Introducing the Kinoscope Programme of the 31st Sarajevo Film Festival

The Kinoscope programme of the 31st Sarajevo Film Festival will feature 19 films - 14 in the Kinoscope section and 5 in the Kinoscope Surreal section.

“This year's selection is marked by the current state of our world. A world torn by wars and destruction, a world in which autocratic powers defy democracies and justice, in a world in which artists often feel powerless. Filmmakers reflect on this world and question themselves: What can art do when faced with extreme violence?”, said programmers Alessandro Raja and Mathilde Henrot.

 

 

Japan, United States, 2024, 113 min.

Director: Neo Sora

Cast: Hayato Kurihara, Yukito Hidaka, Yuta Hayashi, Shina Peng

In a near-future Tokyo, where the threat of a catastrophic earthquake pervades daily life, two rabble-rousing best friends are about to graduate from high school. One night, they pull a prank on their principal, which leads to a surveillance system being installed in the school. Stuck between the oppressive security system and a darkening national political situation, the two respond in contrasting ways, leading them to confront differences they never had to face before.

 

United Kingdom, Germany, Greece, France, United States, 2024, 133 min.

Director: Athina Rachel Tsangari

Cast: Caleb Landry Jones, Harry Melling, Rosy McEwen, Arinzé Kene

Over seven hallucinatory days, in an undefined time and place, a village with no name disappears. In this tragi-comic take on a Western, townsman-turned-farmer Walter Thirsk and befuddled lord of the manor Charles Kent are childhood friends about to face an invasion from the outside world: the trauma of modernity. Based on the novel "Harvest" by Jim Crace.

 

France, Belgium, 2025, 109 min.

Director: Déni Oumar Pitsaev

When Déni inherits a small patch of land in the wild, beautiful valley of Pankissi, he sees a chance at last to build the house in the trees he's dreamed of since he was a boy. But nothing in the rugged Caucasus is ever simple. Returning to the village just across the Chechen border where he was born—a place he barely knows—Déni stirs up old feuds, buried family dramas, and, above all, the questions everyone keeps asking: When, and to whom, is he finally going to get married?

 

Portugal, France, Brazil, Romania, 2025, 211 min.

Director: Pedro Pinho

Cast: Cleo Diára, Jonathan Guilherme, Sérgio Coragem

Sergio, a Portuguese environmental engineer, travels to Guinea-Bissau to conduct an impact report for a road-building project. As he grapples with heat and isolation, he meets Diara and Gui—two locals yearning to find their own way. As tensions arise within their ambiguous relationship, and as Sergio comes to understand the capitalist and post-colonial dynamics in play around his mission, each of the three must confront the ways their identities shape them in a globalised world.

 

Belgium, France, 2025, 104 min.

Director: Alexe Poukine

Cast: Manon Clavel, Ethelle Gonzalez Lardued, Makita Samba, Suzanne Elbaz

Pregnant with her second child, Kika faces the sudden death of her partner. Heartbroken and broke, she sets her priorities - 1: Make money fast; 2: Stay strong. Dirty underwear, dildos, and neurotic parents provide unexpected help.

 

Germany, 2025, 90 min.

Director: Julian Radlmaier

Cast: Clara Schwinning, Maral Keshavarz, Henriette Confurius, Paula Schindler

Ursula and Neda, respectively an East German server with a broken heart and an Iranian YouTuber with a broken arm, feel trapped and lonely in their precarious lives. One summer evening, Ursula falls for a mysterious musician from the city, while Neda becomes convinced she has recognised an old friend from Tehran in an equally enigmatic street sweeper. The winding paths of chance draw these two women together on an unexpected ghost hunt in the mountains.

 

France, Palestine, Iran, 2025, 112 min.

Director: Sepideh Farsi

PUT YOUR SOUL ON YOUR HAND AND WALK is a filmmaker's response to the ongoing massacre of Palestinians. A miracle happened when director Sepideh Farsi met Fatima Hassona. Hassona became the filmmaker's eyes in Gaza, where she resisted while documenting the war, as Farsi became a link between Hassona and the world at large from what she calls her "Gaza prison." The two maintained this lifeline for almost a year. The bits of sound and pixel they exchanged became this film. The death of Fatima, on 16 April 2025, as a result of an Israeli raid on her home, changes its meaning forever.

 

Netherlands, Belgium, 2025, 111 min.

Director: Sven Bresser

Cast: Gerrit Knobbe, Loïs Reinders

When Johan, a reed cutter, discovers the lifeless body of a girl on his land, he is overcome by an ambiguous sense of guilt. While taking care of his granddaughter, he sets out on a quest to track down evil. But darkness can thrive in unexpected places.

 

Spain, Germany, 2025, 104 min.

Director: Carla Simón

Cast: Llúcia Garcia, Mitch, Tristán Ulloa, Alberto Gracia, Miryam Gallego

Orphaned at a young age, at eighteen Marina must travel to the Atlantic coast of Spain to obtain a signature for a scholarship application from paternal grandparents she has never met. She navigates a sea of aunts, uncles, and cousins, uncertain whether she will be embraced or met with resistance. As her visit stirs long-buried emotions, revives tenderness, and uncovers unspoken wounds, Marina pieces together fragmented, often contradictory memories of the parents she barely remembers.

