Join us for the 33rd Edition of Sheffield DocFest from 10 - 15 June

Savage Mountain + Conversation

Thursday 1 1 June | Intro, Extended Q&A

Kristin Harila risked everything to summit the world’s 14 highest peaks at record speed. When her final ascent sparked backlash, her greatest triumph became a reckoning.

Join us for this special screening of Savage Mountain, followed by a conversation with the director, Evan Sigstad and protagonist Kristin Harila.

Kristin Harila stunned the climbing community in 2023 when she set out to become the fastest person to summit the world’s 14 highest peaks. Alongside her climbing partner, Tenjen Lama Sherpa, she achieved what many believed impossible, summiting all 14 in just 92 days and halving the record held by Nims Purja. But, what should have been her greatest triumph became a reckoning. During the final ascent, Kristin was accused of stepping over a dying porter, triggering a global backlash and fierce debate about ambition, ethics, and who controls the narrative. Drawing on never-before-seen footage from K2, the film unpacks the story behind the controversy. Back in Norway, Kristin struggles to rebuild her life, while in Nepal, Lama joins another climber’s record bid. When tragedy strikes again, Kristin is forced to confront the cost of her record-breaking pursuit.

Colors of White Rock

Thursday 11 June | Intro, Q&A
Also screening Friday 12 June

In Mongolia's Gobi Desert, Maikhuu is one of the country's only female truck drivers, hauling coal across treacherous roads to provide for her family.

With few other choices available to her, she navigates the punishing landscape of Mongolia's mining boom, where an endless line of trucks race each other to the Chinese border. It is gruelling, dangerous work in a country increasingly shaped by the human and environmental costs of what has come to be known as 'Minegolia'. Dominated by men in a system that leaves little room for anyone, let alone a woman determined to carve out her own place in it, Maikhuu's strength of spirit is remarkable. The roar of engines and the silence of the desert are rendered with a closeness that puts us right beside her, feeling both the weight of her world and the vast emptiness that surrounds it. Maikhuu keeps driving.

Lesbian Lines

Thursday 11 June | Intro, Q&A
Also screening Saturday 13 June

An intimate portrait of a network of underground telephone helplines established by a small community of Irish lesbians in 1979.

At a time when homosexuality faced intense social and legal hostility in Ireland, a group of women created a lifeline for those experiencing isolation, abuse and profound loneliness. Every call was logged as handwritten notes, kept through decades of constitutional change as women fought for their rights in an oppressive and conservative society. Lesbian Lines brings together an ensemble cast of original helpline volunteers and actors to breathe life into this rich, undocumented history, weaving collective memories into a moving and joyful new archive. Blending dramatised sequences with archival material, it is a story of community, connection and the transformative power of listening.

Content guidance: contains themes of homophobia, discrimination, abuse, suicide and mental health.

A City in the Forest

Thursday 11 June | Intro, Q&A
Also screening Friday 12 June

When a police unit in Atlanta moves to raze an urban forest for the country’s largest police training facility, a grassroots movement fights to defend the land.

It started in the streets. During the 2020 George Floyd uprising, a private police foundation proposed clearing over 300 acres of urban forest for what opponents would come to call “Cop City.” The community pushed back, filling 17 hours of public comment urging Atlanta City Council to reject the plan. When those voices went unheard, people took matters into their own hands. In his feature debut, director Lev Omelchenko embeds his camera within the protests, capturing a diverse, decentralised resistance that connects environmental racism, political corruption, police violence and the criminalisation of dissent. What emerges is a collective portrait of one of America’s most urgent social justice stories, where the fight to save a forest becomes about something much bigger.

Cantona

Friday 12 June | Intro, Q&A

Told largely in his own words, the remarkable story of Eric Cantona's journey from volatile French prodigy to Manchester United legend.

Drawing on extraordinary archives and intimate contributions from Cantona himself, Alex Ferguson and David Beckham, Cantona traces the life of one of football's most magnetic and enigmatic figures. Capable of breathtaking brilliance and combustible controversy in equal measure, he arrived at Old Trafford as a mercurial talent that others had struggled to manage. The film explores how Ferguson's mentorship became the crucial force in channelling that volatility, shaping a legacy that stretched far beyond the pitch. Creative storytelling mirrors its subject's unpredictability, while an evocative original score by Orbital's Paul Hartnoll completes a portrait that captures both the myth and the man behind it.

Give Me The Ball!

Friday 12 June | Intro, Q&A

An intimate portrait of tennis legend Billie Jean King, revealing the personal sacrifices, hidden struggles and fierce determination behind her transformation of women's sport.

