Program
The full 2026 festival program
September 15-18
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IL KINO
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b-ware! ladenkino
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Berlin
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don't miss out
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September 15-18 ✳︎ IL KINO ✳︎ b-ware! ladenkino ✳︎ Berlin ✳︎ don't miss out ✳︎
OPENING NIGHT
SEPTEMBER 15 | IL KINO | 19.00
Nansenstraße 22, 12047 Berlin
RO & LUKA | DIR Sienna Quayle, Oliver Zech | Germany | 12:25
A portrait of a genderqueer couple who have built their life around sex work in Berlin, serving primarily male clients. It’s an intimate look at a partnership in which sex is both private and professional, and at the mutual care that holds their world together.
OPENING NIGHT SHORT
Modern Whore
OPENING NIGHT SPECIAL FEATURE
MODERN WHORE | DIR Nicole Bazuin | Canada | 120:00
Modern Whore is a hybrid documentary that reimagines popular depictions of sex work through the lived experiences of writer, performer, and sex worker, Andrea Werhun. Based on her book Modern Whore: A Memoir, Andrea grapples with social stigma and reclaims her narrative in a series of funny, heartbreaking, and surprising stories.
NIGHT TWO
SEPTEMBER 16 | IL KINO | 19.00
Nansenstraße 22, 12047 Berlin
LOVE & CONNECTION SHORT FILM NIGHT
A curated selection of films celebrating the many ways we find, lose and redefine connection with others and ourselves.
LINGER ON WITH ME | DIR Anika Mätzke | Germany | 10: 48
Vivi and Milo spend an unusual nighttime date in a plaster statue collection. Do they capture the perfect moment forever, or will they look back on it melancholically?
NO ONE HAS EVER LOOKED AT ELEPHANTS AS YOU DO | DIR Sandra Jovanovska | Slovenia | 9:57
A lyrical and visually rich animated poem, exploring the transformation of motherhood into a pure, primal state of being.
DESIRE | DIR Lula Dahringer | Germany, Spain| 15:01
Caught between duty and desire, Ginu finds herself suffocating in the quiet familiarity of a long-term relationship. When she begins therapy with Dr. Speck, their sessions slip into forbidden intimacy.
BUSH | DIR Danielle LeBlanc | USA | 14:27
Darcy desperately tries to remove her bush before she has sex with her boyfriend.
THE LANGUAGE OF LOVE | DIR Valerie Cappuccino Cocos | Russia, Thailand | 3.20
The first novella, "Escape," a hero who flees his feelings for another city and remembers the girl he left behind. The second, "Lost in Translation," a girl from a tribe living by the ocean. Every time she finds love, she loses her identity. The third is about a couple who, behind the mask of physical intimacy, have lost emotional intimacy. Their novella is called "Body Language."
TWO | DIR Klāvs Liepiņš | Iceland | 7:12
A visual poem about an unwritten love story between two men. What could not exist between them begins to take shape in the natural world, the places where they are most deeply connected. Nature becomes the only space where their presence can coexist.
DON’T FEEL SORRY FOR ME! | DIR Eir í Ólavsstovu | Faroe Islands | 9:19
After ten years of marriage, Birgit is confronted with the ultimate betrayal-her younger husband, Hanus, has moved in with a new, younger woman, Maria.
LOVE SPELLS | DIR Michael Plewa | USA | 12:00
Two working magicians fall in love on New Years Eve only to realize their divergent career prospects might be impossible to overcome.
NIGHT THREE
SEPTEMBER 17 | IL KINO | 21.30
Nansenstraße 22, 12047 Berlin
SEX & DESIRE SHORT FILM NIGHT
COLDSORES | DIR Ina Morkin | Germany | 11:13
A fun and sexy tale following twenty-something Allie as she navigates her dating life after a (not so fun and sexy) genital herpes diagnosis.
THE LOVER | DIR Cadenza Zhao| Germany | 15:00
Haunted by grief, Daniel fills the void with casual sex, hoping to escape his loneliness. But when he can no longer ignore the truth, he’s forced to face the emotions he has been running from.
BRUSH ME | DIR Nikolaus Jantsch | Austria| 2.00
In a bustling bathroom, amidst the chaos of everyday life, two toothbrushes find themselves drawn to each other. A heartwarming tale of love, loss, and the resilience of the toothbrush spirit.
HOUSE PLAY | DIR Alberto De La Rosa | USA | 11:03
A couple receives a visit from a young man who begins to clean their apartment, but as doubt and desire take over, new dynamics are soon revealed.
A curated selection of films exploring sexuality, attraction, intimacy and the many ways humanity expresses desire.
PORTRAIT OF DESIRE | DIR Nina Degraeve| Belgium | 14:56
For one night, artist Romina Remmo invites us to experience the sensation of her suggestive work, imbued with eroticism and femininity. Exploring the imagination and the hidden side of the artist, the film takes us into a labyrinth of thoughts and fantasies where desire brushes up against violence and where seduction borders on suffering.
