Corbucci Love Story Opens 2026 DocuSlate Documentary Festival in Los Angeles
The 2026 DocuSlate Documentary Film Festival in Los Angeles will open with a North American premiere, Sergio & Mirta, A Love Story in 8 mm. Deadline announced the lineup on 21 October 2026. The festival runs from 12 to 15 November.
The film is directed by Fabrizio Laurenti and Niccolò Vivarelli. It is built from rediscovered archival footage of Italian cult director Sergio Corbucci and his then-wife, Mirta Guarnaschelli. Opening night is Thursday, 12 November, and the screenings begin at the Cinelounge Sunset Theater in Hollywood.
The lineup is compact. It includes seven film programmes, with 12 documentary shorts and five documentary features, plus two virtual panels. Most of the titles are premiering in some form. Besides the two North American premieres, the lineup holds one world premiere, one U.S. premiere, one West Coast premiere and six Los Angeles premieres.
The festival closes on 15 November with the Los Angeles premiere of Uncommitted, directed by Razi Jafri and executive produced by W. Kamau Bell. That final day runs a full programme at South Park Center in Downtown Los Angeles.
Two films come out of NewNarratives, a programme that supports documentary makers working on environmental stories. Why Is Climate Changing? by Lu Ren has its world premiere in the lineup. Lu Ren received a 2026 NewNarratives Environmental Storytelling Grant. The Art of Sharing, by Jen and Ric Serena, is also on the bill. The Serenas received a 2025 NewNarratives grant.
Ora DeKornfeld's short The Grandfather Puzzle is also in the lineup. It won the Best Short Documentary award at Mountainfilm, and that win earned it Oscar-qualifying status. In plain terms, the film can now be considered for an Academy Award in the short documentary category.
For a general audience, a film festival like this is a showcase where films get their first big public screenings. The DocuSlate programme pairs a famous name from Italian cinema with new work from first-time grant recipients. Both kinds of film are on the same four-day schedule.
