Levitating

Wregas Bhanuteja's 2026 Indonesian film is set in a town where pleasure is equated with being possessed by spirits. Bayu wants to be the shaman of these trance parties; his aim is not art but raising the money to stop his neighbourhood being evicted. The film folds belief and necessity into each other. Whether Bayu is really conducting the ritual or only appearing to is not stated; the real matter is a community turning its own rite into a show in order to live. Bhanuteja had taken up social pressure at the scale of a town before. The cinematography is built on night and crowds, and the music serves a function inside the narrative. Angga Yunanda leads. Who it's for: those who like contemporary Indonesian cinema and dramas about folk belief. Who it's not for: viewers expecting a definite explanation; the film deliberately blurs the line between the supernatural and the performed.