Portobello Film Festival 2026

For more than three decades Portobello Film Festival has been celebrating independent film making and festival culture at the original epicentre of the British Underground. Free to enter and free to attend, the festival is an annual reminder of a time when Ladbroke Grove was to London what San Francisco was to America.

One of this year’s highlights is a feature on Laura Del-Rivo, Britain’s first female beatnik author whose debut novel provided the inspiration for Michael Winner’s West 11. Supplementing her income by trading on Portobello Road Market while continuing to write about the changing life of the neighbourhood, she was affectionately known as “The Tights Lady”.

A curated evening on 17 September is dedicated to Pink Floyd and to collective art-making. Original shorts from the late 60s are shown alongside a newly released documentary on The Exploding Galaxy, a group of artists, musicians, poets and dancers with a shared creative spirit.

One Foot in the Grove revived the spirit of psychedelia, punk and 80s graffiti with a spectacular display of murals, giant sculptures and fire-breathing robots under the Westway in 2009. While most traces have long since disappeared, a ceramic mural by Carrie Reichardt and the Treatment Rooms Collective remains as a permanent reminder. Members of the collective return with a group show at The Muse to run alongside Portobello Film Festival. The exhibition opening party on 10 September is accompanied by a screening of Vive Le Punk, Danny Garcia’s documentary marking 50 years of punk by following four bands still active today.

The opening night at The Gate Picturehouse on 3 September is the only ticketed event. There is no need to book for more than 200 new films. Tomorrow’s cinema today - all free to attend!