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Festival coverage

Fantastic Fest

18 September – 25 September 2025

Fantastic Fest turns 20 this year, and it's doing so in style, with a line-up that includes no fewer that 45 World premières. It opens with Johannes Roberts' tropical survival thriller Primate.

The festival runs from 18 to 25 September.

View complete schedule

Other years (5)

Box office and information

Latest reviews

  • Crushed
    Review preview for Crushed

    What is interesting here is that Olivia is never objectified.

    Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
    In suburban Bangkok, a family's faith is thrown into crisis when their daughter is kidnapped.
  • Obsession
    Review preview for Obsession

    Obsession is not just a real indicator of talent but an absolute treat.

    Andrew Robertson · 4.5 out of 5
    A desperate wish for love goes terribly wrong.
  • Camp
    Review preview for Camp

    A thoughtful, subtly dangerous film which denies viewers the reassurance of a conventional ending.

    Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
    Emily takes a job as a counselor at a summer camp and finds a coven of witches ready to show her a path to healing.
  • Marama
    Review preview for Marama

    One of the most impressive films of the year to date.

    Jennie Kermode · 5 out of 5
    A young Māori woman travels to Victorian England after receiving a letter promising information about her birth parents. As she peels back the layers of colonial deceit, she is driven to avenge her shattered ancestry.
  • The Cramps: A Period Piece
    Review preview for The Cramps: A Period Piece

    The film’s general campiness does not diminish the points it’s making.

    Jennie Kermode · 4 out of 5
    A vibrant collision of horror, comedy, and aching personal truth as seen through the eyes of a young woman dealing with the pain of her menstrual cramps.
  • Night Stage
    Review preview for Night Stage

    The film is shot in gorgeous shades of noir by Luciana Baseggio, and has a deliciously dark, sultry score.

    Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
    An actor and a politician start an affair and discover a fetish for having sex in public places. The closer they get to their dreams, the more risk taking they become.
  • Primate
    Review preview for Primate

    I didn't go in with high expectations but I was thrilled.

    Andrew Robertson · 3.5 out of 5
    Home from college, Lucy reunites with family including pet chimp Ben. Ben contracts rabies during a pool party and turns aggressive. Lucy and her friends barricade themselves in the pool, devising ways to survive the vicious chimp.
  • The Plague
    Review preview for The Plague

    Borrowing tropes from horror, the film adds an uncanny undercurrent to its drama.

    Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
    At an all-boys water polo camp, a socially anxious 12-year-old is pulled into a cruel tradition targeting an outcast with an illness they call “The Plague.” But as the lines between game and reality blur, he fears the joke might be hiding something real.
  • Sisu: Road To Revenge
    Review preview for Sisu: Road To Revenge

    I was entertained, in much the same way but not to the same extent as the first outing.

    Andrew Robertson · 2.5 out of 5
    Returning to the house where his family was brutally murdered during the war, “the man who refuses to die” dismantles it, loads it on a truck, and is determined to rebuild it somewhere safe in their honour. When the Red Army commander who killed his family comes back hellbent on finishing the job, a relentless cross-country chase ensues
  • Reflection In A Dead Diamond
    Review preview for Reflection In A Dead Diamond

    For something so lovely, it is hard-edged, and it sparkles with visual wit.

    Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
    When the mysterious woman in the room next door disappears, a debonair 70-year-old ex-spy living in a luxury hotel on the Côte d’Azur is confronted by the demons and darlings of a lurid past in which moviemaking, memories and madness collide.

A–Z of Fantastic Fest 2025 reviews

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