Festival Programme

Films by Venue

Bridgeway Cinemas

Baby

Marcelo Caetano

A young, released offender struggles to regain his bearings in São Paulo, forging a tumultuous partnership in love and business with an older sex worker, in Marcelo Caetano’s raw, vital drama.

The Ballad of Wallis Island

James Griffiths

What would you do if you won the lottery? Charles answers the age-old question by inviting his favourite former folk duo to his remote island, where the estranged band members prove that some flames never die...

Bati

Andrew John Fakaua Ponton

Framed with enchanting Fijian landscapes and carefully decorated with beautiful Fijian people and culture. A story about familiarity, growth, responsibility, love, respect and boxing… told in true Fiji style.

The Blue Trail

O último azul

Gabriel Mascaro

In a future world where senior citizens are banished from society, a rebellious matriarch instead embarks on a fantastic Amazon adventure. Gabriel Mascaro’s film is an ode to life and freedom with no age restrictions.

Bring Them Down

Christopher Andrews

Set amongst the rugged countryside of Western Ireland, Christopher Abbot (Poor Things) and Barry Keoghan (Saltburn) deliver standout performances in a thriller that is as shocking as the landscape is serene.

Deaf

Sorda

Eva Libertad

A woman navigates the experience of motherhood as a deaf person in a hearing world in Eva Libertad’s crowd-pleasing, feel-good drama which collected the Panaroma Audience Award at Berlin this year.

DJ Ahmet

Georgi M. Unkovski

Ahmet stumbles upon a forest rave at the edge of his local village, where he finds the escape he’s been desperately seeking in Georgi M. Unkovski’s loveable debut, the first ever Macedonian film to be awarded at Sundance.

Dreams (Sex Love)

Drømmer

Dag Johan Haugerud

A teenage girl recounts her crush for her teacher through the pages of a memoir. The winner of the Golden Bear 2025 is a lucid and tender chronicle of the unforgettable experience of first love.

Enzo

Laurent Cantet, Robin Campillo

A woozy summer of youthful aimlessness morphs into a complex infatuation as a rebellious bourgeois French teen falls for an older Ukrainian bricklayer in this sun-drenched coming of age tale.

Home Sweet Home

Hjem kære hjem

Frelle Peterson

A young single mother takes on a challenging role as a carer for the elderly in this poignant exploration of in-home care. Eager to make a difference in her patients’ lives, Sofie’s compassion is inspiring.

Hysteria

Mehmet Akif Büyükatalay

A film shoot sparks fear and anger when a holy book is desecrated in the name of art in this intense German thriller, fanning the flames of contemporary conflict into a taut and tangly blaze.

It Was Just an Accident

Yek tasadef sadeh

Jafar Panahi

A masterpiece of cinematic invention and political bravery, Jafar Panahi’s rousing new film deservedly won the Cannes Palme d’Or and opens NZIFF 2025 on a powerful and inspiring note.

Late Shift

Heldin

Petra Volpe

Plunging through the corridors of a surgical ward, this frantic Swiss drama charts the pulse-racing worklife of an overstretched, underappreciated nursing professional.

A Little Something Extra

Un p'tit truc n plus

Artus

This wacky and heartfelt comedy, from popular French standup Artus, follows two criminals on the lam who lay low at a summer camp for young adults with disabilities. A runaway hit at the French box office last year.

Love

Kjærlighet

Dag Johan Haugerud

What is love? Through the stories of a straight woman and a gay man, Haugerud defies conventions with humor and compassion, in an eloquent and moving masterwork on human relations in the 21st century.

The Love That Remains

Ástin sem eftir er

Hlynur Pálmason

An intimate, rapturously-lensed exploration of a family struggling with a parental separation, Hlynur Pálmason’s mosaic of snapshots, dreams and memories finds gentle profundity in the slow march of time.

Mirrors No. 3

Miroirs No. 3

Christian Petzold

In the wake of a traumatic incident, a young woman forms a surrogate mother-daughter relationship with her rescuer. As emotional walls come down, doubts arise: is there more to the care offered than simple kindness?

Misericordia

Miséricorde

Alain Guiraudie

French auteur Alain Guiraudie continues his Hitchcockian streak with this slippery, eccentric story of a provincial French family in mourning and the chaos that arrives with the prodigal return of a disquieting family friend.

Mistress Dispeller

Elizabeth Lo

This thought-provoking documentary follows a “mistress dispeller” – a professional specialist in ending infidelity – and intimately interrogates marriage, loneliness and labour in contemporary China.

One to One: John & Yoko

Kevin Macdonald, Sam Rice-Edwards

This immersive portrait of the time John and Yoko spent living in Greenwich Village is a vivid time capsule of America in the early 70s. A time of extreme political polarisation which may seem uncannily familiar.

