This year the Toronto Film Festival is celebrating its 50th edition; Here are 15 movies to watch at TIFF 2025 this September.
The Toronto Film Festival, one of the biggest film festivals in North America and indeed the world, returns in September and Loud and Clear Reviews will be there! TIFF 2025 boasts a typically eclectic programme, with a range of films from potential future Hollywood blockbusters to international art house gems, including a number of world and North American premieres. With almost 300 films across several programmes and seven awards to be won, there’s bound to be something here for everyone. Here are 15 movies to watch at TIFF this year, ranked alphabetically.
1. 100 Sunset
Discovery
Director & Writer: Kunsang Kyirong
Country: Canada
Perhaps this year’s most intriguing homegrown world premiere comes from visual artist and first-time filmmaker Kunsang Kyirong. Based in Toronto, Kyirong is known for her themes of memory and immigration, and looks set to explore Canada’s cultural multiplicity with this story of two young women in a community of Tibetan immigrants. Introvert Kunsel (Tenzin Kunsel) spends much of her time spying on neighbours and committing petty thefts, seeing herself as an outsider even within her own diaspora. Only when the enigmatic Passang (Sonam Choekyi) appears does she begin to step out of her comfort zone. Expect a unique take on the immigrant narrative, exploring voyeurism, longing and desire.
2. Ballad of a Small Player
Special Presentation
Director: Edward Berger
Writer: Rowan Joffe
Country: UK
Berger makes a second TIFF appearance in a row this year, having wowed audiences at the festival (and beyond) with his spectacular papal melodrama, Conclave. This time around, he’s taking us far from the Vatican, both geographically and spiritually, to Macau, where Colin Farrell’s travelling gambler is struggling to manage his debts and finds himself being hunted down by Tilda Swinton’s dogged detective. Ballad of a Small Player, which will have its world premiere at TIFF, is adapted from Lawrence Osborne’s novel of the same name and is said to blend hard-hitting realism with a more dreamlike atmosphere, courtesy of some striking visuals from Berger’s All Quiet on the Western Front cinematographer, James Friend.
3. California Schemin’
Special Presentations
Director: James McAvoy
Writers: Archie Thomson, Elaine Gracie
Countries: UK, USA
Actor James McAvoy makes his directorial debut with this true story of two lads from Dundee who swapped their Scottish accents for generic American ones in order to become hip hop stars. The thing is, as anyone who saw Jeanie Finlay’s 2013 documentary The Great Hip Hop Hoax will know, it sort of worked. California Schemin’ seems to have exactly the kind of tragicomic tone that McAvoy himself delights in as an actor – indeed, he appears in a supporting role – and it will be interesting to see what he can do with this material from behind the camera. This is another exciting world premiere at the festival.
4. Christy
Special Presentations
Director: David Michôd
Writers: Mirrah Foulkes and David Michôd
Country: USA
There’s talk of a potential career-best turn from Sydney Sweeney in this biopic of boxer Christy Martin that will have its world premiere at TIFF. It tells the story of a working-class daughter of a coal miner who excels at sport from a young age and literally fights her way to the top, contending with misogyny, drug addiction and horrifying domestic abuse. Martin was a pioneer of a sport that is still slow to recognise its female greats, all while managing an incredibly difficult personal life, so her story feels like one that deserves to be told on the big screen. Don’t be surprised if we see Oscars talk about Sweeney and her performance later this year.
5. Couture
Special Presentations
Writer and Director: Alice Winocour
Countries: USA, France
Taking place during the leadup to a Paris fashion show, this Angelina Jolie-led drama from French cinéaste Alice Winocour contains intersecting experiences of women and girls from Ukraine, France and Sudan. It’s another TIFF world premiere and sees Jolie play a film director working on a video at the event, a quick gig in between feature film projects, who is also going through a divorce when she is hit with a serious medical diagnosis. Alongside Ella Rumpf and newcomer Anyier Anei, Jolie is supported by an impressive cast of recognisable names in French cinema, including Louis Garrel, Vincent Lindon and Aurore Clément.
