The best film award

Sanguine, a body horror film about work pressure by French director Marion Le Corroller, won best film in the Official Fantastic Section of the 59th Sitges International Fantastic Film Festival of Catalonia. The jury announced the winners at a press conference on 17 October 2026, and the prize is worth 20,000 euros. The film stars Mara Taquin as a resident doctor in training in a competitive emergency department, who struggles to meet the demands of the job while she starts treating patients her own age with unusual symptoms. Her own body then begins to change. The film had already premiered at the Cannes festival before arriving in Sitges, and it is set to reach Spanish cinemas on 6 November.

Origins of the film

Le Corroller studied finance for five years, and she said that experience of business pressure shaped the story, which moves to a hospital. She said she wanted the film to be a horror film because what she lived through in finance was terrifying. She also said some hospitals had become enormous companies, a paradox she found striking, and she used that setting as a mirror of capitalist society. In the film, a mysterious epidemic strikes young workers and causes grotesque mutations, with some characters sweating blood and others growing out of control. La Vanguardia describes the tone as black comedy, more cynical and ironic than dramatic.

Women directors at Sitges

El Mundo notes that Sanguine is the fifth Sitges winner directed by a woman. The earlier winners it lists are Surveillance by Jennifer Lynch (2008), La invitación by Karyn Kusama (2015), El baño del diablo by Veronika Franz (2024, co-directed with Severin Fiala) and La hermanastra fea by Emilie Blichfeldt (2025). El Periódico says the jury again favoured female authorship, as it did last year with La hermanastra fea. The same outlet describes the film as using body horror to examine work stress and the pressure for productivity felt by younger generations.

Acting, writing and special prizes

Joko Anwar won best direction for Ghost in the Cell, a prison-set mix of supernatural horror, violence and dark humour in which a series of murders forces inmates to face a threat. Jasmine Trinca won best actress for The Spiral, which also took the Méliès de Plata for best European genre film, while Benoit Magimel won best actor for Historias de la noche. Casper Kelly and Jamie King took the screenplay prize for Buddy, Raphaël Vandenbussche won best cinematography for Océano Titánico, Mondo Boys won best music for River and Hong Jeong-ho won best special effects for Colony.

The jury also gave a special prize to Drag, by Greg Yagolnitzer and Raviv Ullman, a film produced by Danny DeVito. Adrian Chiarella won the Citizen Kane award for best new director for Leviticus, and the Jose Luis Guerin critics' prize went to The Incomer by Louis Paxton. La Vanguardia reports that Wildwood won the audience's favour. The Méliès d'Or had been awarded a few days earlier to Feels like home, by Gábor Holtai.