FUR CHANGE | DIR Lioba Schmidt | Germany | 15:00
With the help of a mouse, a young woman begins to rediscover her body awareness and to break through the boundaries of naturalness and social constraints. A film about the love of the tactile sense and the hairy body regardless of species and gender.
HOTSPOT| DIR Yann Cado, Julien Ordan| Switzerland | 4:20
During a chic cocktail party, two friends' conversation drifts to the topic of sharing. Lucie expresses her skepticism about the need to share in life. Wanting to change her mind, Sélène doesn't realize that she herself will have to question everything she thought she knew about the subject.
LEO & ANNA | DIR Luca Forcignanò Serri | Italy | 15:00
Set entirely in an abstract bedroom, Leo & Anna unfolds the arc of a love story through five intimate scenes. Without dialogue, the film explores the complexity of their bond through body language, subverting conventional romantic narratives. Glances, subtle gestures, and movements reveal their inner worlds, turning intimacy into a powerful narrative vehicle where the body becomes the only possible language.
NIGHT FOUR
SEPTEMBER 18 |ANOTHER COUNTRY BOOKSTORE | 19.00 - 21.00
Riemannstraße 7, 10961 Berlin
INTIMACY COORDINATION IN PRACTICE|
Consent, Communication and Safer Intimate Scenes
Facilitator: Anarella Martínez-Madrid (pictured)
Audience: Performers, filmmakers, producers, directors, crew members, students and anyone interested in intimacy coordination, consent-based practices and safer creative environments
Duration: 90 minutes
Workshop Synopsis: How are intimate scenes created safely, ethically and collaboratively?
Format: Slide-based workshop with guided discussion, practical tools and scenario-based exercises
Fee: By donation - suggested amount €10
Spaces limited to 15 seats, drinks available at the venue. This is a cash only event.
XO Sex School is a proud partner of Love, Sex & Cinema Film Festival 2026.
Anarella (She/They) is the founder of Sex School, now reimagined as XO—a platform built to give voice to sex educators, sex workers, performers, and beyond… who often go unheard. Her mission is clear: to create a space where conversations about sex, feminism, gender, and sexualities aren’t just welcomed but celebrated. Anarella also works as an Intimacy Coordinator at Erika Lust, where she bridges the worlds of art, sex, and storytelling.
TICKETS AVAILABLE HERE SOON
b- ware! Ladenkino| 23.00 - late
Gärtnerstraße 19, 10245 Berlin
AFTER DARK SHORT FILM NIGHT
An intimate late-night showcase of bold, provocative or transgressive cinema pushing the boundaries of storytelling, sexuality and cinematic expression.
Y2KAGE| DIR Jazzy Boho | USA | 7:52
What is a virtual pet in an age of mass surveillance? Get jacked out of the Y2KAGE in Jazzy Boho's Erotic Hauntology, a dazzling genre-bending allegory for sexual autonomy in America’s post-9/11 security state—an unforgettable, neon-dripping fever dream of cybersex, Tamagotchis, Bush-era surveillance, and the ghosts of a millennium that never arrived.
GOONWEED| DIR Ethan Roberts | USA | 4:17
When two bros hotbox a new strain of cannabis called goonweed, they find themselves descending into a horny hysteria of ass-worship.
HORNPLAY | DIR ElectricSkin | Germany | 9.52
A dystopian fetish agency stages ritualized domination sessions where religious iconography, demonology, and latex bodies merge into a choreography of controlled erotic power.
BOUNDRY LINE | DIR Olesya Smolkova | RUSSIA | 8:39
A married woman is torn by her sexual attraction to a younger man.
WOMN ASMR | DIR Val deRosa | Switzerland | 4:25
A woman and her microphone provide an erotic autonomous sensory meridian response.
MAYBE| DIR Maha Benraïs | Switzerland| 20:00
Within the walls of an ordinary school, 14-year-old Wendy meets her fifty-year-old teacher, Mr. M. What first appears to be a caring and supportive relationship slowly begins to shift into something far more disturbing.
CUMDROP | DIR Keith Brooks | USA | 10:00
An unexpected visitor joins a family for breakfast.
SUMMONING OF PLEASURE | DIR ANGELSSEX | Spain | 5:10
When a woman finds an ancient scroll detailing a summoning ritual her curiosity takes over. She is pleased by who the ceremony conjures.
7 FLOORS TO MIDNIGHT | DIR Sebastian Fesser | Germany| 10:14
Claus leads a miserable life in a squalid apartment. After being evicted from his home due to rent arrears, he intends to commit suicide—but suddenly, an unknown woman appears at his door.
FRICTION | DIR Maiju Voutilainen | Finland | 6:30
Through the practice of shibari, Friction explores how our relationship with power changes when we are allowed to define its terms ourselves. The film approaches power as an embodied experience, examining the ways it lingers in the body and shapes our understanding of control, vulnerability, and agency.