6. Frankenstein
Special Presentations
Writer and Director: Guillermo del Toro
Country: USA
Mexican auteur Guillermo del Toro returns with his own take on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, his first live action film since 2021’s Nightmare Alley. Oscar Isaac plays the eponymous scientist, while Jacob Elordi follows in the footsteps of Boris Karloff, Christopher Lee and Robert De Niro by portraying his monstrous creation. Mia Goth, Christoph Waltz and Lars Mikkelsen also star. It’s a project del Toro has been talking about for almost 20 years, and one that he promises will be a more faithful and emotional adaptation of the source material. It may well be gothic, but this isn’t a horror movie in the traditional sense.
7. Good Fortune
Gala Presentations
Writer and Director: Aziz Ansari
Country:USA
The feature directorial debut of Parks and Recreation and Master of None star Aziz Ansari will have its world premiere at TIFF. It boasts a who’s who of great US comic actors, including Seth Rogen, Keke Palmer, Keanu Reeves, Sandra Oh and Ansari himself. Reeves plays the ‘budget guardian angel’ Gabriel, who descends on the Earth to improve the lives of mere mortals, though his powers are somewhat limited. There he meets Ansari’s struggling gig worker Arj and Rogen’s tech bro Jeff, whom he forces to swap lives in a kind of satirical Freaky Friday. It seems there’s plenty of social commentary there for those who want it, but could just work as a silly laugh, too.
8. Hamnet
Gala Presentations
Director: Chloé Zhao
Writers: Chloé Zhao and Magie O’Farrell
Country: UK
We’ve all been waiting to see what else Chloé Zhao can do since she burst onto the scene with the Academy Award for Best Picture-winning Nomadland – and let’s be honest, Eternals doesn’t count. With Hamnet, she’s back to exploring more human topics, namely the personal life of one William Shakespeare. Based on the novel by Maggie O’Farrell, who also co-wrote the script with Zhao, it has Paul Mescal interpreting the Bard, though our real protagonist here is his wife, Agnes, played by the mercurial Jessie Buckley. The death of the couple’s son, who gives the film its name, looms large, but this is a film about life as much as death.
9. No Other Choice
Gala Presentations
Director: Park Chan-wook
Writers: Park Chan-wook, Lee Kyoung-mi, Don McKellar, Jahye Lee
Country: South Korea
Park Chan-wook returns to TIFF, having last appeared in Toronto with 2022’s Decision to Leave, bringing with him another darkly comic and violent opus. No Other Choice is adapted from Donald E. Westlake’s “The Ax”, last brought to the screen by Costa-Gavras in 2005, with a story transplanted from the USA to South Korea. It follows a newly unemployed man who is willing to do whatever it takes to land a coveted position, even if things get bloody. Taking place in the paper industry, this macabre satire sounds like a cross between Oldboy and The Office.
10. Roofman
Gala Presentations
Director: Derek Cianfrance
Writers: Derek Cianfrance and Kirt Gunn
Country: USA
Another world premiere here, this time starring Channing Tatum as the real-life ‘Rooftop Robber’ Jeffrey Manchester, known for his propensity to steal from branches of McDonald’s by entering their premises via the roof. Tatum seems perfectly cast as an amiable outlaw devoted to his kids, while the supporting cast includes much-loved faces such as Kirsten Dunst, LaKeith Stanfield, Juno Temple and Peter Dinklage. A true-crime drama with the heart of a family comedy, Roofman is the latest from Derek Cianfrance, whose empathetic filmmaking style we last saw in Sound of Metal.
11. Saipan
Centrepiece
Directors: Lisa Barros D’Sa and Glenn Leyburn
Writer: Paul Fraser
Country: Ireland, UK
It may not be a chapter of history that many North Americans are familiar with, but the dramatisation of footballer Roy Keane’s headline-grabbing exit from the Ireland squad at the 2002 World Cup will nonetheless get its world premiere at TIFF. Steve Coogan has found quite the niche in portraying controversial personalities in the British media – he’s been Tony Wilson, Paul Raymond and Jimmy Savile to name but a few – and manager Mick McCarthy, with his iconic Yorkshire drawl, should be right up the Alan Partridge actor’s street. Éanna Hardwick plays Keane in what promises to be a fascinating character study, exploring power struggles, masculinity and Irish identity.
