Tarantino screens 17 minutes of new Cliff Booth film at AFI Fest

Quentin Tarantino ended his AFI Fest appearance in Los Angeles with a 17-minute preview of The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth. The footage screened on the night of October 23, after an IMAX presentation of Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood and a conversation with the filmmaker at the TCL Chinese Theatre. The preview had not been disclosed in the festival’s public schedule.

According to separate reports from Deadline and Variety, Tarantino gave the audience a choice between hearing him continue to discuss the project and watching the beginning of the film. The crowd saw the latter. What is confirmed is the length of the preview and the circumstances of the screening; individual audience reactions are not the same as a critical assessment of the completed feature.

A follow-up with a different director

The new film brings back Cliff Booth, the character played by Brad Pitt in Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood, while changing a central part of the creative arrangement. Tarantino wrote the screenplay, and David Fincher directed it. Netflix describes the story as a Los Angeles crime tale set in 1977, eight years after the events of the 2019 film.

At this point in his life, Cliff no longer relies only on stunt work. He operates as a fixer hired to solve problems for people in the entertainment business, while also working as a bartender and projectionist. The premise moves him away from his day-to-day relationship with actor Rick Dalton and into a network of agents, television stars and figures from Hollywood’s criminal underside. Elizabeth Debicki, Scott Caan, Carla Gugino and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II are among the confirmed cast members.

The change in director does not make the project less connected to Tarantino: its world, lead character and screenplay remain tied to him. Fincher’s involvement nevertheless creates a particular expectation around pacing, investigation and violence. That is an editorial inference based on the filmmakers’ bodies of work, not an advance description of the finished result. Seventeen minutes shown at a promotional event cannot establish the full tone of a movie that Netflix lists at 2 hours and 21 minutes.

What the AFI screening changes

The AFI Fest presentation serves as a step between the trailer already released and the film’s launch. It allowed a substantial sequence to play for an audience connected to the original movie without turning the event into a full premiere. The footage was not officially released online, so detailed accounts from outlets in attendance should be understood as reports from the room, not as public access to the cut.

The venue also reinforced the connection between the films. The event took place at the same TCL Chinese Theatre that hosted the U.S. premiere of Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood in 2019. AFI’s official schedule had advertised only the IMAX revival and the Tarantino conversation, framing the evening as a lead-in to Fincher’s film.

The release starts in IMAX

Netflix says The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth will begin an exclusive two-week global IMAX run on November 25, 2026. It is scheduled to reach Netflix on December 23. Those dates are the distributor’s formal announcement and do not depend on accounts of the festival presentation.

The plan preserves a theatrical component for a streaming-backed feature and uses the premium format as a limited event. For Netflix, it also turns the Pitt, Fincher and Tarantino collaboration into a two-stage release. For audiences, the surprise screening confirms that a significant portion of the film is now being shown beyond trailer form, but it does not establish whether more special screenings will take place before November.