But Warner Bros.—the studio bringing out the film—was not so receptive. I learned while trying to contact them that they rarely show films at festivals. They are so big they do not need that exposure. The consistent response to my long insightful emails (at least I thought they were insightful) was that the studio wouldn’t be making up its mind about early screenings for a long time. Only I didn’t have a long time. I still had to put together a festival, get it promoted early and make sure the website was up in time to accept ticket sales.

My team and I put together an outstanding program even though “Wuthering Heights” was nowhere in the neighborhood. Still I left an empty slot just in case, unable to accept that a version of the classic Brontë novel directed by the iconoclastic Emerald Fennell (“Promising Young Woman” and “Saltburn”) and starring Owen Cooper (the incredible young star of TV’s “Adolescence”) and heartthrob Jacob Elordi as the young and adult Heathcliff wouldn’t be in our festival.

And then right before everyone disappeared for the holidays I got a one-sentence email saying that Warner Bros. was going to proceed with our screening. What makes it a Christmas present not just for our festival but also our audience is that the screening on February 11 will be free - but you still must have a ticket. They will be available at the Vogue box office on opening night of the festival February 5. I hope to see you at Mostly British for this feverishly romantic film and many others on topics sure to compel.

Tickets will be available January 1 at mostlybritish.org and at the Vogue Box Office.