The SGIFF 2026 curtain has fallen, and the numbers are strong: the 37th Singapore International Film Festival closed on 1 November with 27 sold-out screenings and a new box office record for the fourth year in a row. Singapore feature Ah Girl took Best Film in the Asian Feature Film Competition.
A first dedicated Festival Closing since 2014
The festival ended with the Asian premiere of Vintage Violence at Capitol Theatre, the first dedicated Festival Closing since 2014. Director Eugene Kotlyarenko and stars Cole Sprouse and Kiko Mizuhara walked the red carpet, a day after meeting audiences at an In Conversation With session at the National Museum of Singapore.
SGIFF 2026 Silver Screen Awards: who won
Ang Geck Geck’s Ah Girl, set in 1990s Singapore and following a seven-year-old caught between her separated parents, is her feature debut. It was developed at the SGIFF Southeast Asian Film Lab in 2015, so the win closes a loop for the festival’s talent pipeline.
- Best Film (Asian Feature Film Competition): Ah Girl, Ang Geck Geck
- Best Director: Shahrbanoo Sadat, No Good Men
- Best Performance: Pushpa Thing Lama, Elephants in the Fog, and Putri Marino, Four Seasons in Java
- Special Jury Prize: Burn, Makoto Nagahisa
- Best Southeast Asian Short Film: Golden Island, Arief Budiman
- Best Singapore Short Film: Singapore God, EXYL
- Audience Choice Award: Singapore Panorama Programme 2: Second Life, Second Skin
The Audience Choice Award for the best Singaporean film programme or co-production went to Singapore Panorama Programme 2, which brought together five shorts by Shara Tay, Ash Goh Hua, Syahmi Iman, Leon Cheo and Ewan Leong. Golden Island and Singapore God both received the SGIFF Film Fund’s SEA-SHORTS grant in 2025.
Record demand and industry growth
- More than 100 films from over 50 countries screened across twelve days, including more than 25 Singapore productions and co-productions.
- 21 sessions sold out within three weeks of public sales. Look Back, the new film from Hirokazu Koreeda, sold out in a single day, and extra seats for La Bola Negra went in 15 minutes.
- Aamir Khan’s In Conversation With session drew 738 attendees, the highest for a single event in SGIFF history. He received the SGIFF Screen Icon Award, while Koreeda received the Cinema Honorary Award.
- SGIFF Industry Days pass sales more than tripled from 2025, and the Asian Producers Network will expand to the Pacifics in 2027.
The festival also introduced Junior Explorers, its first programme of sensory-friendly, relaxed screenings for young audiences, and expanded live screen-based performances in its Undercurrent section. Looking ahead, the SGIFF Film Fund, backed by the Tan Ean Kiam Foundation, opens this month.
Missed the festival? Catch up on our earlier coverage of the Singapore Panorama short films and the Junior Explorers and Parallax programmes, or see what is on at the vOilah! French Film Festival.