Orwell: 2+2=5

Raoul Peck

Raoul Peck, the acclaimed documentary chronicler of power in America, looks to George Orwell’s writing of 1984 as a prescient guide to our modern era of Trumpian rule and reality manipulation.

Peacock

Pfau - Bin ich echt?

Bernhard Wenger

Mattias spends his days pretending to be someone else, offering companionship to strangers in need. Bernhard Wenger’s unsettling drama quietly dissects loneliness, identity and the cost of always performing.

Predators

David Osit

This gripping Sundance documentary re-examines the rise and fall of mid-00s hidden camera show To Catch a Predator in a damning investigation into the murky ethics of true crime entertainment.

The President’s Cake

Mamlaket al-Qasab

Hasan Hadi

A young girl scrambles to prepare a high-stakes birthday cake for a dictator amidst the dangers and deprivations of the Gulf War in this irresistibly scrappy Caméra d'Or-winner from Iraq.

Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk

Sepideh Farsi

As a Gaza native, photojournalist Fatma Hassona documents aspects of the war in Palestine that foreign journalists cannot access. Her tenacious Palestinian voice will not be silenced in this poignant documentary.

Reedland

Reitland

Sven Bresser

When a reed-cutter finds a girl’s body in the marsh, silence grips his remote Dutch village. Sven Bresser’s debut is an eerily quiet thriller about guilt, violence and the stories that fester when no one speaks.

Resurrection

Kuang ye shi dai

Bi Gan

Visionary director Bi Gan invites audiences to a journey through the ages of cinema. In a dazzling kaleidoscope of images, he keeps the flame of the undying love between cinema and audiences burning.

Riefenstahl

Andres Veiel

With unfettered access to Leni Reifenstahl’s personal archive, documentarian Andres Veiel delivers an extraordinarily discerning portrait of the infamous filmmaker that allows audiences to draw their own conclusions.

Romería

Carla Simón

One of the standouts of Cannes 2025, Carla Simón’s personal exploration of the restlessness of a young woman without parents is a poignant example of the healing power of cinema.

The Secret Agent

O agente secreto

Kleber Mendonça Filho

Brazilian filmmaker Kleber Mendonça Filho painstakingly recreates the Recife of the 70s dictatorship years in this sprawling, colourful spy thriller like no other. Winner of Best Director and Best Actor at Cannes.

Sex

Dag Johan Haugerud

Returning from last year’s Festival to screen alongside the rest of his Sex Dreams Love trilogy, Dag Johan Haugerud’s comic drama takes a candid and refreshing look at modern gender roles.

The Shrouds

David Cronenberg

David Cronenberg’s sardonic self-portrait of his own struggle with grief is couched within a chilly and unsettling story of a tech-savant and his morbid invention which brings bereavement into the app age.

Sound of Falling

In die Sonne schauen

Mascha Schilinski

German cinema celebrated the arrival of a bold new auteur in Cannes, as Mascha Schilinski unveiled her ghostly epic of women in one house visited by catastrophe and its echoes over generations.

The Teacher Who Promised the Sea

El maestro que prometió el mar

Patricia Font

A progressive teacher brings new methods to a village in Burgos on the eve of the Spanish Civil War, whilst in present day Catalonia a woman searches for answers as to the whereabouts of her great-grandfather’s remains.

Urchin

Harris Dickinson

This gritty and empathetic portrait of addiction and the self-destruction that comes along with it is filled with pitch black humour. Frank Dillane puts on a masterclass as he takes his character to rock bottom.

A Useful Ghost 

Pee chai dai ka 

Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke 

After her death by dust poisoning, a woman returns as a haunted vacuum cleaner to comfort her grieving husband. Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke blends absurd comedy and class politics into a fable that’s as strange as it is moving.

War Stories Our Mothers Never Told Us

Gaylene Preston

Seven women reflect on the emotional cataclysm of World War II in Dame Gaylene Preston’s landmark contribution to the collective memory of Aotearoa, which has lost none of its raw power on its 30th anniversary.

Went Up the Hill

Samuel Van Grinsven

An unsettling, sinister slow-burn thriller, Samuel Van Grinsven unites rising star Dacre Montgomery with Phantom Thread’s Vicky Krieps and New Zealand’s own Sarah Peirse for a supernatural chiller like no other.

What Marielle Knows

Was Marielle weiß

Frédéric Hambalek

Panic around a new digital Big Brother era underpins a clever, absurdist send-up of bourgeois hypocrisy, as a married couple are put on the spot by their daughter’s all-pervasive telepathy.

Young Mothers

Jeunes mères

Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne

The Dardenne brothers return with a deeply affecting drama exploring the lives of five teen mothers. Hopes and fears steer the young women towards bettering their lives for themselves and their children.