Director Liz Garbus draws on extensive archive and a searching interview with King herself to trace a life defined by battles fought both on and off the court. From her early years pushing for the professionalisation of tennis to the famous 'Battle of the Sexes' showdown, King confronted misogyny at every turn while privately navigating an unhappy marriage, hiding her sexual orientation and facing an eating disorder. With contributions from Elton John, Serena Williams and fellow tennis pioneers, Give Me the Ball! builds a rich, layered account of a woman whose public triumphs came at deeply personal cost, and whose march to equality was a long and often lonely one.

MKO

Friday 12 June | Intro, Q&A

Moshood Abiola wins Nigeria's freest election, only for the military to jail him. When U.S. diplomats arrive to negotiate his release, he is served tea, and dies.

MKO unravels the cover-up behind one of Africa's most consequential political crimes. In 1993, Abiola, the world's richest Black man, won a landslide victory that the military swiftly annulled. What followed was years of imprisonment, international negotiation and, ultimately, a death that has never been fully explained. The investigation draws on extraordinary access on all sides of the story: current and former Nigerian presidents, Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka, Abiola's family and the U.S. delegate who was in the room when he died. Those implicated in the annulment also appear, offering conflicting accounts that unravel against one another. As the trail leads through broken promises from Washington and London, the question of who killed Abiola becomes inseparable from the question of who abandoned Nigerian democracy.

The Archivist + Conversation

Saturday 13 June | Intro, Extended Q&A

David “Doc” Rowe has spent decades preserving Britain’s overlooked folk traditions. Now, with time running short, he faces a race to protect them.

Rowe has devoted his life to documenting customs, songs and celebrations that few others thought worth saving, building an extraordinary archive along the way. As personal challenges mount and the collection’s future grows uncertain, the urgency of his mission sharpens. With remarkable access, we get close to Rowe as he pushes forward, eccentric and determined, navigating the fragile line between preserving memory and letting go. The Archivist is a story about one person’s refusal to let the traditions that connect us to where we come from quietly slip away.

The Cycle of Love

Saturday 13 June | Intro, Q&A

In 1977, a young street artist from Delhi picked up a second-hand bicycle and set off on a 6,000-mile journey to find the woman who captured his heart.

Growing up poor and ‘untouchable’ in Delhi, PK’s odds of making it across a continent on a second-hand bicycle were slim. He pedalled anyway, all the way to Sweden to reach Lotta. From Academy Award-nominated director Orlando von Einsiedel, The Cycle of Love pieces together their extraordinary story through intimate interviews with PK and Lotta alongside vivid recreations that place an actor in conversation with real people along the route. What unfolds is more than a love story. PK’s journey forced him to reckon with the caste system, the weight of family expectation and the sheer improbability of cycling 6,000 miles with little more than a handful of paintbrushes and a stubborn heart.

The Man Will Burn

Saturday 13 June | Intro, Q&A

Drawing on extraordinary archive footage and unforgettable first-hand stories, a series tracing the origins and wild evolution of the iconic Burning Man festival.

The Man Will Burn tells the full story of how a bonfire on a San Francisco beach grew into one of the world’s most radical creative gatherings. With remarkable access to the people who shaped the event from its earliest days, the series captures the spirit of self-expression, community and counterculture that has drawn tens of thousands to the Nevada desert for decades. Rich archival material brings each era vividly to life, from scrappy beginnings to the sprawling temporary city of Black Rock. Full of the energy, imagination and joy of Burning Man itself, The Man Will Burn is a celebration of what happens when radical creativity takes hold.

Earth, Wind & Fire (To Be Celestial vs. That’s The Weight)

Saturday 13 June | Intro, Q&A

Academy Award winner Questlove directs the definitive portrait of one of the most influential bands in music history, with exclusive access to their archives.

Made with the support of the band and the estate of late founder Maurice White, Earth, Wind & Fire draws on a remarkable trove of visual, audio and written material from the group’s own vaults to get closer than ever to the personalities behind the music. The creative ambitions, rivalries, friendships and sheer force of talent that forged their sound all come vividly to life, tracing the journey from their early days through to a global stardom that crossed borders and generations. Their records soundtracked dancefloors, living rooms and protest marches alike, and their influence on funk, soul, disco and pop remains deeply felt. Questlove’s film goes deep into the archives to tell the full story, and the groove is very much still there.

SKYCLIMBER - Scaling The Eiffel Tower

Saturday 13 June | Intro, Q&A

A climber attempts to scale the Eiffel Tower in a documentary that is equal parts high-altitude adventure and intimate personal portrait.

SKYCLIMBER Scaling The Eiffel Tower builds its tension with the precision of a heist film, mapping every step of an audacious ascent of the Eiffel Tower. The climbing sequences are visceral and genuinely exhilarating, the kind that hold an audience in collective breath. But running alongside the adrenaline is something more personal: a portrait of the person behind the climb, taking in homelessness, neurodivergence and the very real weight of men’s mental health. The result is a film that works both as a gripping adventure and as a genuinely compelling personal story.

Content guidance: Contains themes of suicide and mental health.