9 Films Shot on 16mm After Hollywood Moved to Digital

Digital cameras took over most professional sets years ago, and nobody pretends otherwise. Yet a small group of directors and cinematographers keep loading the smallest of the classic film formats into their cameras. They do it by choice, and often on tight budgets.

Sixteen millimeter film carries less fine detail than 35mm or modern digital sensors, and that is part of its appeal. This gallery looks at nine features that used it, from lean indie productions to a studio comedy and a fifty million dollar sports drama.

How to Blow Up a Pipeline (2022)

Daniel Goldhaber’s thriller follows a group of young activists who plan to sabotage an oil pipeline in Texas. It sits on Wikipedia’s list of theatrical features whose principal photography was done on 16mm film, which makes it one of the more unexpected heist style movies of recent years.

The grain suits the story. The picture looks scrappy and handmade, close to the do it yourself spirit of the characters on screen. It also shows that 16mm doesn’t belong only to quiet character studies.

Between the Temples (2024)

Nathan Silver’s comedy stars Jason Schwartzman as a grieving cantor and Carol Kane as his former music teacher, who wants a late in life bat mitzvah. Film at Lincoln Center notes it was shot in 16mm by Sean Price Williams. The film premiered at Sundance in January 2024 and reached US theaters that August.

Silver has explained that he wanted warmth, and that an analogue look can get lost in high definition. One review noted that the production used rare Kodak stock pushed by two stops, which lowered the contrast. The result is a soft, faintly faded picture that fits the film’s odd tenderness.

Saturday Night (2024)

Jason Reitman’s film covers the ninety minutes before the first broadcast of Saturday Night Live in 1975. Kodak says it was shot on 16mm film by cinematographer Eric Steelberg. The setting is a crowded backstage world, so the camera keeps moving through it.

The format was chosen partly for period feel. One interview said the film stock gives the movie a texture reminiscent of films from the era. Steelberg also said the process went smoothly, noting that a Kodak lab in Atlanta handles the processing and the film stock is available and affordable.

Sing Sing (2023)

Greg Kwedar’s prison drama centers on a theater program inside the Sing Sing correctional facility. Colman Domingo earned an Oscar nomination for Best Actor, and the film made the top ten lists of both the National Board of Review and the American Film Institute for 2024. It reached US theaters in July 2024.

Cinematographer Pat Scola shot it on Kodak 16mm. Almost all of it used Vision3 250D stock, with a faster 500T stock saved for a long dress rehearsal take in a dark space. The film’s budget was reportedly only about two million dollars, which shows how practical 16mm can be.

Bird (2024)

Andrea Arnold’s Bird premiered in competition at Cannes in 2024 and stars Barry Keoghan and Nykiya Adams. It appears in the same Wikipedia category of theatrical features shot on 16mm film. The story follows a young girl on the edge of adulthood in a rough corner of Kent, in England.

Arnold has long favored a close, tactile style, and 16mm supports it well. The film mixes social realism with moments of fantasy, and the grain keeps both worlds looking like the same place. It’s a good example of the format serving a story, not just a look.

Harvest (2024)

Athina Rachel Tsangari’s Harvest is adapted from a novel by Jim Crace. It stars Caleb Landry Jones and premiered in competition at Venice in 2024. It’s listed with other features whose principal photography was done on 16mm film.

The story takes place in an unnamed village at an unspecified time, where outsiders upset a fragile community. A timeless setting like that benefits from film grain, because the image doesn’t point to a specific decade. Tsangari’s patient pacing gives that texture room to settle in.

Universal Language (2024)

Matthew Rankin’s Universal Language is a deadpan comedy set in a version of Winnipeg where the dialogue is mostly Persian. It premiered at Cannes in the Directors’ Fortnight in 2024, and it also appears in the Wikipedia category of features shot on 16mm film.

The format helps with the film’s strange mood. Beige buildings, frozen streets and muted colors take on a worn, slightly faded quality. It looks like a half remembered movie from another era, which suits the joke at its center.

Sirāt (2025)

Óliver Laxe’s desert odyssey was shot by Mauro Herce, and Kodak confirms it was captured on Super 16mm film. It won the Jury Prize at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. Herce later earned the European Film Award for Best Cinematographer, and the film was nominated for Best International Film at the 2026 Oscars.

Money was part of the story. One report put the budget at about 1.2 million dollars, less than a sixth of what Anora had. The film’s long takes in the Moroccan desert carry a granular, physical quality that digital often smooths away.

The Smashing Machine (2025)

Benny Safdie’s biopic about MMA fighter Mark Kerr stars Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt. It premiered at the 82nd Venice International Film Festival on September 1, 2025, where it won the Silver Lion. The budget was reported at fifty million dollars.

Safdie and cinematographer Maceo Bishop built their own visual rules for the fights, based on documentary styling. One reviewer noted that 16mm holds about as much detail as 1080p, while 35mm and digital cameras can reach an image quality around 4K. That softness is a big part of the film’s look, and the grain is easy to spot on a large screen.