Written by Chris Swan
July 11, 2025
Our Picks for the 2025 Melbourne International Film Festival
The full program for the 2025 Melbourne International Film Festival has been announced.
With 250+ films from Australia and all over the world screening in the festival this year, there’s an entire cinematic world waiting to be discovered this August. With an incredible 26 films brought to you by Madman, here’s a list of our films featured in this year’s program.
The 2025 Melbourne International Film Festival runs in cinemas August 7-24.
Check out the full program HERE
The Rivals of Amziah King
Australian Premiere – Bright Horizons Competition
Academy Award® winner Matthew McConaughey returns to the big screen in writer/director Andrew Patterson’s whimsical Southern crime caper.
Deep within the backwoods of rural Oklahoma, charismatic and musically gifted Amziah King herds a bluegrass-playing band of misfits while overseeing the premier honey-making operation in town. But the honey game is ruthless, and Amziah’s rivals threaten to destroy everything he’s built.
It Was Just An Accident
What begins as a minor accident sets in motion a series of escalating consequences.
Winner of the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT is the new film from renowned filmmaker Jafar Panahi. A powerful, political and personal film that will resonate deeply with audiences at this year’s festival.
Sirat
Winner of the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, SIRAT demands to be seen loud and on the biggest screen possible.
Splitsville
An endearing and hilarious romantic comedy starring Dakota Johnson and Adria Arjona. When Ashley asks for a divorce, the good-natured Carey runs to his friends, Julie and Paul, for support. Their secret to happiness is an open marriage; that is, until Carey crosses the line and throws all of their relationships into chaos.
Book Tickets
One More Shot
Australian Premiere
An end-of-millennium house party becomes endless, tequila-fueled time loop in this ingenious Australian comedy starring Emily Browning. A fresh new twist on time-loop comedies filled with plenty of laughs and hit 90s songs.
Book Tickets
Spreadsheet Champions
Australian Premiere
Six young people from around the world channel their dreams into a competition with a difference: a test of their elite mastery of Microsoft Excel. This homegrown documentaries travels the world to follow these six fierce competitors from their homes on five different continents to the pressure-cooker environment of the world championship in Florida.
Book Tickets
Parasite - Live Score
Bong Joon-ho’s PARASITE is one of the most acclaimed and awarded films of the century, winning the rare double of the Cannes Palme d’Or and Academy Award for Best Picture.
This is a rare, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the South Korean maestro Jung Jae-il conduct and perform his own composition for Bong Joon-ho’s masterpiece PARASITE with Melbourne’s own Orchestra Victoria – while the film plays on the big screen.
Journey Home, David Gulpilil
David Gulpilil was one of Australia’s greatest screen actors, with an illustrious career spanning over five decades. JOURNEY HOME, DAVID GULPILIL is the story of Gulpilil’s journey home after his passing in 2021, back to his birthplace, the centrepiece of which is his Bäpurru ceremony in Marwuyu near the Arafura Swamp and the remote community of Ramingining, Eastern Arnhem Land. Narrated by Academy Award nominee Hugh Jackman with Storyteller Danzal Baker aka Baker Boy, this remarkable documentary is a rare insight into a powerful ceremony of renewal and regeneration and is told completely from the Yolŋu perspective, and that of his family.
Book Tickets
Marlon Williams: Two Worlds - Ngā Ao E Rua
Director Ursula Grace Williams’ new documentary is a joyful story of self-discovery, following beloved Aotearoa New Zealand singer-songwriter Marlon Williams on the four-year profoundly revealing journey of reconnection and self-discovery behind writing and recording his first album in te reo Māori.
Book Tickets
Birthright
Zoe Pepper’s darkly comic BIRTHRIGHT is a twisted tale about a disillusioned generation and their chase for the success of their baby boomer parents. There’s no place like home…Evicted and jobless, Cory and his pregnant wife are forced to stay with his parents. As the younger couple’s stay extends, the edges of Cory’s reality slip away and he find an unexpected path to success that detonates the family… there’s no place like home!
Book Tickets
Deeper
Dr. Richard “Harry” Harris, known around the world for his contributions to the 2018 Thai cave rescue, has devised a way to push further than anyone else into one of the deepest, darkest, most isolated cold-water cave systems in the world.
From the award-winning director of Sherpa, Mountain and River comes a cinematic journey into exploration’s final frontier.
The Extraordinary Miss Flower
Australian Premiere
THE EXTRAORDINARY MISS FLOWER brings to life the remarkable story of the extraordinary Geraldine Flower and the discovery of a suitcase of letters sent to her in the 60s and 70s that inspired acclaimed Icelandic singer/songwriter Emilíana Torrini to return to the studio.
The new film from Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard (the directors of 20,000 Days on Earth), featuring and all-star collection of musicians and actors including Nick Cave, Richard Ayoade and Angus Sampson.
Pavements
An examination of the iconic 1990s indie band Pavement appears to be just another music documentary—until it isn’t.
