That’s a Wrap on the 2026 Oak Cliff Film Festival!
It was a whirlwind of a film festival. I’m talking about the 2026 Oak Cliff Film Festival that I was super lucky to attend July 30 through August 3. The fest itself ran July 31-August 2 but, I like to get to festivals early and leave a little late in order to not be completely consumed by the natural intensity of a jam packed weekend.
I genuinely love Texas, at least the Texas I get to see and visit which revolves around seeing friends and attending film festivals. I feel very at home there for some reason. Maybe it’s a familiarity or all the awesome food (talking about tacos and BBQ), the always bubbling film scene or just being away from my Northern California home. Then when you combine those things with seeing friends and attending festivals, it’s just a nice concoction, a sort of vacation with very little relaxing.
After a long day of travel (have you heard? Airline travel is a mess!) I finally touched down in Dallas around 5:00 p.m. and was promptly smacked in the face by the heat. It was real hot. Hot even by Texans standards. I also have been enjoying a NorCal summer that’s hit 90 degrees once so, 103 degrees at 5:00 p.m. was…alarming.
I recently realized that I don’t attend nearly as many film festivals as I used to. Probably a combo of day jobs mixed with the constant merry-go-round of people I know at festivals moving on and me not really knowing the new person as well as the fact that festivals don’t really “bring out” film writers like they used to. There was a time some 20-odd years ago when I was at Film Threat where there were so many invites, I had to turn some down.Thus, the fact that Oak Cliff has the same core group of people allows me to get to attend but it also speaks to just how solid and committed this film festival is to their community and film fans.
I provided a quick background in my curtain raiser about how the OCFF came to be and even before I left, I was struck by how much the festival remains committed to the Oak Cliff neighborhood which is in Dallas. While there have been constant rumblings of “gentrification” of the neighborhood, I honestly don’t see that happening in any negative way. Granted, I am a visitor and didn’t grow up there but I’ve visited numerous time and since the last festival I attended there in 2017, the neighborhood seems relatively the same.
Yes, there’s a dispensary right next door to the Texas Theater but, who even knows what that means with the new (idiotic) Texas laws against cannabis. And aside from the theater and a record store (Top Ten records, amazing) which is overseen by a few Texas Theater owners, the Oak Cliff neighborhood feels predominantly old school Texas/Latino. I’d say TexMex but I don’t know if that’s the proper term. Hopefully, you get my point.
There’s amazing taquerias and paleta’s (fresh frozen fruit ice cream) as well as joyeria’s (jewelry stores) and stores to buy or rent clothes for weddings and quinceañera’s. Then there’s the glorious Texas Theater, right in the middle. A jewel of an old movie palace with a film festival serving as a jewel of the community.
When I finally deemed it safe enough to venture out of my darkly air-conditioned hotel room on Thursday (as an avid indoorsman, this was no small feat) I headed to an opening night party at a very nice Mexican restaurant. Film festivals are many things but a refrain I was reminded about by one of the volunteers is, they’re like a summer camp. People you haven’t seen in a year or more are back and it’s truly lovely to catch up with them. For me, it was my first time seeing my good friend Melanie Addington in at least seven years. Soon my even older good friend Joe Swanberg rolled in as well as even older termed friends like James Faust, artistic director of the Dallas International Film Festival.
After several free drinks and tons of laughs, the party moved across the street to the Texas Theater for the opening night screening of Swanberg’s The Sun Never Sets. I truly loved the film and in all honesty, I try not to write about films made by friends. However, I was the first person to ever review Swanberg’s first film, Kissing on the Mouth and as one of the few remaining writers around who covered Mumblecore from the get-go, I bent my own rule. Plus, the movie is really, really great. Go see it when it opens later this month!
After the film the opening night party commenced in the lobby and upper rooms of the Texas Theater. A local brewery named Vector Brewing created a lovely lager called “Vignette” for the festival and even though the party was poppin’, I am much older than I used to be and was starving so I dipped early and hit up a late night taqueria down the street before calling it a night.
Joe Swanberg intros THE SUN NEVER SETS
Another cool thing about the Oak Cliff Film Festival is, they don’t program things early in the morning, I get that some fests are just packed to the gills and have no choice but as a filmmaker and as a person who reviews films at a festival, it’s such a drag when something is happening at 10:00 a.m. the morning after a party. Thus, the first official festival happening on Friday was a 4:00 p.m. cocktail party at a beautiful old church that is now a performing arts center. I hung there for a bit and spent the next few hours hanging with old friends in and around the Texas Theater before settling in for a very cool video showcase featuring festival guests Mark Pellington and Tamra Davis.
Pellington and Davis each have made well-known films (Pellington did The Mothman Prophecies and Arlington Road and Davis helmed Half Baked and Billy Madison) and both have made some of the greatest music videos of all time. Literally. I won’t bore you with a laundry list but the OCFF put together a jaw-dropping showcase that swam between “I didn’t realize they did that one!” over to “holy shit, that was amazing…how did they…” Festival Director Ashton Campbell not only oversaw the group of music videos, he also handled Q & A duties and did an awesome job. I really cannot emphasize just how much the music videos made by Pellington and Davis not only inspired countless people but they also serve as a time capsule for the music of that time and for me as well. You should really check out all the videos they made as well as Davis’ The Best Summer which should be available soon.