12. Sentimental Value
Special Presentations
Director: Joachim Trier
Writers: Eskil Vogt and Joachim Trier
Countries: Norway, France, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, UK
Fresh from winning the Grand Prix at Cannes earlier in the summer, the latest film from The Worst Person in the World director Joachim Trier is one of TIFF’s must-sees. Renate Reinsve stars as Nora, the estranged daughter of Stellan Skarsgård’s Gustav, a once-great filmmaker in search of a comeback. You’ll also find Elle Fanning as a Hollywood actress who agrees to star in Gustav’s new film, which is so intensely personal that Nora and her sister Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) can’t help but be drawn back into their father’s orbit. Loud and Clear Reviews’s Philip Bagnall reviewed Sentimental Value at Cannes, describing it as a ‘masterclass in cinematic grace and honesty’.
13. Sk+te’kmujue’katik (At the Place of Ghosts)
TIFF Next Wave Selects
Writer and Director: Bretten Hannam
Country: Canada, Belgium
L’nu filmmaker Bretten Hannam last appeared at TIFF in 2021 with the well-received Wildhood, a tale of a young man reconnecting with his indigenous roots. Their latest effort follows a similar theme, focusing on two Mi’knaw brothers reconnecting and confronting past trauma, but appears to take a much more haunting, genre-bending direction. This immersive ghost story sees Mise’l (Blake Alec Miranda) and Antle (Forrest Goodluck) journey through a forest where time collapses on itself in order to rid themselves of a malicious spirit. This blend of Hannam’s culture with the colonial history of Eastern Canada will have its world premiere at TIFF.
14. Unidentified
Centrepiece
Director: Haifaa al-Mansour
Writers: Brad Niemann and Haifaa al-Mansour
Country: Saudi Arabia
Haifaa al-Mansour made waves in 2012 with Wadja, the first feature film entirely in Saudi Arabia and, more significantly, the first feature film made by a Saudi woman. She then struggled with a couple of English-language projects before reenamouring herself to critics after returning to her home country with The Perfect Candidate. Premiering at TIFF, Unidentified is another Saudi-shot film that follows Nawal (Mila Alzahrani) as she assists an otherwise all-male police team in investigating the death of a young girl. Through Nawal’s obsession with true-crime media, the film scrutinises the intrigue that surrounds the deaths of women and girls all over the globe, while also offering new perspectives on Saudi Arabia’s longstanding patriarchal system.
15. Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery
SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS
Writer and Director: Rian Johnson
Country: USA
What started as a fun throwback murder mystery in 2019’s Knives Out has morphed into quite the lucrative franchise, with Daniel Craig and his magnificent cod-Southern American accent returning to the role of Benoit Blanc for a third edition in just six years. Like the original film, Wake Up Dead Man will have its world premiere at TIFF, and boasts a stellar cast including, but absolutely not limited to, Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin and Jeremy Renner. This mystery takes place in the local church of a small town, with a seemingly impossible murder at its heart. Contrasting it with 2022’s Glass Onion, writer-director Rian Johnson has described it as ‘Gothic’ with a ‘much more grounded tone’.
Toronto Film Festival 2025 – 10 More Movies to Watch at TIFF This Year:
- A Poet, Simón Mesa Soto
- A Private Life, Rebecca Zlotowski
- The Cost of Heaven, Mathieu Denis
- Franz, Agnieszka Holland
- Glenrothan, Brian Cox
- It Was Just an Accident, Jafar Panahi
- The Love That Remains, Hlynur Pálmason
- The Secret Agent, Kleber Mendonça Filho
- Renoir, Chie Hayakawa
- The Wizard of the Kremlin, Olivier Assayas
The 49th Toronto Film Festival Film Festival will take place on September 4 – 14, 2025. Take a look at the official 2025 Toronto Film Festival schedule and follow us on our socials for festival updates!
