Downtown Surrey is about to become the centre of South Asian cinema. From Wednesday, September 23 to Sunday, September 27, the International South Asian Film Festival — iSAFF — returns for its 16th year, and the 2026 programme is the biggest pitch yet for making a BC trip of it.

The numbers are genuinely impressive: 77 films (eight features and 69 shorts) from 15 countries, screened across 19 languages, all built around this year's theme of "Dreamscapes." More than half the titles have never screened in Canada — or anywhere — before. iSAFF is the only South Asian film festival in Western Canada and qualifies for Canadian Screen Awards, drawing roughly 3,000 filmgoers to venues across the city, with most screenings at Landmark Cinemas Guildford.

Not sure where to start? The opening-night feature is a good bet. Sarmad Sultan Khoosat's Lali, a B.C. premiere, is a dark comedy about Zeba and Sajawal, two protagonists living among ghosts — desire, superstition and spooky-funny vibes all at once. It screens at 6 p.m. Thursday, September 24.

Documentary fans have two standouts. Habiba Nosheen, a three-time Emmy winner, directs The Gymnasts of Fisherman Colony (8 p.m., Friday, September 25), following three teenage female gymnasts in Pakistan as they push against expectations of what women can and can't do — a rare on-screen window into that world. Chithra Jeyaram's Love Chaos Kin (2 p.m., Sunday, September 27) is more intimate family drama: Lakshmi, a mother of two adopted white twins raised in an Indian-American household, navigates her daughters' wish to find their birth mother while pregnant herself.

For something with edge, Saturday's 6 p.m. slot brings NAMASLAY, a horror satire from directors Rish and Kanish that flips masala cinema on its head and takes aim at the West's appropriation of yoga. And the closing night feature on September 27 is Crowned Athletes, Prabhjit Singh Sabharwal's short documentary profiling four Canadian athletes who compete while wearing turbans — the filmmakers are presenting its world premiere. (One scheduling note: the festival's own listing for that screening appears to read September 2, so double-check times before you book.)

So why should a traveller care? Surrey sits just outside Vancouver, well served by transit, and late September is a pleasant shoulder-season window in the Lower Mainland. A festival pass turns five days into a proper culture-forward city break: films by day, the Metro Vancouver food scene by night. Tickets and passes vary by film and event and are sold through the festival.

If your taste runs to stories that rarely get the big-screen treatment — from Pakistan, the South Asian diaspora, and beyond — this is one of the most concentrated lineups in North America this year.

Story via Curiocity.