WHO CAN KILL A CHILD?

This event is part of Forbidden Worlds Film Festival: The Big Scream 2026. Visit **\www.forbiddenworldsfilmfestival.co.uk** **to see the full line-up as well as buy weekend and day festival passes. **

Original Title: ¿Quién puede matar a un niño? | Dir. Narciso Ibáñez Serrador | Spain | 111 mins | Cert. 18

“Comes from a different era in filmmaking, when horror movies could spit in the eye of the status quo…” - Slant Magazine.

Directed by Narciso Ibáñez Serrador (El televisor, The House That Screamed), the legendary master of horror who has been dubbed the ‘Spanish Hitchcock’, Who Can Kill A Child? is his undisputed masterpiece, an extreme and unbearably tense work that remains deeply shocking in its disregard for societal taboos. 

Taking its time building a mood of palpable dread, Serrador wrings the menace out of every social encounter faced by British couple, Tom (Lewis Fiander) and Evelyn (Prunella Ransome) as they travel out to a remote Spanish island village, which seems to be populated solely by sullen and unnerving children. 

As the couple begin to find evidence of foul play and the children start to gather together, Tom and Evelyn are forced to contemplate the unthinkable, and struggle with the notion that they may have to kill or be killed. 

50 years after it was released, Who Can Kill A Child?’s reputation has continued to grow among genre aficionados and is now considered, not just as a landmark work of Euro-horror, but as one of the greatest horror films ever made.

Content warning: Please be aware that this version of the film contains a restored eight-minute documentary prologue composed of real archival footage of children suffering in global conflicts including The Holocaust, The Vietnam War and the Nigerian Civil War. The filmmakers included it to underline how adults have historically used and harmed children as helpless victims of conflict, but the use of real-life tragedies has proved controversial and disturbing for audiences.

The film will be introduced by Mike Cherry of Heavy Pictures Presents.

We will be screening a brand new 4K restoration of the film courtesy of Radiance Films.

This film will be screened primarily in English with certain scenes in Spanish subtitled.