Michel Gondry and Ira Sachs are among the headline filmmakers set to debut new feature works within the sidebar competitions at next year’s Berlin Film Festival.
The German festival announced the pair this afternoon as part of its first crop of confirmed titles.
Gondry will screen Maya, Give Me a Title (Maya, donne-moi un titre) in Berlin’s Generation sidebar. The festival’s website describes the film as Gondry’s “stop-motion love letter to his daughter Maya brings to life a poetic and amusing journey that invites you to dream and laugh.”
Also set for the Generation competition is Our Wildest Days (I Agries Meres Mas) by Greek filmmaker Vasilis Kekatos who is best known for his 2019 short film The Distance Between Us and the Sky, which won the Short Film Palme d’Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival. He also created the popular Greek series Milky Way.
Ira Sachs returns to the Berlinale’s Panorama competition with Peter Hujar’s Day, starring Ben Wishaw and Rebecca Hall. The film is described as a “1974 conversation between photographer Peter Hujar and his friend Linda Rosenkrantz” The festival description says the film “provides a glimpse into the New York downtown art scene of the time and the personal struggles and epiphanies that define an artist’s life.” Sachs was last at the Berlinale with the cult favorite Passages, also starring Wishaw.
Elsewhere, in the Berlinale Specials programme, German director Jan-Ole Gerster debuts Islands, a neo-noir thriller starring Sam Riley and Stacy Martin. Director-duo Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli will debut Honey Bunch. Both films are presented as Latenight Specials.
Scroll down for the full list of titles. Next Year’s Berlin Film Festival runs February 13–23. The festival will mark festival head Tricia Tuttle’s first edition at the helm. Tuttle replaced the festival’s former dual-directors Carlo Chatrian and Mariette Rissenbeek. Tuttle was last head of the BFI’s London Film Festival.
Panorama
by Marcio Reolon, Filipe Matzembacher | with Gabriel Faryas, Cirillo Luna, Henrique Barreira, Ivo Müller, Kaya Rodrigues
Brazil 2025
World premiere
An actor and a politician start a secret affair and together discover their fetish for having sex in public places. The closer they get to their dream of fame, the more they feel the urge to put themselves at risk.
Bajo las banderas, el sol Under the Flags, the Sun
Panorama Dokumente
by Juanjo Pereira
Paraguay / Argentina / USA / France / Germany 2025
World premiere | Debut film | Documentary form
This fully archival journey through the 35 years of Alfredo Stroessner’s regime in Paraguay reveals unseen footage and explores one of the longest-running dictatorships in history, whose effects still resonate today.
Den stygge stesøsteren The Ugly Stepsister
Panorama
by Emilie Blichfeldt | with Lea Myren, Thea Loch Næss, Ane Dahl Torp, Flo Fagerli
Norway / Poland / Sweden / Denmark 2025
European premiere | Debut film
Elvira will go to any lengths to compete with her insanely beautiful stepsister. In a fairy-tale kingdom where beauty is a brutal business, she uses blood, sweat and tears to catch the Prince’s eye. A twisted take on the classic Cinderella story.
Panorama
by Shatara Michelle Ford | with Denée Benton, Mars Storm Rucker, Dezi Bing, Sasha Compere, Charlie Barnett
USA / Taiwan / United Kingdom 2024
International premiere
Three Black queer femmes in their mid-thirties take a road trip across the American Midwest in search of their friend who has seemingly disappeared off the grid.
Hjem kaere hjem Home Sweet Home
Panorama
by Frelle Petersen | with Jette Søndergaard, Karen Tygesen, Mimi Bræmer Dueholm, Hanne Knudsen, Finn Nissen
Denmark 2025
World premiere
Sofie begins her new work as a carer making home visits to old people. She is quickly confronted with the harsh realities of this challenging job. A precise, authentic representation of a profession that remains largely invisible to the public eye.
Panorama Dokumente
by Anas Saeed, Rawia Alhag, Ibrahim Snoopy, Timeea M Ahmed, Phil Cox | with Khadmallah, Majdi, Jawad, Lokain, Wilson
Sudan / United Kingdom / Germany / Qatar 2025
European premiere | Documentary form
Five lives, one city, the fate of a nation. A civil servant, a tea lady, a resistance committee volunteer and two street boys are forced to flee when civil war breaks out in Sudan. An emotional and lyrical portrait of five people from Khartoum.
Panorama
by Emma Hough Hobbs, Leela Varghese | with Shabana Azeez, Gemma Chua Tran, Richard Roxburgh, Bernie Van Tiel, Mark Bonanno
Australia 2025
World premiere | Debut film | Animation
The introverted space princess Saira is forced to leave her home planet of Clitopolis on an inter-gay-lactic mission to save her ex-girlfriend who has been kidnapped and is being held ransom by the Straight White Maliens.
Die Möllner Briefe The Moelln Letters
Panorama Dokumente
by Martina Priessner | with Hava Arslan, İbrahim Arslan, Namık Arslan, Yeliz Burhan
Germany 2025
World premiere | Documentary form
Thirty years after the racist attacks in Mölln, survivor İbrahim Arslan discovers hundreds of forgotten letters of solidarity. The film follows him and his family in their struggle to foster a new, victim-centred culture of remembrance.
Panorama Dokumente
by Denis Côté | with Cleaning Simp Paul
Canada 2025
World premiere | Documentary form
Struggling with depression and social anxiety, Paul has found refuge in serving women who invite him to clean their homes. By sharing his gently eccentric routines on social media, he combats loneliness and takes it one day at a time.
Panorama
by Ira Sachs | with Ben Wishaw, Rebecca Hall
USA / Germany 2025
International premiere
A 1974 conversation between photographer Peter Hujar and his friend Linda Rosenkrantz provides a glimpse into the New York downtown art scene of the time and the personal struggles and epiphanies that define an artist’s life.
Panorama
by Eva Libertad | with Miriam Garlo, Álvaro Cervantes, Elena Irureta, Joaquín Notario
Spain 2025
World premiere
Ángela, a deaf woman, is expecting a child with her hearing partner, Héctor. The baby’s arrival causes a crisis in their relationship, forcing Ángela to face the challenges of raising her daughter in a world which is not made for her.
Panorama
by Andreas Prochaska | with Julia Franz Richter, Reinout Scholten van Aschat, Gerti Drassl, Maria Hofstätter, Gerhard Liebmann
Austria / Germany 2025
World premiere
Judith works as an emergency doctor in Berlin. When she inherits a house in Austria from the family who gave her away as a child, her quest to solve the mystery of her origins turns into a nightmarish journey into the past and the dark places of her soul.
