Cypriot production 'Hold Onto Me' has become the first official selection of a Cypriot feature film at the Sundance Film Festival 2026, the Deputy Ministry of Culture has announced.
According to the Deputy Ministry, the film 'Hold Onto Me', by Cypriot screenwriter and director Myrsini Aristidou, has been selected to compete in the 'World Cinema Dramatic Competition' section of Sundance 2026, in January, where it will also have its world premiere.
The Deputy Ministry noted that this is the first official selection of a Cypriot feature film in the international competition section of the Sundance Film Festival, which takes place every year in Utah, in the United States of America.
The film 'Hold Onto Me,' the Deputy Ministry said, “is the long-awaited feature film debut of the distinguished director” who already has two award-winning short films - 'Semele' (2015) and 'Aria' (2017) - which have been screened at the Venice, Sundance, Toronto, Tribeca and Berlin Film Festivals, among others.
Myrsini Aristidou is a Cannes Cinefondation Residence fellow and winner of the Sam Spiegel Film Lab Emerging Filmmaker Award. “Her film ‘Hold Onto Me’ is her most personal creation to date and the completion of the trilogy that began with Semele and Aria, which explored different phases of the father-daughter relationship,” the press release added.
According to the press release, the film follows 11-year-old Iris, who spends her summer with her friend Danae. When she discovers that her estranged father, Aris, has returned for her grandfather’s funeral, she decides to look for him.
It is noted that the film was shot entirely in Cyprus with an international creative team, is a Cyprus-Greece-Denmark co-production with the participation of the United States, in co-production with the Department of Contemporary Culture of the Deputy Ministry of Culture of Cyprus, and with the participation of the Danish Film Institute, the Hellenic Film and Audiovisual Center, Greece’s national broadcaster (ERT), and the Black Family Grant of NYU Tisch School of the Arts.
(Source: CNA)
