Before losing its way, the world’s largest short film festival had an A-list guestlist and kickstarted the careers of Justin Kurzel and Nash and Joel Edgerton. What will it look like in 2026?
If Tropfest was a Hollywood story, it might run something like this: scrappy young ingenue has a stratospheric rise to stardom, loses their way and falls off the radar – then stages a comeback: reformed, wiser, ready for the golden statuette.
The largest short film festival in the world is back, returning this month after a seven-year hiatus, 33 years after its debut at Darlinghurst’s Tropicana Caffe which featured a single VHS movie directed by a young out-of-work actor called John Polson, a TV screen, and an audience of 200 spilling onto the street.