FINGERNAILS Special Screenings

Screening to be followed by a conversation with director Christos Nikou.

Greek director Christos Nikou (APPLES, AFI FEST 2020) makes a bold English-language debut with this charming lo-fi sci-fi about the clash between our over-reliance on technology and the primal drive to find true love. Anna (Academy Award® nominee Jessie Buckley, WOMEN TALKING, AFI FEST 2022) and her partner Ryan (Jeremy Allen White, THE BEAR) are among the lucky couples to have passed the “love test,” a cutting-edge method of determining romantic compatibility using extracted fingernails and a mysterious machine that resembles a 1980s microwave. But when Anna starts a new dream job at the esteemed Love Institute, helping couples to train for and pass the test, she grows close to her new colleague Amir (Oscar® winner Riz Ahmed), an experienced and passionate love tester with an innovative method of preparing clients to take the big test. As the pair become increasingly attached to their work – and to one another – Anna grows distant from her home life with Ryan and begins to question the validity of the very test she’s worked so hard to master. Shot on 35mm with a retro futurist aesthetic that perfectly matches the film’s allegorical tone, FINGERNAILS raises essential questions about the dangers of prizing technological certainty over the nuances of instinct and emotion. –Abbie Algar