Donkey Princess (Imagine Film Fest 2026)

Originally called Princesa Burro in Spanish, this Freudian and fairy tale-like Imagine Fantastic Film Festival pick is a surreal exploration into the multiverse that stars Antonia Giesen as Princess Diana (the titular Donkey Princess herself), in a visual feast for the eyes that will leave you squirming in your seat.

Set in the kingdom of Chile, the heartbroken King Athur (Francisco Melo), outlaws love after his wife and the mother of his daughter dies during a plague. When Princess Diana grows up she secretly falls in love secretly with Lalo (Andrew Bargsted), who’s then banished when their relationship is discovered by her father. Distraught, she uses a magical bracelet Lalo gifted gave her to grant her wish, but instead it transports her to a different place and time. A journey across a multitude of universes ensues as Diana struggles to find contentment and herself while she’s constantly torn between the suffocating relationship with her father, and her freedom to love Lalo.

Following the stop-motion movie The Wolf House (2018), and surrealist hybrid-live action The Hyperboreans (2024), Donkey Princess is the third feature length outing from Chilean duo Cristóbal León and Joaquín Cociña – both of whom wrote and directed the film. It’s the next step in the pair’s exploration of puppetry, papier-mache, stop motion and live action, and from the handmade miniature backgrounds of the kingdom to the small animated birds flittering across the screen, they definitely leave their mark as you can feel the passion that went into creating this dark fairy tale world. As the film goes on and Diana becomes unsatisfied with each dimension, the playful elements begin to fade away until she finds herself in a realistic, modern, and somewhat greyer, world. Adding in

Donkey Princess is an incredibly unique film with some gorgeously detailed costumes and tonal colours, and a limited cast of just three main performers who bring strong performances to the 90-minute runtime. Antonia Giesen stands out as a young woman searching for freedom and her own identity, while Francesco Melo plays the overprotective (and creepy), father in a subtly menacing way, and although slightly overshadowed by the other two, Andrew Bargsted delivers on his portrayal of a yearner turned insecure love interest.  

Debuting at the 79^th Locarno film festival in August, Donkey Princess is a riff on Donkeyskin – the 17^th century tale by Charles Perrault, and there are a number of parallels between the two. A major similarity is the king developing quite inappropriate (and straight up incestuous), feelings towards his daughter who look an awful lot like his late wife. The patriarchy looms large over the princess as the suffocating affection of her father ultimately drives the her away from him and into the arms of another man – her lover.

The problem with a lot of dimension-hopping alternate universe films is that the multiverse portions tend to feel rushed, a good example of this being Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. With its quick “look at this cool universe”, “oh here’s another”, and so on and so forth before settling on a relatively boring universe, it just feels wasted and leads to the underdevelopment of characters and the concept. It’s a cool concept that just doesn’t go far enough for me, and unfortunately Donkey Princess falls into this habit as it devotes most of the time to the first and last destinations Diana winds up in. After a slight lull in the middle of the movie, the film gets back on its feet with a shocking third act that completely flips expectations of this fairytale-esque story and kept me hooked to its conclusion.

Donkey Princess is a visually exciting, eccentric, and fascinating exploration of a hybrid live-action style with a great premise, and off the back of this I’m looking forward to León and Cociña’s next film together.

JESSICA’S ARCHIVE – DONKEY PRINCESS