Look, at this point, I’m not going to lie. Be it the blazing hot weather, the cool and dark hotel room or just the simple pleasure of not being home but, I found it very difficult to want to leave my hotel room for any daytime activities. I also was bummed to not be able to wander around the local neighborhoods due to the weather but would also get hungry so was Door-Dashing tacos like an insane person. I think my taco total at the end of the trip (5 days) was 18. Honestly, a bit disappointing but I also ate Texas fast food staple Wataburger twice, the second of which was a big mistake and likely cost me some tacos.
As the weather cooled to around 100 degrees on Saturday, I ventured to the Texas Theater to see, you know, some movies. First up was David Kittredge’s fascinating and lovingly done doc Boorman and the Devil which details the truly disastrous – in virtually every aspect– of John Boorman’s film Exorcist II: The Heretic. I hope to have more on this soon but the long story short is, no one sets out to make a terrible movie unless they’re a dim brained asshole and Boorman is definitely not that. Movies are hard to make and while I still can’t classify Exorcist II: The Heretic as a noble failure, it seems to have some cool stuff in it! Our Chris Reed also listed the film as one of his favorite docs of 2025 so, you know it’s good.
After that I grabbed some popcorn and headed right back inside the theater for Douglas Blush, Piero F. Giunti’s doc Los Lobos: Native Sons. I’ve been a massive fan of Los Lobos forever and often thought doing a doc on them would be a dream project. Clearly Blush and Giunti agreed and beat all of us to the punch. As a music snob, I and others often argue who the greatest American band is and while names like REM, The Band and The Grateful Dead are always in the mix, I would and have argued Los Lobos is way up there. Los Lobos: Native Sons solidifies my opinion on this and although it’s a bit “by the book” in terms of music docs, a story and, more importantly the music, of Los Lobos doesn’t need any dressing up.
I also want to point out that the short film that played before Los Lobos: Native Sons, Teatro Dallas: 40 Years of Play was a loving tribute to what seems like an amazing local theater troupe that has been through ups and downs that would destroy most creative endeavors. As I listened to around 100 people in the crowd who were there for the short laugh, applaud and yell out words of support for the theater being shown onscreen, I was reminded of what I mentioned up top here, the Oak Cliff Film Festival is more than just a film festival, it’s a celebration of the community it resides in and seeks to bring people there to share in this community. One hand washing the other, a film reel feeding in to another film reel.
HtN’s Don R. Lewis & Roger Avary
By Sunday, I was pretty cooked. But, as I mentioned in my curtain raiser, I have a long history with Roger Avary and while we had met briefly a few times over the weekend, I really wanted to speak with him and, you know, get a selfie. The opportunity presented itself perfectly as the fest was showing Pulp Fiction which, if you are unaware, is a pretty good movie. Seeing it with an audience for the first time since it was in theaters was a amazing and hearing Avary’s take on the whole thing was cool and insightful. After the film I hung for a few with his daughter and partner-in-crime, Gala before I got to talk for a few minutes with Roger and tell him how much his website and his community building there back in the early 2000s influences me and helped create a friend group I still have today. He is a good dude and I hope his upcoming film projects (even the AI ones!) yield results. I’m also excited to become part of he and Gala’s new streaming service Pulp Time!
After Pulp Fiction and even more tacos, this dude was toast. I had an 11:00 a.m. flight and while the desire to party the night away one last time at the Texas Theater was strong, I had had enough. I had a great time at the festival and want to also thank my friend Chris Gardner for making the fest so smooth to navigate and also, Jason Reimer, co-founder of the theater and fest who, every time I talk to, I discover something new we have in common. I also want to shout out fellow co-founder of the theater and fest Barak Epstein who is truly the man behind the curtain and I loved watching him at the control board in the back of the theater, making sure everything looked and sounded perfect. Finally, shout out to all the volunteers who worked their tails off throughout the weekend making sure everything ran smoothly. It was a great festival and I hope to be back sooner rather than later.
Below are the jurors and the award winners for the 2026 Oak Cliff Film Festival
– Don R. Lewis (@ThatDonLewis)
| Jeremy Inman – | CrunchyRoll |
| Mark Menza – | Composer |
| Cory Edwards – | Writer/ Director |
| Austin Flores – | DFC Locations Specialist |
| Jess Garland – | Filmmaker |
| Christian Vazsquez – | Filmmaker |
| Ardis Campbell – | Producer |
| Sean O’Neil – | Texas Monthly |
| Amber Eckelberry – | DIFF |
| Gala Avary – | Producer |
| Katie Schuck – | Dallas Film Commissioner |
| Miguel Alvarez – | Filmmaker |
| Monika Watkins – | Writer/ Director |
| Adam Minnick – | Producer |
| Ben Flarehty – | Filmmaker |
| Roger Avary – | Writer/ Director |
| Sunrise Tippeconnie – | deadCenter Film Festival |
| James Faust – | DIFF |
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2026 OCFF AWARDS
Animation shorts
Special Jury mention – THE SWORD OF THE SUN
Award – DRAFT PAPER
Texas Student Shorts
Special Jury mention – MICHAEL
Award – SQUALL MOUTH
Doc Shorts
Special Jury Mention – MONSTER SLAYER
Award – BABA
Narrative Shorts
Special Jury Mention – MR. ADIDOS
Award – EP PROJECT
Doc features
Special Jury Mention – TRACERS
Award – THE LAST CRITIC
Narrative feature
Award – CRAMPS! A PERIOD PIECE
