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Sundance Film Festival · 2025

Sundance Film Festival 2025

Midnight

Programme

7 films · 4 reviews

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Dead Lover

Review preview for Dead Lover

The expressionist feeling of early 20th century cinema is further enhanced by the specific colour scheme, resembling a very early version of Technicolor, while the sound recalls that of the early sound films.

Marko Stojiljkovic · 3.5 out of 5
A lonely gravedigger who stinks of corpses finally meets her dream man, but their whirlwind affair is cut short when he tragically drowns at sea. Grief-stricken, she goes to morbid lengths to resurrect him through madcap scientific experiments, resulting in grave consequences and unlikely love.

(Country: Canada; Year: 2025; Director: Grace Glowicki; Writer: Grace Glowicki, Ben Petrie; Stars: Grace Glowicki, Leah Doz, Ben Petrie, Lowen Morrow)

Full review

World premiere

Didn't Die

A podcast host desperately clings to an ever-shrinking audience in the zombie apocalypse.

(Country: US; Year: 2025; Director: Meera Menon; Writer: Paul Gleason, Meera Menon; Stars: George Basil, Ali Lopez-Sohaili, Kandis Fay, Kiran Deol, Rachna Khatau, Rupak Ginn, Samrat Chakrabarti, August Redd, Katie McCuen, Vishal Vijaykumar Kamley)

World premiere

Opus

A young writer is invited to the remote compound of a legendary pop star who mysteriously disappeared 30 years ago. Surrounded by the star’s cult of sycophants and intoxicated journalists, she finds herself in the middle of his twisted plan.

(Country: US; Year: 2025; Director: Mark Anthony Green; Writer: Mark Anthony Green; Stars: Ayo Edebiri, John Malkovich, Murray Bartlett, Amber Midthunder, Tatanka Means, Young Mazino, Tamera Tomakili, Stephanie Suganami, Peter Diseth, Melissa Chambers, Mark Sivertsen, Aspen Martinez, Juliette Lewis, Sarah May Sommers, Jasper Keen)

World premiere

Rabbit Trap

Review preview for Rabbit Trap

The film’s success hinges on its unwillingness to take sides.

Jennie Kermode · 4 out of 5
When a musician and her husband move to a remote house in Wales, the music they make disturbs local ancient folk magic, bringing a nameless child to their door who is intent on infiltrating their lives.

(Country: US, UK; Year: 2025; Director: Bryn Chainey; Writer: Bryn Chainey; Stars: Dev Patel, Rosy McEwen, Jade Croot)

Full review

World premiere

Together

With a move to the countryside already testing the limits of a couple’s relationship, a supernatural encounter begins an extreme transformation of their love, their lives, and their flesh.

(Country: US, Australia; Year: 2025; Director: Michael Shanks; Writer: Michael Shanks; Stars: Alison Brie, Dave Franco, Damon Herriman, Sunny S. Walia, Mia Morrissey, Jack Kenny, Karl Richmond, Tom Considine, Charlie Lees, Melanie Beddie, MJ Dorning, Rob Brown)

World premiere

Touch Me

Review preview for Touch Me

It’s the situation that delivers the strangeness – and charm – mediated by Dudley’s performance as a woman who is self-deprecating and messy but lively enough to root for.

Jennie Kermode · 3.5 out of 5
Two codependent best friends become addicted to the heroin-like touch of an alien narcissist who may or may not be trying to take over the world.

(Country: US; Year: 2025; Director: Addison Heimann; Writer: Addison Heimann; Stars: Olivia Taylor Dudley, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jordan Gavaris, Marlene Forte, Paget Brewster)

Full review

World premiere

The Ugly Stepsister (Den Stygge Stesøsteren)

Review preview for The Ugly Stepsister

There’s a good deal of depth and nuance to these relationships as Blichfeldt uses them to illustrate how a society which makes women dependent on men magnifies every petty disagreement and sets them at odds with one another.

Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
In a fairy-tale kingdom where beauty is a brutal business, Elvira battles to compete with her incredibly beautiful stepsister, and she will go to any length to catch the prince’s eye.

(Country: Norway, Denmark, Romania, Poland; Year: 2025; Director: Emilie Blichfeldt; Writer: Emilie Blichfeldt; Stars: Lea Myren, Flo Fagerli, Isac Calmroth, Malte Gårdinger, Ralph Carlsson, Isac Aspberg, Albin Weidenbladh, Oksana Czerkasyna, Katarzyna Herman, Adam Lundgren, Willy Ramnek Petri, Cecilia Forss, Kyrre Hellum, Richard Forsgren, Agnieszka Zulewska)

Full review See: Interview with Anne Catherine Sauerberg and Thomas Foldberg about The Ugly Stepsister , Interview with Emilie Blichfeldt about The Ugly Stepsister

World premiere