Dracula_Dir Radu Jude_IMG_4359

Source: Luxbox

‘Dracula’

The Locarno Film Festival (August 6-16) has unveiled the line-up for the 2025 edition, with world premieres including Radu Jude’s Dracula.

Romanian filmmaker and Berlinale Golden Bear winner Jude’s Romania-Austria-Luxembourg co-production, which competes in the international competition, is a comedy drama shot and set in Transylvania that explores the legend of Dracula through multiple lenses. Luxbox represents sales. Jude returns to Locarno after two films played out of competition last year – Eight Postcards From Utopia, co-directed with Christian Ferencz-Flatz, and Sleep #2.

Locarno’s international competition comprises of 17 world premieres, which will vie for the Golden Leopard awards. Among them is UK artist-filmmaker Ben Rivers’ Mare’s Nest, a UK-France-Canada co-production, that’s set in a world where adults no longer exist. Rivers’ documentary Bogancloch world premiered at Locarno in 2024.

Blue Is the Warmest Colour director Abdellatif Kechiche also appears with the third instalment in his Mektoub, My Love series, titled Mektoub, My Love: Canto Due.

Scroll down for full line-up

There’s also feature documentary With Hasan In Gaza, directed by Palestinian filmmaker Kamal Aljafari. The doc draws on rediscovered footage of Aljafari’s from Gaza in 2001. The film was backed by the Doha Film Institute.

Israeli Let It Be Morning filmmaker Eran Kolirin world premieres out of competition with his latest, Some Notes On The Current Situation.

Taking part in Locarno’s famed Piazza Grande screenings will be Miguel Ángel Jiménez’s Heretic-produced The Birthday Party, a drama set in the late 1970s starring Willem Dafoe, Emma Suarez and Joe Cole, sold by Bankside.

As previously announced, Lebanon’s Abboutt Productions, Alexander Payne, Emma Thompson and Jackie Chan will receive honours at the festival. Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh is jury president of the international competition.

Giona A. Nazzaro, artistic director of the Locarno Film Festival, said: “The films of the 78th edition represent what is alive, necessary, and daring in contemporary cinema today. A cinema entirely in the present tense, devoid of any nostalgia and projected forward towards an open, dynamic, inclusive future that is to be imagined together, once again.

“A playful and dangerous cinema that takes many risks, but also a cinema that does not forget to laugh and smile, and to question history in all its aspects. A necessary cinema, therefore, to be discovered in the darkness of the screening hall, where we rediscover the profound sense of aesthetic pleasure and feel part of a community. These are films designed for the cinema and for the collective experience in front of the screen. Once again, cinema is now – and facing into the future.”

