WATCH THE TRAILER HERE
MUBI, the global distributor, streaming service, and production company, proudly announces the Canadian theatrical release date for FATHERLAND, the award-winning new film from Paweł Pawlikowski (Ida, Cold War). The announcement follows the film’s triumphant and critically-lauded World Premiere in Official Competition at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, where Pawlikowski was honoured with the Best Director award ex aequo.
Written by Pawlikowski and Henk Handloegten, the film stars Academy Award®-nominated Sandra Hüller (The Zone of Interest, Anatomy of a Fall), Hanns Zischler (Munich, Germany Year 90 Nine Zero, Kings of the Road), August Diehl (A Hidden Life, Inglourious Basterds), Devid Striesow (All Quiet On The Western Front), and Anna Madeley (Patrick Melrose, All Creatures Great And Small).
FATHERLAND centres on the relationship between the Nobel Prize-winning writer Thomas Mann (Hanns Zischler) and his daughter Erika (Sandra Hüller) – actress, writer and rally driver. In the summer of 1949, at the height of the Cold War, father and daughter embark on a challenging and emotional road trip in a black Buick taking them across a Germany in ruins – from US dominated Frankfurt to Soviet controlled Weimar. Returning home after sixteen years of exile in the US, Thomas Mann has to face not only a divided fatherland, but also a deep fracture within his own family.
With FATHERLAND, Pawlikowski picks up where he left off with his award-winning Ida and Cold War, exploring – in his elliptic, distilled style – the themes of identity, family, love and guilt amid the turmoil and confusion of post-war Europe.
The film is a MUBI, OUR Films (a Mediawan Company, Italy), Extreme Emotions (Poland), Nine Hours (Germany), and Chapter 2 (a Mediawan Company, France) production, in collaboration with Circle One (Italy) and Apocalypso Pictures, with the participation of Arte and Pathé. It is produced by Mario Gianani and Lorenzo Mieli for OUR Films, Ewa Puszczyńska for Extreme Emotions, Jeanne Tremsal and Edward Berger for Nine Hours, Dimitri Rassam for Chapter 2, and Lorenzo Gangarossa for Circle One.
Pawlikowski reunites with his longtime filmmaking team, which includes the Academy Award®-nominated cinematographer Łukasz Żal, costume designer Aleksandra Staszko, and production designers Katarzyna Sobańska and Marcel Sławiński.
Previously, Pawlikowski’s Ida garnered 70 international awards, including 5 European Film Awards and the 2015 Academy Award® for Best Foreign Language Film. He won the Best Director Prize at Cannes in 2018 for Cold War, with the film going on to receive a further 52 wins and 126 nominations, including Academy Award® nominations for Best Foreign Film, Best Director, and Best Cinematography.
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