A new four-hour director's cut of Kevin Costner's Dances with Wolves is set to debut at Locarno 2026.

      Although there is no update on the distribution of Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 2, which we reviewed two years ago following its debut at the Venice Film Festival, another grand western from Kevin Costner is being revitalized. The Locarno Film Festival has announced that a 4K restoration of Costner’s extended Dances with Wolves—restored by the Zurich-based Cinegrell in partnership with the Locarno Film Festival as part of its Locarno Heritage project along with its international sales representative, K5 International—will make its premiere on August 7.

      Clocking in at nearly four hours, with approximately 30 minutes of never-before-seen content, the festival states, “Costner’s Western epic, which garnered seven Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director, played a significant role in transforming the Western genre during the early 1990s and highlighted the historical struggles of Indigenous peoples in America. Presented on the large screen of the Piazza Grande in this nearly four-hour extended version—featuring over half an hour of previously unreleased material—this restoration gives audiences the opportunity to experience Costner’s expansive classic as envisioned by the director.”

      Furthermore, the festival mentions that “Safi Faye’s Letter from My Village (Kaddu Beykat, 1975), awarded in the 2025 Heritage Restoration Contest, is also newly restored by Cinegrell in collaboration with the Locarno Film Festival through its Locarno Heritage project and its rights holder, Arsenal Filminstitut. Recognized as the first feature film released commercially by a woman from Sub-Saharan Africa, Letter from My Village is located in the Serer region of rural Senegal and depicts a young couple whose marriage plans are interrupted by drought and the challenging realities of village life. This significant blend of documentary and fiction in African and global cinema will debut in its restored version at the Festival.”

      Artistic Director Giona A. Nazzaro stated, “The Locarno Film Festival has a profound connection with cinema history, spanning all eras and forms. From the tradition of groundbreaking retrospectives, each year enhanced with new and exciting additions, to the celebrated restorations of Locarno Heritage, the Festival facilitates a rich and multifaceted dialogue with widely acclaimed masterpieces and those cinematic chapters that await discovery or preservation. From Kevin Costner to Safi Faye, the Locarno Film Festival addresses past cinema with a perspective geared towards new generations and future audiences, who are already preparing for the new challenges brought by evolving technologies.”

      The press release continues below.

      In line with the Festival’s long-standing collaboration with the Cinémathèque suisse, two works by Swiss experimental filmmaker Isa Hesse-Rabinovitch—Sirenen-Eiland (1981) and Geister und Gäste (1989)—will be featured in the Cinéma Suisse Redécouvert section, highlighting rediscovered Swiss cinema. Hesse-Rabinovitch, who had a previous career as an illustrator and graphic artist, began filmmaking at fifty and developed a diverse range of works. Notably, the screenings in Locarno are organized in partnership with the Museum Hermann Hesse in Montagnola, marking the beginning of a long-term initiative to reinterpret and present Hesse-Rabinovitch’s body of work, collaboratively developed with the University of Zurich.

      The Locarno Film Festival and mudac—Cantonal Museum of Design and Contemporary Applied Arts at the Plateforme 10 arts district—are collaborating to honor Isao Takahata's contributions, one of the co-founders of Studio Ghibli and a master of animation. At Locarno79, the program will pay tribute by screening Grave of the Fireflies (Hotaru No Haka, 1988) on Friday, August 7, introduced by his son, Kosuke Takahata, and presented in partnership with mudac, Plateforme 10. Isao Takahata attended Locarno in 2009 to receive an Honorary Leopard.

      Lastly, as part of a special centenary tribute, Histoire(s) du Cinéma will feature Roger Corman’s final directorial work, Frankenstein Unbound (1990), starring John Hurt, Raúl Juliá, and Bridget Fonda—a daring blend of science fiction and Gothic horror that reinterprets the Frankenstein narrative for the late twentieth century. The screening at Locarno presents a suitable opportunity to celebrate the legacy of this daring and immensely prolific producer-director, who has previously been honored at Locarno.

      The complete official selection for Locarno79 will be unveiled during the press conference on Thursday, July 9, 2026.

      The 79th Locarno Film Festival is scheduled to take place from August 5-15, 2026.