My Notes on Mars (2026) by Lili Horvát - Review

This post is also available in: Italiano (Italian) Deutsch (German)

by Lili Horvát

grade: 7.5

In My Notes on Mars, Lili Horvát doesn’t want to provide definitive answers at all costs. On the contrary, the viewers have the precious opportunity to draw their own conclusions whilst being mesmerised by images of great visual and communicative power. Opening film of the Giornate degli Autori section at the 2026 Venice Film Festival.

Like Earth and Mars

The planet Mars, as we know, represents passion and desire, but also something that, by its very nature, we cannot fully understand. The only thing we can do is stop and observe it from our own planet. In the same way, sometimes we cannot claim to truly know even the person we love and live with. Young Hungarian director Lili Horvát knows this well. And in My Notes on Mars – the opening film of the Giornate degli Autori section at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival, and the result of a co-production between Hungary, Austria and Bosnia and Herzegovina – she has chosen to tell us the story of a mysterious and tormented love. So, how, then, can a human relationship be linked to the planet Mars? Quickly said.

The story depicted in My Notes on Mars, therefore, is that of American astrophysicist Margot (played by Mackenzie Davis), who, following a burnout, resigned from her job and decided to spend some time in Hungary with her husband Sam (Rupert Friend), with whom she is going through a relationship crisis. One day, whilst out on a walk, she disappears, only to reappear miraculously on the very day of her memorial service. After her return, however, she seems a very different person: she remembers nothing of her past and is determined to destroy her own notes on the scientific research she was working on.

It is interesting to observe, therefore, how My Notes on Mars features a clear division between its first and second part. Initially, in fact, it is Margot who feels deeply unhappy, constantly seeking escape from her daily life with Sam (and from herself) and even forgetting important appointments. Then, suddenly, after her return, things change (just as the perspective from which the story is told shifts). Now it is Sam who feels confused by this new version of his wife; it is he who almost tends to avoid her and barely recognises her anymore; it is he who, despite still loving her, is almost afraid to truly open up. What if all this is simply his way of coming to terms with a difficult period?

Margot and Sam, then, are just like Earth and Mars: they observe each other from afar; each longs to truly know the other, but, in reality, they seem destined to remain light-years apart. And in staging this drama of theirs, Lili Horvát has opted for a sober and elegant staging and narrative style, where visually striking images and a contemplative atmosphere – which at times takes on almost supernatural connotations – combine with moments in which images prevail over words to create perfect harmony.

In My Notes on Mars, the director doesn’t want to provide definitive answers at all costs. On the contrary, the viewers have the precious opportunity to draw their own conclusions whilst being mesmerised by images of great visual and communicative power. Lili Horvát knows her stuff. And she had already proven this back in 2020, when, again in Venice, she presented the fascinating Preparations to be together for an unknown Period of Time. We are now curious to find out what other directions her cinema will take in the future.