A prismatic hybrid of narrative, scripted, documentary, musical, and metatextual forms, director Alex Ross Perry gives us all of this and more in his new rule flouting meta-documentary.
The Legend of Ochi
Australian Premiere
In a remote village on the island of Carpathia, a shy farm girl named Yuri is raised to fear an elusive animal species known as Ochi. But when Yuri discovers a wounded baby ochi has been left behind, she escapes on a quest to bring him home. A thrilling new modern take on the the old-school classic children’s fantasy adventures, starring Finn Wolfhard and Academy Award® nominees Willem Dafoe and Emily Watson.
Book Tickets
Orwell 2+2=5
Produced by Academy Award winner Alex Gibney, ORWELL 2+2=5 connects archival footage of previous adaptations of George Orwell’s 1984 with a tapestry of resonant images from the 21st century. Award-winning director Raoul Peck (I Am Not Your Negro) masterfully dissects Orwell’s prescient vision and its vital lessons for our times and the future of our society.
Book Tickets
DJ Ahmet
A 15-year-old Yuruk boy from a remote North Macedonian village escapes into music amidst parental expectations, societal conservatism, and forbidden love for a promised girl. Winner of the Audience Award at this year’s Sundance Film Festival and filled with warm humour, lovable characters, and an unsurprisingly catchy soundtrack, DJ AHMET is an inspiring tribute to the unifying power of music at any age.
Book Tickets
Workmates
Australian Premiere
Sometimes it’s love. Sometimes you just work together…
Lucy and Tom are best mates running a tiny, broke theatre. But when an accident forces them to shut down and Tom threatens to leave, Lucy realises she would do anything to save the theatre and keep her friend… who she might be in love with.
Cutting Through Rocks
As the first elected councilwoman of her deeply conservative Iranian village, Sara Shahverdi — a divorced, motorcycle riding, former midwife — stands out. Tenacious and not easily intimidated, Sara is determined to uplift her community and put an end to the empty promises and laziness perpetuated by local councilmen over the years.
Winner of the Grand Jury Prize for World Cinema Documentary at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, CUTTING THROUGH ROCKS is a beautifully crafted and endearing documentary that celebrates the profound ways women like Sara change the world around them.
The End
From Academy Award nominated director Joshua Oppenheimer (The Act of Killing, The Look of Silence) comes a poignant and deeply human musical about a family that survived the end of the world. An urgent and unforgettable cautionary tale, THE END stars Academy Award® winner Tilda Swinton, Academy Award® nominee Michael Shannon, George MacKay and Moses Ingram.
Book Tickets
Mr. Nobody Against Putin
A Russian teacher secretly documents his small town school’s transformation into a war recruitment center during the Ukraine invasion, revealing the ethical dilemmas educators face amid propaganda and militarization. Brimming with creativity and humour, MR NOBODY AGAINST PUTIN was awarded the Special Jury Prize for World Cinema Documentary at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
Book Tickets
Mistress Dispeller
Desperate to save her marriage, a woman in China hires a professional to go undercover and break up her husband’s affair. With strikingly intimate access, MISTRESS DISPELLER follows this unfolding family drama from all corners of a love triangle.
Book Tickets
Late Shift
Leonie Benesch (September 5, The Teachers’ Lounge) delivers a captivating performance as Flora, a nurse who works with passion as professionalism as she navigates the relentless pace on the surgical ward with unwavering dedication. Writer/Director Petra Volpe (The Divine Order) infuses LATE SHIFT with humanity and warmth while weaving an intense story that transforms into a gripping race against time, culminating in a riveting climax.
Book Tickets
Mirrors No. 3
Acclaimed filmmaker Christian Petzold (Afire, Phoenix) reunites with the brilliantly talented Paula Beer (Undine) in this Cannes selected, intrigue filled drama about a woman who becomes entwined with a family following a car crash.
Book Tickets
Deaf
When deaf Ángela expects a child with her hearing partner Héctor, her fears about motherhood surface as she confronts the reality of raising a baby in a world not built for her.
Winner of the Audience Award at the Berlin Film Festival, Eva Libertad’s powerful drama explores an unprecedented theme in cinema: the relationship between a deaf woman and motherhood.
Young Mother
Legendary filmmakers Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne return to MIFF this year with their powerful new award-winning film. YOUNG MOTHERS weaves an intimate portrait of a group teenage mothers and their children, their social situations and personal emotional relationships, presenting a singularly alive and unique cinematic experience.
Book Tickets
The Little Sister
Love, faith and desire collide in Fatima Daas’ acclaimed autobiographical novel adapted here by award-winning filmmaker Hafsia Herzi, and featuring a breathtaking lead performance by newcomer Nadia Melliti who was awarded the Best Actress prize at the Cannes Film Festival.
Book TicketsWith over 250 films screening across two and a half weeks, Melbourne will become the movie capitol of Australia this August. Dive into the world of great cinema at the Melbourne International Film Festival 7-24 August 2025.
