Berlinale 2025: The 10 Most Anticipated Films at This Year’s Festival

A new Bong Joon-ho film after six years. An Oscar-nominated musical biopic starring Timothee Chalamet. A Norwegian body horror take on the classic Cinderella fairytale. It’s an exciting time to be at the 2025 Berlin International Film Festival.

Here are the 10 films we’re most looking forward to.

Shadowbox

Section: Perspectives

You might recognise Saumyananda Sahi’s work from the cinematographer’s stunning frames in streaming series Black Warrant (2025) and Trial By Fire (2023), the Oscar-nominated documentary All That Breathes (2022), and the farcical drama Eeb Allay Ooo! (2019), edited by Tanushree Das. Their debut feature, Shadowbox, follows a woman (Tillotama Shome) who discovers that her husband — a former soldier struggling with PTSD — is the prime suspect in a murder investigation. 

Mickey 17

Section: Berlinale Special Gala

It’s been six long years since Bong Joon-ho’s last film, Parasite, the South Korean black comedy that became the first non-English-language film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. Now, the director returns with Mickey 17, another black comedy about the kinds of people society is conditioned to see as ‘less-than’. The film, adapted from Edward Ashton’s sci-fi novel Mickey 7, finds an ‘expendable’ (Robert Pattinson) on an expedition to colonise the ice planet Niflheim. Only his designation means that he’s sent on all the most dangerous missions, to be killed and then resurrected. Over and over and over again. 

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Blue Moon

Section: Competition

Legendary lyricist Lorenz Hart grapples with his former creative partner Richard Rodge’s newfound solo success in this drama. Set largely in New York’s Sardi’s Restaurant on March 31, 1943 — the opening night of the hit Broadway musical Oklahoma! — the film sees director Richard Linklater reunite with frequent collaborator Ethan Hawke (the Before trilogy, Boyhood), while also rounding out his cast with Margaret Qualley, Bobby Cannavale and Andrew Scott. 

'Blue Moon'

Tiger’s Pond

Section: Forum

Natesh Hegde’s debut feature, Pedro, told the story of a man gradually, pitifully turned into an outcast by his community. Another outcast forms the subject of his new film, Tiger Pond, only this time, the villager’s wiles prove to be an obstacle to a cutthroat businessman’s plot to manipulate a local election. The film stars Dileesh Pothan, Achyut Kumar and Gopal Hegde.

The Ugly Stepsister

Section: Perspectives

Emilie Blichfeldt’s bleak, gory take on the Cinderella fairytale swaps out the story’s traditional protagonist to focus on her unsightly step-sister instead. A victim of her greedy mother’s schemes, the girl is forced to undergo 19th-century surgical transformations and worse in this body horror film that premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.

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A Complete Unknown

Section: Berlinale Special Gala

Having recently secured eight nominations at the 97th Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director for James Mangold and Best Actor for Timothee Chalamet, the 2024 Bob Dylan musical biopic now travels to Berlin. Adapted from Elijah Wald’s 2015 book Dylan Goes Electric!, the film traces the singer-songwriter’s meteoric rise, from the 19-year-old who had just arrived in New York City to his controversial 1965 Newport Folk Festival performance.

Hot Milk

Section: Berlinale Special Gala

Playwright Rebecca Lenkiewicz, who co-wrote Paweł Pawlikowski’s Oscar-winning 2013 drama Ida, makes her directorial debut with this adaptation of Deborah Levy’s 2016 novel of the same name. Fiona Shaw plays Rose, a woman travelling to a Spanish seaside town with her daughter (Emma Mackey) to meet an enigmatic healer.

Dreams

Section: Competition

Jessica Chastain reunites with her Memory (2023) director Michel Franco in this drama about a young Mexican ballet dancer (Isaac Hernández) who moves to San Francisco to pursue his dreams, but must confront the harsh reality that his partner isn’t as supportive as he thought.

'The Thing with Feathers'

The Good Sister

Section: Panorama

After her beloved brother is accused of rape, a young woman is asked to testify in the investigation into him. Sarah Miro Fischer’s drama stars Marie Bloching, Anton Weil, Proschat Madani, Laura Balzer and Jane Chirwa.

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The Thing with Feathers

Section: Berlinale Special Gala

Benedict Cumberbatch plays a grieving man whose hold on reality crumbles in the wake of his wife’s death, and after a shadowy figure begins to stalk him and his two young sons. Dylan Southern’s horror movie also stars Richard Boxall, Henry Boxall, Sam Spruell and Vinette Robinson.

This year, the Berlinale runs from February 13 to 23.

Our coverage of the Berlinale is made possible with the support of the Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan Mumbai.