LFEST is Back, and We’re Returning to Curate the Cinema
There are some announcements that feel particularly special to write, and this is definitely one of them.
After saying goodbye to LFEST in 2022, we are incredibly excited that LFEST is returning in 2026 with LFEST: Back to Basecamp, and even more excited to confirm that Safflicks and Lesflicks will be joining them to bring sapphic cinema back to the festival.
From 5 to 7 June 2026, the LFEST community will come together again at Stanford Farm near Shrewsbury for a weekend of music, entertainment, activities, old friends, new connections and plenty of that familiar LFEST spirit.
And, of course, there will be films.
Going back to where it all began
For us, returning to LFEST feels particularly significant because the history of Safflicks is closely connected to the festival.
The film festival that eventually became Safflicks spent more than a decade growing up within LFEST. The LFEST Cinema had been part of the festival since its early years, with different organisations and programmers taking responsibility for the programme over time.
Our founder, Naomi Bennett, first took over programming the cinema in 2016 through Planet Nation, returning to curate it again in 2017 and 2019. When Lesflicks launched, the relationship evolved again. During the pandemic we took the LFEST film programme online through Lesflicks, before finally returning with a hybrid festival in 2022.
Over those years, the cinema introduced audiences to an enormous range of lesbian, bisexual and sapphic films, from independent shorts and documentaries to international features. In 2019 alone, the programme included films such as Rafiki, Good Kisser, Lez Bomb, JT LeRoy, The Duke of Burgundy, Camp Belvidere and Invisible Women, alongside emerging independent filmmakers and short films from around the world.
When LFEST came to an end in 2022, we knew we didn’t want the film festival we had built there to disappear with it. Safflicks was created as its new home, allowing us to continue developing the festival independently while retaining the same commitment to putting authentic sapphic stories in front of the audiences they were created for.
So being invited back to programme cinema for the returning LFEST feels rather like coming home.
Safflicks Pride Film Fest comes to LFEST
This year’s cinema will also form the in-person launch of our Safflicks Pride Film Festival 2026, bringing five new independent shorts to LFEST audiences before the festival continues online through Lesflicks during Pride Month.
Across the weekend we’ll be showing a deliberately varied collection of films exploring relationships, bisexuality, coming out, sex, friendship, attraction and LGBTQ+ community.
There is plenty of comedy too.
Lez Be Honest takes the already stressful experience of coming out to your parents and turns it into complete chaos when Eleanor prepares to tell her lesbian parents about her relationship with Scarlett. What should be a relatively straightforward dinner somehow involves anxiety pills, nudity, unconscious parents and a kitchen fire.
Playground explores that wonderfully complicated territory between casual and committed as Grace and Jas are forced to confront what their undefined relationship actually means.
Things become rather more claustrophobic in Trapped, where longtime neighbours Gina and Alexa find themselves stuck together in a stalled lift. With nowhere to escape, secrets, suppressed emotions and unexpected attraction begin coming to the surface.
What Friends Are For follows bisexual Eden after a diagnosis of vaginismus while they are dating a cis man for the first time. Turning to lesbian best friend Grace for help, the film explores intimacy, friendship and some of the assumptions we make about what sex is supposed to look like.
Finally, documentary Why We Pride takes us behind Southend Pride, looking at the people who create LGBTQ+ spaces and why local Pride organisations continue to matter. It is a reminder that visibility isn’t only about our biggest cities or largest Pride celebrations. Community is built by people creating spaces for one another wherever they happen to live.
Together, the five films reflect what we want Safflicks programming to do: entertain, introduce audiences to filmmakers they may not have encountered before and show just how broad sapphic storytelling can be.
Cinema, community and a bag of popcorn
The cinema will be based in The Stables, offering somewhere to settle down after everything else happening across the weekend.
Screenings are planned for Friday at 10pm, Saturday at 9.30pm and Sunday at 5pm, so whether you want to finish your evening with a sapphic film, escape for a quieter couple of hours or squeeze in one final screening before heading home, there should be an opportunity to join us.
LFEST has even promised popcorn.
What we have always loved about showing films at festivals like LFEST is that cinema becomes a shared experience. You aren’t watching something because an algorithm happened to put it in front of you. You’re sitting alongside other LGBTQ+ women, discovering a filmmaker or story together and then continuing the conversation afterwards.
That was always part of the magic of the old LFEST Cinema, and we can’t wait to experience it again.
What happens after LFEST?
LFEST is only the beginning for this year’s Pride Film Festival.
After launching in Shrewsbury, the Safflicks Pride Film Festival will be available virtually on Lesflicks from 8 to 21 June, giving audiences who can’t make it to LFEST the opportunity to watch the programme online.
We’ll also be taking a selection of the films to London on 9 June for an invitation-only screening and networking event for LGBTQ+ employee network Chairs and committee members, hosted by Universal Music Group UK in collaboration with the British LGBT Awards, InvestingIN LGBTQ+ and InterMediaUK.
It means these independent films won’t simply have a single festival screening. They’ll have several opportunities to reach different sapphic and LGBTQ+ audiences during Pride Month.
That has become an increasingly important part of how we think about Safflicks. Great independent films need audiences, and audiences need more opportunities to discover them. By working with festivals, community organisations, businesses and our sister platform Lesflicks, we can create more of those connections.
But first, we’re going back to Basecamp.
LFEST: Back to Basecamp takes place from 5 to 7 June 2026 at Stanford Farm near Shrewsbury.
After four years away, we couldn’t think of a more appropriate place to launch this year’s Pride Film Festival.
See you in the cinema.