 

France, Spain, 2025, 115 min.

Director: Oliver Laxe

Cast: Sergi López, Brúno Núñez, Stefania Gadda, Joshua Liam Henderson

A man and his son arrive at a rave deep in the mountains of southern Morocco. They’re searching for Mar - daughter and sister - who vanished months ago at one of these endless, sleepless parties. Surrounded by electronic music and a raw, unfamiliar sense of freedom, they hand out her photo again and again. Hope is fading but they push through and follow a group of ravers heading to one last party in the desert. As they venture deeper into the burning wilderness, the journey forces them to confront their own limits.

 

Germany, 2025, 149 min.

Director: Mascha Schilinski

Cast: Hanna Heckt, Greta Krämer, Filip Schnack, Helena Lüer, Anastasia Cherepakha

Four girls - Alma, Erika, Angelika, and Lenka - each spend their youth on the same farm in northern Germany. As the home evolves over a century, echoes of the past linger in its walls. Though separated by time, their lives begin to mirror each other.

 

Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, France, 2025, 109 min.

Director: Hlynur Pálmason

Cast: Saga Garðarsdóttir, Sverrir Gudnason, Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir

THE LOVE THAT REMAINS tenderly captures a year in the life of a family as the parents navigate their separation. Through both playful and heartfelt moments, the bittersweet essence of faded love and shared memories is portrayed amid the changing seasons.

 

United States, 2025, 110 min.

Director: Kelly Reichardt

Cast: Josh O'Connor, Alana Haim, John Magaro, Gaby Hoffmann, Eli Gelb

In a sedate corner of Massachusetts circa 1970, JB Mooney, an unemployed carpenter turned amateur art thief, plans his first big heist. When things go haywire, his life unravels.

 

France, Israel, Cyprus, Germany, 2025, 149 min.

Director: Nadav Lapid

Cast: Ariel Bronz, Efrat Dor, Naama Preis, Alexey Serebryakov, Sharon Alexander

Fiercely provocative and politically charged, Nadav Lapid’s YES is a furious satire of Israeli nationalism and societal decay. Set in the aftermath of 7 October 2023, the film follows Y., a jazz musician who drifts between domestic routine and hedonistic performances for Israel’s elite - until he’s unexpectedly commissioned to write a new national anthem. What begins as artistic opportunity spirals into a surreal, unsettling journey through a country caught in a frenzy of denial, propaganda, and militarism. A Cannes standout that has sparked intense debate, especially in Israel where it has faced fierce backlash, YES is Lapid at his most fearless-mocking, exposing, and confronting a nation in moral freefall.

 

 

Belgium, Luxembourg, Italy, France, 2025, 87 min.

Director: Hélène Cattet, Bruno Forzani

Cast: Fabio Testi, Yannick Renier, Koen De Bouw, Maria de Medeiros

John D, a septuagenarian living in a luxury hotel on the Côte d’Azur, is intrigued by his next-door neighbour, who reminds him of his wildest years on the Riviera during the 1960s. At that time, he was a spy in a rapidly developing world full of promise. One day, the neighbour mysteriously disappears, bringing John face to face with his demons: are his former adversaries back to wreak havoc on his idyllic world?

 

Japan, 2025, 95 min.

Director: Genki Kawamura

Cast: Kazunari Ninomiya, Yamato Kochi, Naru Asanuma, Kotone Hanase

A man trapped in an endless sterile subway passageway sets out to find Exit 8. The rules of his quest are simple: do not overlook anything out of the ordinary. If you discover an anomaly, turn back immediately. If you don’t, carry on. Then leave via Exit 8. Even a single oversight will send him back to the beginning. Will he ever reach his goal and escape the infinite corridor? THE EXIT 8 is based on the global hit video game of the same name created by Kotake Create. 

 

Republic of Korea (South Korea), Germany, Qatar, 2025, 85 min.

Director: Syeyoung Park

Cast: Yeji Yeon, Pureum Kim, Goh-Woo, Youngdoo Jeong, Joowon Meng

In a post-war and ecologically devastated Korea, mutated outcasts called Omegas are exploited as cheap labour. Sujin, a young government worker, begins to doubt the state’s ideology as she pursues Mia, an Omega in hiding.

 

France, Germany, 2025, 117 min.

Director: Lucile Hadzihalilovic

Cast: Marion Cotillard, Clara Pacini, August Diehl, Gaspar Noé, Marine Gesbert

Colder than ice, her kiss pierces the heart… The 1970s. Runaway Jeanne falls under the spell of Cristina, the enigmatic star of "The Snow Queen," a film being shot in the studio where Jeanne has taken refuge. A mutual fascination grows between the two.

 

Spain, France, Argentina, 2024, 107 min.

Director: Pedro Martín-Calero

Cast: Ester Expósito, Mathilde Ollivier, Malena Villa

Something is haunting Andrea, but no one, not even Andrea herself, knows what it is. Twenty years ago, ten thousand kilometres away, the same presence terrorised Marie. Camila was the only person who could understand what was happening to Marie, but no one believed what they had to say. When they are confronted by this oppressive threat, all three hear the same thing: a wailing.