The anniversary edition of the Mannheim-Heidelberg Film Festival is entitled ‘Imagine Futures!’ and opened on 5 November with ‘My Notes on Mars’ (Hungary, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina 2026) by Lili Horváth. Following a welcome address to the guests by, amongst others, the mayors of the two festival cities and festival director Sascha Keilholz, journalist Heribert Prantl spoke about the need for a resilient democracy in times of right-wing threats and the importance of hope for politics and culture. The festival reflects this very theme in the title of its main competition, “On the Rise”, which is dedicated to emerging talent in international cinema. The retrospective “Back to the Futures – Utopias vs. Dystopias” also fits within this framework.