Locarno 2025 line-up

*denotes world premiere

International Competition

The Seasons (Port-Fr-Sp)*

Dir. Maureen Fazendeiro

God Will Not Help (Cro-It-Rom)*

Dir. Hana Jušić

Donkey Days (Neth-Ger)*
Dir. Rosanne Pel

Dracula (Romania-Austria-Lux)*

Dir. Radu Jude

Dry Leaf (Ger-Geo)*

Dir. Alexandre Koberidze

Mosquitoes (It-Swiz-Fr)
Dirs. Valentina Bertani, Nicole Bertani

Le Lac (Switz)*

Dir. Fabrice Aragno

Desire Lines (Ser-Bos & Her-Neth-Cro-Ger)*

Dir. Dane Komljen

Mare’s Nest (UK-Fr-Can)*
Dir. Ben Rivers

Mektoub, My Love: Canto Due (Fr)*

Dir. Abdellatif Kechiche

Phantoms Of July (Ger)*
Dir. Julian Radlmaier

Solomamma (Nor-Latvia-Lithuania-Den-Fin)*

Dir. Janicke Askevold 



Sorella Di Clausura (Rom-Ser-It-Sp)*
Dir. Ivana Mladenović 



Two Seasons, Two Strangers (Japan)*

Dir. Sho Miyake 



Tales Of The Wounded Land (Leb)*
Dir. Abbas Fahdel

White Snail (Austria-Ger)*
Dirs. Elsa Kremser, Levin Peter

With Hasan In Gaza (Palestine-Ger-Fr-Qat)*
Dir. Kamal Aljafari

Cinema Of The Present

Affection Affection (Fr)* 

Dirs. Alexia Walther, Maxime Matray 



Balearic (Sp-Fr)*

Dir. Ion de Sosa

Becoming (Fr-Kazakhstan-Neth-Lithuania)*

Dir. Zhannat Alshanova

Blue Heron (Canada-Hun)*

Dir. Sophy Romvari

Don’t Let The Sun (Switz-It)*

Dir. Jacqueline Zünd

Fantasy (Slovenia-North Macedonia)*

Dir. Kukla

Follies (Can)*

Dir. Eric K. Boulianne 



Sweetheart (It)*

Dir. Margherita Spampinato

Hijo Mayor (Arg-Fr)*

Dir. Cecilia Kang

Don’t Let Me Die (Rom-Bul-Fr)*

Dir. Andrei Epure

Olivia (Arg-UK-Sp)*

Dir. Sofía Petersen

The Fin (S Kor-Ger-Qat)*

Dir. Park Syeyoung

The Plant From The Canaries (Ger)*

Dir. Ruan Lan-Xi 



Hair, Paper, Water (Belg-Fr-Viet)*

Dirs. Nicolas Graux, Trương Minh Quý

A Balcony In Limoges (Fr)*

Dir. Jérôme Reybaud

Out Of Competition

Bobò (It)*

Dir. Pippo Delbono

Deathstalker (Can)*

Dir. Steven Kostanski

E (Fin)*

Dir. Anna Eriksson

Exile (Tunisia-Lux-Fr-Qat-Saudi)*

Dir. Mehdi Hmili

I Live Here Now (US)

Dir. Julie Pacino

Judas’ Gospel (It-Pol)*

Dir. Giulio Base 



Keep Quiet (US)*

Dir. Vincent Grashaw

Kerouac’s Road: The Beat Of A Nation (UK-US)

Dir. Ebs Burnough

Le Chantier (Fr-Switz)*

Dir. Jean-Stéphane Bron

Legend Of The Happy Worker (US)*

Dir. Duwayne Dunham

Nova ’78 (UK-Port)*
Dirs. Aaron Brookner, Rodrigo Areias 



Silence (Sp)*

Dir. Eduardo Casanova

Some Notes On The Current Situation (Isr)*
Dir. Eran Kolirin

The Deal (Switz-Fr-Lux-Belg)* - eps 3-6

Dir. Jean-Stéphane Bron

Piazza Grande



In The Land Of Arto (Fr-Armenia)*

Dir. Tamara Stepanyan

The Birthday Party (Greece-Sp-Neth-UK)*

Dir. Miguel Ángel Jiménez

The Dead Of Winter (US-Ger)*

Dir. Brian Kirk

Together (Aus-US)

Dir. Michael Shanks

Sentimental Value (Nor-Fr-Den-Ger-Swe)
Dir. Joachim Trier

Police Story (HK)

Dir. Jackie Chan

Heads Or Tails (It-US)*

Dirs. Alessio Rigo de Righi, Matteo Zoppis

The Shining (UK-US)

Dir. Stanley Kubrick 



The Deal (Switz-Fr-Lux-Belg)* - eps 1-2

Dir. Jean-Stéphane Bron

Irkala - Gilgamesh’s Dream (Iraq-UAE-Qat-Fr-UK-Saudi)*

Dir. Mohamed Jabarah Al-Daradji

La Petite Dernière (Fr-Ger)
Dir. Hafsia Herzi

Rosemead (US)

Dir. Eric Lin

It Was Just An Accident (Iran-Fr-Lux)

Dir. Jafar Panahi

Kiss Of The Spider Woman (US-Uru)

Dir. Bill Condon