Stockholm International Film Festival presents the 2025 festival programme

For it’s 36th consecutive year, Stockholm Film Festival invites audiences, actors and directors from all around the world to twelve dazzling days between November 5–16. The long-awaited festival program is finally being released, with 135 premieres on the schedule, featuring both debutant filmmakers and seasoned masters. This year’s festival is dedicated to David Lynch, whose memory will be honored through film screenings, stagetalks, and a “Lynchified” Bio Skandia.

This year’s edition of the festival is packed to the brim with films, parties, gala premieres, a substantial industry programme and exciting guests from all over the world. The festival opens with Tarik Saleh’s conclusion to the Cairo trilogy, Eagles of the Republic, starring Fares Fares. Over twelve days, festivalgoers can enjoy 135 films and TV series, take part in Face2Face sessions with filmmakers, and dance into the early hours at one of the festival’s many parties. Stockholm Film Festival will welcome international talents such as director Benny Safdie with his much-talked-about The Smashing Machine, as well as Alexander Skarsgård, who has built a major international career and will receive this year’s Stockholm Achievement Award.

Daniel Day-Lewis makes his long-awaited return to the screen in his son Ronan Day-Lewis’s directorial debut Anemone, while Richard Linklater presents his latest creation Blue Moon. The film is a quiet, moonlit love triangle featuring 2023’s Stockholm Achievement Award winner, Ethan Hawke, in the lead.

– We are proud to present a rich program full of promising debuts and countless festival gems that shine alongside the bigger names. We are excited to show the work of Korean master Park Chan-wook, who delivers world-class contemporary satire in his new film No Other Choice. The allure and shimmer of the past are strong in this year’s film lineup and are captured by the titles featured in this year’s Spotlight: Be Kind Rewind. As always, we are delighted to bring the film world a little closer to our capital with guests like Isabella Rossellini and our honorary award recipients Alexander Skarsgård and Benny Safdie, says Beatrice Karlsson, head of programming.

No Other Choice, this year’s centerpiece film, received a nine-minute standing ovation at its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival earlier this year, along with the Audience Award for Best International Film. The festival closes with Lynne Ramsay’s Die, My Love, already praised on the festival circuit for its raw energy and emotional precision, with Jennifer Lawrence rumored to be an Oscar contender for her leading performance.

This year’s Spotlight: Be Kind Rewind shines a light on contemporary nostalgia through a series of films where filmmakers rewind the videotapes to grasp both the present and the past. Among the featured titles are the video store documentary Videoheaven, and Ross McElwee’s tender and grief-laden Remake. The program also includes Ira Sach’s Peter Hujars Day, with Rebecka Hall and Ben Whishaw in a 70’s scented New York.

Stockholm Film Festival is this year dedicated to the memory of the iconic director David Lynch, who passed away earlier this year. Lynch inaugurated the very first edition of the festival in 1990 and will forever hold a special place in the festival’s history. Isabella Rossellini will attend and take part in a Face2Face conversation following a screening of her breakthrough film Blue Velvet, directed by Lynch. The festival will also screen the Lynch classic Mulholland Drive in 35 mm, followed by a Lynch-o-mania party at Spy Bar.

The Stockholm Visionary Award 2025 goes to American director Benny Safdie, who will attend the festival with his film The Smashing Machine in which Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson delivers the performance of his career as MMA star Mark Kerr. Together with his brother Josh, Benny Safdie has made a name for himself as one of the most exciting filmmakers working today, with films such as Good Time (2017) and Uncut Gems (2019). The Smashing Machine marks his first feature as sole director, writer, and editor.

The recipient of the Stockholm Achievement Award 2025 is the versatile actor Alexander Skarsgård, appearing at the festival with the acclaimed, leather-scented Pillion from director Harry Lighton. With a career spanning over two decades, Skarsgård has repeatedly demonstrated his ability to move between Hollywood blockbusters, European arthouse films, and celebrated TV productions.

