The 2025 Glasgow Film Festival is almost upon us, and it’s set to be a highlight of the UK’s film calendar. Here are 10 movies to watch we’ve got our eyes on!
The Glasgow Film Festival is nearly here, running from 26 February to 9 March 2025, and its programme is packed full of premieres and special guests, including James McAvoy, Jessica Lange, and Tim Roth. Audiences can look forward to a smorgasbord of world and international premieres, immersive screenings, and a diverse programme showcasing films from 39 countries. With the opening gala a week away, here is our list of 10 movies to watch we can’t wait for, in alphabetical order.
1. Bob Trevino Likes It
Director: Tracie Laymon
Country: USA
This heartwarming dramedy which is based on the director’s life sounds like a real winner: when Lily (Barbie Ferreira) tries to reconnect with her narcissistic dad (French Stewart) on Facebook, she accidentally adds the wrong Bob (John Leguizamo). Lily might not have found what she was looking for, but she might just have stumbled upon the kindness she needed all along. One of the festival’s highest rated films on Letterboxd, Bob Trevino Likes It sounds set to be a real crowd pleaser.
2. Boys Go to Jupiter
Director: Julian Glander
Country: USA
Set during the haziest days of the year between Christmas and New Year, this beautiful and surreal animation follows a young gig worker looking to get rich quick. A series of oddball customers and a couple of adorable aliens – not to mention some psychedelic musical interludes – make Boys Go to Jupiter one of the festival’s capital-W Weird selections. Come for profound conversations about the harms of capitalism, stay for absurdities like The World’s Largest Hot Dog.
3. Dreams (Drømmer)
Director: Dag Johan Haugerud
Country: Norway
Love and desire connect three separate films by Haugerud, two of which – Dreams (Drømmer) and Love – are showing at this year’s festival. A teenager, Johanne (Ella Øverbye), experiences her sexual awakening after a new teacher, Johanna (Selome Emnetu), arrives at her school. Johanne writes about it beautifully, but when her family discovers her diary, they have some questions. This instalment in Haugerud’s trilogy explores generational differences, autofiction, and considers what it means to share something so intimate.
4. Dying
Director: Matthias Glasner
Country: Germany
Dying centres around Tom (Lars Eidinger), an orchestra conductor whose family life is taking a toll. His parents are ageing and ailing, his sister is an alcoholic, and he’s taking care of the daughter of his ex-girlfriend. Part of the festival’s official selection, this three-hour drama of a troubled family staring down death sounds like one of the programme’s more intense offerings, but Dying has been commended for its black humour and light touch. Glasnar’s epic won a Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival in 2024 for its screenplay.
5. Ghostlight
Directors: Kelly O’Sullivan, Alex Thompson
Country: USA
A tender familiar affair, Ghostlight sees a volatile father find an outlet for his emotions in a local amateur theatre group. Dan (Keith Kupferer) keeps his involvement in rehearsals for Romeo and Juliet a secret from his wife and daughter, both played by Kupferer’s real-life spouse and child, Tara Mallen and Katherine Mallen Kupferer. Ghostlight promises to be a healing and touching tale, by the creative partnership behind the excellent Saint Frances.
6. Neon Dreaming
Director: Marie-Claire Marcotte
Country: Canada
Little eight-year-old Billie has always believed her absent mum is a ballerina. Her dad and grandma have never corrected her. After a school show-and-tell throws doubt over everything, she becomes determined to work out who and where her real mum is. Marcotte adapted Neon Dreaming from her own play, giving her a bigger canvas to get inside the mind of a child whose world has turned upside down. Expect laughs from Billie’s unfiltered take on her young life and maybe just a few tears too.
7. On Falling
Director: Laura Carreira
Country: UK, Portugal
One of the festival’s gala screenings, and scheduled to be broadcast in partner cinemas around the UK, On Falling is a window into the life of a migrant gig worker in a Scottish warehouse. Produced by Ken Loach’s Sixteen Films, and sharing his social realist touch, On Fallin looks to be a vital piece of empathetic cinema, bringing audiences into the precarious life of Aurora (Joana Santos) as she just tries to get by.
8. Sharp Corner
Director: Jason Buxton
Country: Canada, Ireland
This one sounds intriguing: after moving to a new house, a family is shaken by a car crash in the garden. Josh (Ben Foster), discovering that his home is a road accident blackspot, becomes obsessed with preparing for the next crash. Sharp Corner offers up an intense psychological character study as Josh hides his fixation from his wife (Cobie Smulders), stuck in an all-consuming downward spiral.
9. Tornado
Director: John Maclean
Country: UK
The 2025 Glasgow Film Festival’s opening gala sees Tim Roth and Jack Lowden star as father and son in 1790s Britain. They belong to a gang whose gold is stolen by Tornado, a young woman travelling the country with her father’s samurai puppet show. The film promises an adrenaline-fuelled take on classic Japanese samurai films, as Tornado tries to survive the gang’s revenge. Maclean’s previous film, Slow West, was a critical hit, and we have high hopes for his second feature.
10. Went Up The Hill
Director: Samuel Van Grinsven
Country: Australia, New Zealand
Vicky Krieps and Dacre Montgomery star in this intriguing ghost story of possession. Jack attends the funeral of his mother, Elizabeth, where he meets her widow, Jill. When night falls, Elizabeth’s spirit enters their bodies in turn to converse with the living. One of the programme’s more haunting offerings which seeks to ruminate on grief and letting go. Look out for Tyson Perkins’ stunning cinematography.
More Movies to Watch at the 2025 Glasgow Film Festival
- Brief History of a Family
- By the Throat
- Crickets, It’s Your Turn
- Dogtooth
- The End
- The Extraordinary Miss Flower
- Four Mothers
- In Our Blood
- Kill The Jockey
- Luckiest Man in America
- Mexico 86
- Peacock
- The Players
- Queens
- Raw
- The Return
- Rita
- The Surfer
- Stationed At Home
The 2025 Glasgow Film Festival will take place on 26 February – 9 March.
