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Thessaloniki International Film Festival · 2025

Thessaloniki International Film Festival 2025

Plot Twist, Beyond Sixth Sense

Programme

9 films · 2 reviews

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Atropia

Review preview for Atropia

While Gates has found an intriguing setting for her war satire, it’s less clear what she wants to say with it.

Jeremy Mathews · 2.5 out of 5
When an aspiring actress in a military role-playing facility falls in love with a soldier cast as an insurgent, their unsimulated emotions threaten to derail the performance.

(Country: US; Year: 2024; Director: Hailey Gates; Writer: Hailey Gates; Stars: Alia Shawkat, Callum Turner, Chloë Sevigny, Tim Heidecker, Jane Levy)

Full review

Bouchra

Review preview for Bouchra

This isn’t about rejection but about navigating the difficulties full acceptance bring.

Amber Wilkinson · 3.5 out of 5
A New York-based filmmaker writes an autobiographical script about a fictional double, while also appearing in animated form as a coyote moving through a city of furry creatures.

(Country: Italy, Morocco, US; Year: 2025; Director: Orian Barki, Meriem Bennani; Writer: Orian Barki, Meriem Bennani; Stars: Orian Barki, Meriem Bennani)

Full review See: Meriem Bennani and Orian Barki on making animation Bouchra

Close-Up

Story of a printer who posed as a director. Restored.

(Country: Iran; Year: 1990; Director: Abbas Kiarostami; Writer: Abbas Kiarostami; Stars: Hossain Sabzian, Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Abolfazl Ahankhah, Mehrdad Ahankhah, Monoochehr Ahankhah, Mahrokh Ahankhah, Nayer Mohseni Zonoozi, Ahmad Reza Moayed Mohseni, Hossain Farazmand, Hooshang Shamaei, Mohammad Ali Barrati, Davood Goodarzi, Haj Ali Reza Ahmadi, Hassan Komaili, Davood Mohabbat)

Goodbye, Dragon Inn

On a dark, wet night a historic and regal Chinese cinema sees its final film.

(Country: Taiwan; Year: 2003; Director: Tsai Ming-Liang)

Kinetta

At a Greek hotel in the off-season, a chamber maid, a man obsessed with BMWs, and a photo-store clerk attempt to film and photograph various badly reenacted struggles between a man and a woman.

(Year: 2005; Director: Yorgos Lanthimos; Writer: Yorgos Kakanakis, Yorgos Lanthimos; Stars: Evangelia Randou, Aris Servetalis, Costas Xikominos)

The Photograph

A young furrier leaves Castoria in 1971 to emigrate to France to live with a relative. He finds a photograph, leading to a confrontation with his relative.

(Country: Greece; Year: 1987; Director: Nikos Papatakis; Writer: Nikos Papatakis; Stars: Hristos Tsagas, Aris Retsos, Zozo Zarpa)

Rififi (Du rififi chez les hommes)

Film noir about a jewel heist.

(Country: France; Year: 1955; Director: Jules Dassin; Writer: Auguste Le Breton, Jules Dassin, René Wheeler, Auguste Le Breton, Auguste Le Breton; Stars: Jean Servais, Carl Möhner, Robert Manuel, Janine Darcey, Pierre Grasset, Robert Hossein, Marcel Lupovici, Dominique Maurin, Magali Noël, Marie Sabouret, Claude Sylvain, Jules Dassin, Armandel, Alain Bouvette, Alice Garan)

The Time That Remains

Third part of the director's loose trilogy (featuring Chronicle of a Disappearance (1996) and Divine Intervention about 60 years in the life of a Palestinian family.

(Country: UK, Italy, Belgium, France; Year: 2009; Director: Elia Suleiman; Writer: Elia Suleiman; Stars: Ali Suliman, Elia Suleiman, Saleh Bakri, Menashe Noy, Nati Ravitz, Avi Kleinberger, Amer Hlehel, Samar Tanus, George Khleifi, Ziyad Bakri, Nina Jarjoura, Isabelle Ramadan, Leila Muammar, Lotuf Neusser, Yasmine Haj)

VHS - Kahloucha

In a poor district of Tunisia, self-made auteur, Moncef Kahloucha, a guerilla filmmaker in the purest sense, demonstrates that it takes a village to make fun movies as he brings the power of cinema to the people.

(Country: Tunisia; Year: 2006; Director: Néjib Belkadhi; Stars: Moncef Kahloucha)