San Sebastian International Film Festival has revealed 13 features selected to compete in its New Directors competition.
New Directors, comprising first or second features, will open with Jonatan Etzler’s UK-produced thriller comedy Bad Apples, starring Saoirse Ronan. The film follows a primary school teacher struggling to deal with an adversarial student. Etzler’s credits include 2023 feature film One More Time and 2021 short film Swimmer, which won the best comedy prize at Clermont-Ferrand.
Closing the line-up is Japanese feature White Flowers And Fruits, a debut by Yukari Sakamoto, about a suicide in an all-girls boarding school that deeply affects a pupil who can see ghosts.
British filmmaker Stroma Cairns’ debut feature The Son And The Sea is also competing, following two friends’ physical and emotional journey along the Scottish coast. Cairns co-wrote the film with her mother, the producer Imogen West. Her credits include short film If You Knew and directing work on the BBC series Mood.
Swedish filmmaker John Skoog, winner of the best film award at CPH: DOX with his 2019 documentary Ridge, will premiere Redoubt. Skoog’s fiction debut stars Denis Lavant as a man who sets about fortifying his house to protect it against potential enemy attacks.
Kurdish-Turkish filmmaker Seyhmus Altun will show his debut film As We Breathe, which participated in last year’s WIP Europa with the working title Memento Non Mori. The Turkey-Denmark co-production follows the changes suffered by a family from a rural Anatolian town during a relentless fire.
Other titles include Tribeny Rai’s Shape Of Momo, an India-South Korea co-production which sees a woman return to her native Himalayan village, facing underlying conflict with her family and wider community.
The winning film receives a €50,000 prize which is divided between the director and the Spanish distributor.
The line-up includes nine first films and four second films, all of which are also eligible for the festival’s main competition prizes.
New Directors 2025
Bad Apples (UK) - opening film
Dir. Jonatan Etzler
White Flowers And Fruits (Japan) - closing film
Dir. Yukari Sakamoto
As We Breathe (Tur-Den)
Dir. Seyhmus Altun
The Son And The Sea (UK)
Dir. Stroma Cairns
Before the Bright Day (Tai)
Dir. Tsao Shih-Han
Redoubt (Swe-Den-Neth-Pol-Fin-UK-Switz)
Dir. John Skoog
Weightless (Den)
Dir. Emilie Thalund
If We Don’t Burn, How Do We Light Up The Night (Costa Rica)
Dir. Kim Torres
Nighttime Sounds (China)
Dir. Zhang Zhongchen
Shape of Momo (India-S Kor)
Dir. Tribeny Rai
Foreign Lands (Rus)
Dir. Anton Yarush, Sergey Borovkov
Aro Berria (Sp)
Dir. Irati Gorostidi Agirretxe
La Lucha (Sp-Col)
Dir. José Alayón
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