09/07/2025 - Both the Cineasti del presente section - dedicated to current directors and films of the future - and the Piazza Grande line-up boast rich and multi-faceted selections

Today saw Giona A Nazzaro, artist director of the Locarno Film Festival, unveil the line-up for the 78th edition of the event (running from 6-16 August - read news), including the movies gracing the festival’s ever-interesting parallel sections.

The Cineasti del Presente competition, dedicated to first and second works by young directors, described as a space “pervaded by genuine curiosity for the many possibilities offered by film” in which the presented films “plough the furrow for the future”, includes 15 feature films this year (all in world premieres), of which many are European productions and co-productions (an impressive 14 out of 15). These include Affection Affection, the second feature film shot by Swiss director Alexia Walther and French filmmaker Maxime Matray, their new film after Blonde Animals [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Maxime Matray, Alexia Walther
film profile] (selected in Venice’s International Critics’ Week); Un balcon à Limoges by French director Jérôme Reybaud (also previously selected for Venice’s ICW by way of Four Days in France [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]), which follows a woman who’s decided to live on the fringes of society; the documentary Hair, Paper, Water… co-directed by Belgium’s Nicolas Graux and Vietnam’s Minh Quý Trương (his latest work after Viet and Nam [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], screened in last year’s Un Certain Regard section in Cannes) and looking into Vietnam’s French postcolonial legacy; Balearic by Spain’s Ion de Sosa (selected for the Berlinale Forum via Androids Dream [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]), which is a surreal comedy about a group of teens monitored by three Dobermanns who keep them confined to a swimming pool in the villa which they’ve snuck into; and Don’t Let the Sun by Switzerland’s Jacqueline Zünd (Where We Belong [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], selected for Berlin’s Generation line-up), which is a sci-fi film revolving around ecology in a world on the verge of exploding. There’s also Gioia mia by Italy’s Margherita Spampinato, an intimate and poetic film charting the adventures of a child who’s spending the summer at his grandma’s house in Sicily; Don’t Let Me Die by Romania’s Andrei Epure, a charming yet destabilising film blending comedy, realism and genre film to explore the absurdities of a society plagued by apathy; queer comedy Fantasy by Slovenia’s Kukla, which explores the difficulties involved in being oneself in a society suffocated by Catholicism; Becoming by the Kazakh director based in London Zhannat Alshanova, which is a coming of age film following a young swimming fanatic who’ll do anything to achieve her goals; The Plant From the Canaries by the Chinese director based in Berlin Ruan Lan-Xi, an intense film which tackles the topic of the South Korean diaspora in Berlin; Blue Heron by Canada’s Sophy Romvari, which examines, through the eyes of the youngest son, the internal dynamics of a family who have decided to move to Vancouver Island; Olivia by Argentina’s Sofía Petersen, described by Giona A. Nazzaro as “the most powerful and most formal film in the line-up”; Hijo Mayor by Argentina’s Cecilia Kang, which is part documentary, part fiction and which focuses on the Korean diaspora in Latin America; and The Fin by South Korea’s Park Syeyoung, which is a sci-fi film about identity and the relationship between the two Koreas. Eric K Boulianne’s Canadian film Folichonneries rounds off the selection.

As for the incredible Piazza Grande (boasting one of the biggest screens in the world), this section will be welcoming 14 films this year, including 4 world premieres. No less than 11 of these 14 movies are European productions and co-productions. On the production side we find the festival’s opening film, Le pays d’Arto, by Armenia’s Tamara Stepanyan, painting a poignant portrait of a woman forced to face up to the ghosts of the past; The Birthday Party by Spain’s Miguel Ángel Jiménez, based on Panos Karnezis’ novel of the same name, starring actors along the lines of Willem Dafoe and Emma Suárez, and depicting a family which had fallen apart and the reconciliatory power of art; and (the first two episodes of) the series The Deal [+see also:
series review
series profile] by Switzerland’s Jean-Stéphane Bron, which charts the process which led to the signing of the agreement on Iran’s nuclear power. Co-productions, meanwhile, include the action thriller The Dead of Winter by Northern Ireland’s Brian Kirk; the touching and courageous work Irkala-Gilgamesh’s Dream by Iraqi-Dutch director Mohamed Jabarah Al-Daradji, and the closing film, Kiss of the Spider Woman, by US director Bill Condon, which is a musical adaptation of the musical of the same name, which is itself based on Manuel Puig’s novel El beso de la mujer araña. Films hailing from the most recent Cannes Film Festival include It Was Just an Accident [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] by Jafar Panahi, which won the Palme d’Or; Sentimental Value [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Joachim Trier
film profile] by Joachim Trier, awarded the Grand Prize; The Little Sister [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hafsia Herzi
film profile] by Hafsia Herzi, which won its protagonist Best Actress, and Heads or Tails? [+see also:
film review
interview: Alessio Rigo de Righi and M…
film profile] by Alessio Rigo de Righi and Matteo Zoppis, which was selected in the Un Certain Regard section. Last but not least, Stanley Kubrick’s now legendary movie, The Shining, and its notoriously terrifying scenes, are set to leave the Piazza audience’s nerves in shreds.

The selected films:

Cineasti del presente

Becoming  - Zhannat Alshanova (France/Kazakhstan/Netherlands/Lithuania/Sweden)
Folichonneries  - Eric K Boulianne (Canada)
Balearic  - Ion de Sosa (France/Spain)
Don’t Let Me Die  - Andrei Epure (Romania/Bulgaria/France)
Hair, Paper, Water…  - Nicolas Graux, Minh Quý Trương (Belgium/France/Vietnam)
Hijo Mayor  - Cecilia Kang (Argentina/France)
Fantasy  - Kukla (Slovenia/North Macedonia)
The Plant from the Canaries  - Ruan Lan-Xi (Germany)
Olivia  - Sofía Peterson (Argentina/UK/Spain)
Un balcon à Limoges  - Jérôme Reybaud (France)
Blue Heron  - Sophy Romvari (Canada/Hungary)
Gioia mia – Margherita Spampinato (Italy)
The Fin  - Park Syeyoung (South Korea/Germany/Qatar)
Affection Affection  - Alexia Walther, Maxime Matray (France)
Don’t Let the Sun  - Jacqueline Zünd (Switzerland/Italy)

Piazza Grande

Le pays d’Arto – Tamara Stepanyan (France/Armenia) (opening film)
The Birthday Party – Miguel Ángel Jiménez (Greece/Spain/Netherlands/UK)
The Deal [+see also:
series review
series profile] – Jean-Stéphane Bron (Switzerland/France/Luxembourg/Belgium) (series)
Police Story – Jackie Chan (Hong Kong) (1985)
The Little Sister [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hafsia Herzi
film profile] – Hafsia Herzi (France/Germany)
Irkala-Gilgamesh’s Dream – Mohamed Jabarah Al-Daradji (Iraq/United Arab Emirates/Qatar/France/UK/Saudi Arabia)
The Dead of Winter – Brian Kirk (USA/Germany)
The Shining – Stanley Kubrick (UK/USA) (1980)
Rosemead – Eric Lin (USA)
It Was Just an Accident [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] – Jafar Panahi (Iran/France/Luxembourg)
Testa o croce? [+see also:
film review
interview: Alessio Rigo de Righi and M…
film profile] – Alessio Rigo de Righi, Matteo Zoppis (Italy/USA)
Together – Michael Shanks (Australia/USA)
Sentimental Value [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Joachim Trier
film profile] – Joachim Trier (Norway/France/Denmark/Germany/Sweden)
Kiss of the Spider Woman – Bill Condon (USA/Uruguay) (closing film)

(Translated from Italian)