AFI Fest 2023 world premieres: Freud's Last Session and Albert Brooks documentary to debut at US film festival

AFI Fest returns to the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles, California for the first time since 2018.

The film festival is organised by the American Film Institute, a nonprofit organisation that honours filmmakers and supports the heritage of film in the US. The festival is free to attend, unlike similar ones held in Cannes, Venice, Toronto, and London.

There are over 70 films being screened across the five day festival from Wednesday 25 October to Sunday 29. Among these films are two world premieres.

With so much on offer, we have put together a list of every film in the festival this year, and taken a closer look at the two world premieres happening this week.

Which films are debuting at AFI Fest 2023?

Two films will be having their world premiere at AFI Fest 2023, they are drama film Freud’s Last session, and documentary Albert Brooks: Defending My Life.

Freud’s Last Session stars Anthony Hopkins as the controversial psychologist and Mathew Goode as Chronicles of Narnia author C.S. Lewis. The pair debate the existence of God and discuss familial relationships. The film will premiere at the TCL Chinese Theatre in room one at 5pm on Friday 27 October.

Albert Books: Defending My Life, a feature length documentary about the comedian and star of Broadcast News, Drive, and Defending Your Life, will also premiere at the festival. The film is directed by Rob Reiner and will also feature Judd Apatow, Larry David, Conan O’Brien, Sarah Silverman, Steven Spielberg, and more. The documentary will premiere in room one at 8.30pm on Thursday 26 October.

What else is on at AFI Fest 2023?

There’s plenty more going on at AFI Fest 2023, with more than 70 films and shorts programmes scheduled over the four day festival. These are all the screenings taking place:

• 20,000 Species of Bees
• A Matter of Life and Death
• About Dry Glasses
• Albert Brooks: Defending My Life
• All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt
• All of us Strangers
• All That Jazz
• American Fiction
• An American in Paris
• Anselm 3D
• The Bikeriders
• The Book of Solutions
• The Buriti Flower
• City of Wind
• Close Your Eyes
• Cobweb
• Conservatory Showcase 1-5
• Copa ‘71
• Do Not Expect Too Much From the End of the World
• The Echo
• The End We Start From
• Evil Does Not Exist
• Fallen Leaves
• The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed
• Fingernails
• Four Daughters
• Freud’s Last Session

• Going Varsity in Mariachi
• Greatest Books on Film
• Green Border
• Here
• In Our Day
• In Water
• Inshallah Boy
• Kidnapped: The Abduction of Edgardo Mortara
• La Chimera
• Last Summer
• Leave the World Behind
• Lee
• Little Girl Blue
• Lost in the Night
• Maestro
• Mambar Pierrette
• Maxine’s Baby: The Tiger Perry Story
• Me Captain
• Memory
• Menus Plaisirs - Les Troisgros
• Midwives
• Milisuthando
• Mountains
• Music
• Occupied City
• Orlando: My Political Biography
• Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure
• The Peasants
• Perfect Days
• Pictures of Ghosts
• The Promised Land
• Quiz Lady
• Ryuichi Sakamoto: Opus
• Shayda

• Shorts Program: Animation 1-2
• Shorts Program: Documentary 1-2
• Shorts Program: Live Action 1-2
• Shorts Program: Young at Heart
• Slow
• Sly
• Smoke Sauna Sisterhood
• Society of the Snow
• The Settlers
• Stamped from the Beginning
• The Summer with Carmen
• The Taste of Things
• The Teachers’ Lounge
• Terrestrial Verses
• They Shot the Piano Player
• Tiger Stripes
• Totem
• The Universal Theory
• We Grown Now
• Wings of Desire