Music is a central theme throughout this year’s festival. The brand-new documentary It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley sheds new light on the short but influential life of Jeff Buckley, and Swedish film Egghead Republic bursts with punky indie sleaze energy in a stylized science fiction setting. Jennifer Lopez shines in a musical, campy reinterpretation of Kiss of the Spider Woman, and from Catalonia comes the drama Forastera, with original music composed by Swedish duo Anna von Hausswolff and Filip Leyman, who were nominated for a Guldbagge Award for Best Original Score in 2022.

In this year’s Stockholm Competition, last year’s Bronze Horse winner Sean Baker returns as producer, writer, and editor of Left-Handed Girl. In the body horror film Alpha, visiting director and screenwriter Julia Ducournau explores what happens when society is shaken by a deadly bloodborne infection, and in Eva Victor's Sorry, Baby, power dynamics in relationships are explored.

The documentary program is packed with new titles from masters such as Werner Herzog, Laura Poitras, and Raoul Peck. Peck directs one of the program’s most powerful entries – Orwell: 2+2=5, a sharp analysis of language and power in our time. The section also includes Charlie Shackleton’s true-crime critique Zodiac Killer Project, and in Bao Nguyen’s controversial The Stringer, the story behind the “Napalm Girl” photograph is explored. Tony Benna’s André is an Idiot offers a warm-hearted look at life in the face of death.

This year’s Focus Country, Germany, presents Christian Petzold’s Miroirs No.3 – A Boat on the Ocean and Mascha Schilinski’s Sound of Falling, which won the Jury Prize in Cannes earlier this year. The festival also highlights German feature debuts such as Impatience of the Heart by Lauro Cress and the influencer satire Babystar by Joscha Bongard.

Josh O’Connor, one of his generation’s most acclaimed actors, stars in not one but two films this year: The Mastermind - a psychologically charged art heist directed by Kelly Reichardt - and Rebuilding, a drama by Max Walker-Silverman that premiered to great acclaim at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

So far, those ready for the Masterclass are director and video game genius Josef Fares along with Palme d'Or winner Julia Ducournau.

2025 also marks the launch of a new competitive section during the Stockholm Industry Days: Stockholm Nordic Shorts – a new platform showcasing Nordic short filmmakers and the storytellers of tomorrow. Through this initiative, the festival strengthens its commitment to regional talent and artistic expression in short-form storytelling.

Stockholm Film Festival is once again proud to present TV series on the big screen through the Stockholm Series section. In addition to Ernst De Geer’s Popular problems and We come in peace directed by Jens Jonsson, the section features Isabella Eklöf’s upcoming drama series The Death of Bunny Munroe and Australian director Justin Kurzel’s miniseries The Narrow Road to the Deep North.

Last year, the festival screened eight official Oscar submissions, and this year it proudly presents even more – a total of eleven films representing their respective countries in the race for the Academy Awards:

• Dictator’s Cake (Iraq), by Hasan Hadi

• Reedland (Netherlands), by Sven Bresser

• The Secret Agent (Brazil), by Kleber Mendonça Filho

• Eagles of the Republic (Sweden), by Tarik Saleh

• 2000 Meters to Andriivka (Ukraine), by Mstyslav Chernov

• Father (Slovakia), by Tereza Nvotová

• The Things You Kill (Canada), by Alireza Khatami

• Little Trouble Girls (Slovenia), by Urška Djukić

• No Other Choice (South Korea), by Park Chan-wook

• Sound of Falling (Germany), by Mascha Schillinski

• Left-Handed Girl (Taiwan), by Shih-Ching Tsou

Apply for press accreditation for this year’s festival here.

Press Contacts:

Anna Hedlin, Head of Press

press@stockholmfilmfestival.se

+46 (0)8 677 50 10

Ella Dillén-Tombs, Press Coordinator

pressekreterare@stockholmfilmfestival.se

+46 (0)73 832 52 10

Elvis Forsberg Liem, Press Assistant

pressassistent@stockholmfilmfestival.se

+46 (0)72 389 52 59