Skip to main content

San Sebastian Film Festival · 2025

San Sebastian Film Festival 2025

Pearls

Programme

16 films · 14 reviews

Jump to a film

Bugonia

Review preview for Bugonia

While some directors spend their lives crafting love letters to the worlds they create, Yorgos Lanthimos has developed a fine line in cinematic hate mail to humanity.

Amber Wilkinson · 3 out of 5
Two conspiracy-obsessed young men kidnap the high-powered CEO of a major company, convinced that she is an alien intent on destroying planet Earth.

(Country: Ireland, South Korea, Canada, United States; Year: 2025; Director: Yorgos Lanthimos; Writer: Jang Joon-hwan, Will Tracy; Stars: Emma Stone, Jesse Plemons, Alicia Silverstone, Stavros Halkios)

Full review

It Was Just an Accident (Un Simple Accident)

Review preview for It Was Just an Accident

The takes are usually long and static, but every cut and move is justified for the purpose of dramaturgy.

Marko Stojiljkovic · 4 out of 5
What begins as a minor accident sets in motion a series of escalating consequences.

(Country: Iran, France, Luxembourg; Year: 2025; Director: Jafar Panahi; Writer: Jafar Panahi; Stars: Madjid Panahi, Ebrahim Azizi, Vahid Mobasseri, Mariam Afshari)

Full review See: Jafar Panahi on inspiration for It Was Just An Accident

Jay Kelly

Review preview for Jay Kelly

It cannot be denied that Jay Kelly is interested in exploring the human condition through the lens of fame and fatherhood, but the romantic, sentimental, and saccharine tones come with a risk.

Paul Risker · 3 out of 5
Famous movie actor Jay Kelly and his devoted manager Ron embark on a whirlwind and unexpectedly profound journey. Both are forced to confront choices they've made, their relationships with loved ones and the legacies they'll leave behind.

(Country: US, UK, Italy; Year: 2025; Director: Noah Baumbach; Writer: Noah Baumbach, Emily Mortimer; Stars: George Clooney, Adam Sandler, Laura Dern, Greta Gerwig, Patrick Wilson, Riley Keough, Emily Mortimer)

Full review

Little Amélie (Little Amélie Or The Character Of Rain)

Review preview for Little Amélie

Amélie doesn’t just narrate but completely dominates this film as a personality.

Jennie Kermode · 4 out of 5
Amélie is a little Belgian girl born in Japan. Thanks to her friend Nishio-san, the world is full of adventure and discovery. But on her third birthday, an event changes the course of her life. For Amélie, everything is at stake at that age, happiness as well as tragedy.

(Country: France; Year: 2025; Director: Liane-Cho Han Jin Kuang, Mailys Vallade; Writer: Amélie Nothomb, Liane-Cho Han Jin Kuang, Aude Py, Mailys Vallade, Eddine Noël; Stars: Loïse Charpentier, Victoria Grobois, Yumi Fujimori, Cathy Cerda, Marc Arnaud, Laetitia Coryn, Haylee Issembourg, Isaac Schoumsky, François Raison, Emmylou Homs)

Full review See: The makers of Little Amélie on why perceptions about animation are changing

The Love That Remains

A year in the life of a family as the parents navigate their separation. Through both playful and heartfelt moments, the film portrays the bittersweet essence of faded love and shared memories amidst the changing seasons.

(Country: Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, France; Year: 2025; Director: Hlynur Pálmason; Writer: Hlynur Pálmason; Stars: Ingvar Sigurdsson, Sverrir Gudnason, Anders Mossling, Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir, Katla M. Þorgeirsdóttir, Saga Garðarsdóttir, Halldór Laxness Halldórsson, Grímur Hlynsson, Þorgils Hlynsson, Kristinn Guðmundsson)

Nouvelle Vague (New Wave)

Review preview for Nouvelle Vague

Guillaume Marbeck as Godard is pitch perfect, trademark dark glasses and tobacco smoke his indispensable props with even the voice uncannily resonant of the man himself.

Richard Mowe · 4 out of 5
This is the story of Godard making Breathless, told in the style and spirit in which Godard made Breathless.

(Country: France; Year: 2025; Director: Richard Linklater; Writer: Holly Gent, Laetitia Masson, Vincent Palmo Jr, Michèle Pétin; Stars: Zoey Deutch, Alix Bénézech, Paolo Luka Noé, Nicolas Dozol, Guillaume Marbeck, Tom Novembre, Jade Phan-Gia, Aubry Dullin, Côme Thieulin, Blaise Pettebone, Adrien Rouyard, Matthieu Penchinat, Jodie Ruth-Forest, Roxane Rivière, Jean-Jacques Le Vessier)

Full review See: Richard Linklater on chronicling the creation of Godard's Breathless

Opening film

Orwell: 2+2=5

Review preview for Orwell: 2+2=5

Offers food for thought in the realm of a slightly ungainly and sprawling all-you-can-eat buffet rather than a satisfying sit-down feast.

Amber Wilkinson · 3.5 out of 5
Delves deep into Orwell’s final months and visionary works to explore the roots of the vital and troubling concepts he revealed to the world in his dystopian masterpiece… Doublethink, Thoughtcrime, Newspeak, the omnipresent spectre of Big Brother… disturbing socio-political truths which resonate ever-more powerfully today.

(Country: France, US; Year: 2025; Director: Raoul Peck; Stars: Narrated by, Damien Lewis)

Full review

The President's Cake

Review preview for The President's Cake

Nayyef and Qasem are marvellous, completely natural and without a hint of self-consciousness.

Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
While people struggle daily to survive under sanctions in Saddam's Iraq, nine-year-old Lamia must use her wits to gather ingredients for a cake to celebrate President Saddam Hussein's birthday or face the consequences.

(Country: Iraq; Year: 2025; Director: Hasan Hadi; Writer: Hasan Hadi; Stars: Banin Ahmad Nayef, Sajad Mohamad Qasem, Waheed Thabet Khreibat, Rahim AlHaj)

Full review See: Slice of life.. and fable

A Private Life (Vie Privée)

A psychiatrist investigates a patient's death after becoming convinced they were murdered.

(Country: France; Year: 2025; Director: Rebecca Zlotowski; Writer: Anne Berest, Gaëlle Macé, Rebecca Zlotowski; Stars: Jodie Foster, Virginie Efira, Mathieu Amalric, Daniel Auteuil, Vincent Lacoste, Luàna Bajrami, Sophie Letourneur)

Closing film

The Secret Agent (O Agente Secreto)

Review preview for The Secret Agent

Marcelo is at home in the fine tradition of flicks where the fact that they are an agent is mainly a secret to them.

Anne-Katrin Titze · 4.5 out of 5
Brazil, 1977. Marcelo, a technology expert in his early 40s, is on the run. He arrives in Recife during carnival week, hoping to reunite with his son but soon realises that the city is far from being the non-violent refuge he seeks.

(Country: Brazil, France, Netherlands, Germany; Year: 2025; Director: Kleber Mendonça Filho; Writer: Kleber Mendonça Filho; Stars: Wagner Moura, Udo Kier, Gabriel Leone, Maria Fernanda Cândido, Hermila Guedes, Alice Carvalho, Thomás Aquino, Isabél Zuaa, Suzy Lopes, João Vitor Silva, Roney Villela, Rubens Santos, Luciano Chirolli, Buda Lira, Jimmy Astley)

Full review

Sentimental Value (Affeksjonsverdi)

Review preview for Sentimental Value

What marks Trier out is his ability to take on intellectual ideas like this but make them play out in ways that don’t feel forced or overly constructed.

Amber Wilkinson · 4.5 out of 5
In the wake of their mother's death, two sisters grapple with their relationship with their filmmaker father as he tries to involve one of them in his latest project.

(Country: Norway, Germany, Denmark, France, Sweden; Year: 2025; Director: Joachim Trier; Writer: Joachim Trier, Eskil Vogt; Stars: Elle Fanning, Stellan Skarsgård, Renate Reinsve, Cory Michael Smith, Jesper Christensen, Catherine Cohen, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, Bjørn Alexander, Jonas Jacobsen, Pia Borgli)

Full review

Sleepless City (Ciudad Sin Sueño)

Review preview for Sleepless City

The “star player” is the director of photography Rui Poças

Marko Stojiljkovic · 2.5 out of 5
Toni, a 15-year-old Roma boy, lives in the largest illegal slum in Europe, on the outskirts of Madrid. Proud to belong to his family of scrap dealers, he follows his grandfather everywhere. But when demolition companies start closing in on their land, the family is divided and choices must be made.

(Country: France, Spain; Year: 2025; Director: Guillermo Galoe; Writer: Guillermo Galoe, Victor Alonso-Berbel; Stars: Antonio "Toni" Fernández Gabarre, Bilal Sedraoui, Jesus "Chule" Fernández Silva, Felisa Romero Molina, Pura Salazar, Elisa Fernández, Julio Fernández Romero)

Full review

The Stranger (L'Etranger)

Review preview for The Stranger

Ozon remains faithful to the source and keeps its sense of mystery but has strengthened the female characters

Richard Mowe · 4 out of 5
Adaptation of Camus' classic.

(Country: France; Year: 2025; Director: François Ozon; Writer: François Ozon, , based on the book by Albert Camus; Stars: Benjamin Voisin, Rebecca Marder, Pierre Lottin, Swann Arlaud, Denis Lavant)

Full review See: Ozon on the challenges of tackling Camus' masterwork The Stranger , Benjamin Voisin on Camus, Ozon and learning not to act in The Stranger , Denis Lavant on the art of constructing personas in Redoubt and The Stranger

The Voice Of Hind Rajab

Review preview for The Voice Of Hind Rajab

There is some very good work here, and all of it tempered where it needs to be, to give due prominence to Hind herself.

Jennie Kermode · 5 out of 5
January 29, 2024. Red Crescent volunteers receive an emergency call. A six-year old girl is trapped in a car under fire in Gaza, pleading for rescue. While trying to keep her on the line, they do everything they can to get an ambulance to her.

(Country: Tunisia, France; Year: 2025; Director: Kaouther Ben Hania; Writer: Kaouther Ben Hania; Stars: Saja Kilani, Motaz Malhees, Clara Khoury, Amer Hlehel)

Full review

The Wizard Of The Kremlin

Review preview for The Wizard Of The Kremlin

Dano has chosen to use the same flat vocal expression throughout, a technique well suited to satire which might have worked if only the rest of the film had been a bit more lively.

Jennie Kermode · 2.5 out of 5
Russia, early 1990s. Amid post-Soviet chaos, a brilliant young man, Vadim Baranov, charts his path. First an artist, then a reality show producer, he becomes the spin doctor to a rising KGB agent: Vladimir Putin.

(Country: US; Year: 2025; Director: Olivier Assayas; Writer: Olivier Assayas, Emmanuel Carrère, based on the novel by Giuliano Da Empoli; Stars: Paul Dano, Jude Law, Alicia Vikander)

Full review See: Interview with Olivier Assayas about The Wizard Of The Kremlin