2025 Telluride Lineup:
The 52nd Telluride Film Festival is proud to present the following new feature films and episodic works to play in its main program, the SHOW:
• A PRIVATE LIFE (d. Rebecca Zlotowski, France, 2025)
• ASK E. JEAN (d. Ivy Meeropol, U.S., 2025)
• BALLAD OF A SMALL PLAYER (d. Edward Berger, Hong Kong/Macau, 2025)
• BLUE MOON (d. Richard Linklater, U.S./Ireland, 2025)
• BUGONIA (d. Yorgos Lanthimos, U.K., 2025)
• COVER-UP (d. Laura Poitras, Mark Obenhaus, U.S., 2025)
• EVERYWHERE MAN: THE LIVES AND TIMES OF PETER ASHER (d. Dayna Goldfine, Dan Geller, U.S./U.K., 2025)
• GHOST ELEPHANTS (d. Werner Herzog, Angola/Namibia/U.S., 2025)
• H IS FOR HAWK (d. Philippa Lowthorpe, U.K./U.S., 2025)
• HAMLET (d. Aneil Karia, U.K., 2025)
• HAMNET (d. Chloé Zhao, U.K., 2025)
• HIGHWAY 99 A DOUBLE ALBUM (d. Ethan Hawke, U.S., 2025)
• IF I HAD LEGS I’D KICK YOU (d. Mary Bronstein, U.S., 2025)
• IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT (d. Jafar Panahi, Iran/France/Luxembourg, 2025)
• JAY KELLY (d. Noah Baumbach, Italy/U.K./U.S., 2025)
• KARL (d. Nick Hooker, U.K., 2025)
• LA GRAZIA (d. Paolo Sorrentino, Italy, 2025)
• LOST IN THE JUNGLE (d. Chai Vasarhelyi, Jimmy Chin, Juan Camilo Cruz, U.S./Colombia, 2025)
• LUMIÈRE, LE CINÉMA (d. Thierry Frémaux, France, 2024)
• MAN ON THE RUN (d. Morgan Neville, U.S., 2025)
• NOUVELLE VAGUE (d. Richard Linklater, France, 2025)
• PILLION (d. Harry Lighton, U.K., 2025)
• SENTIMENTAL VALUE (d. Joachim Trier, Norway/France/Denmark/Germany, 2025)
• SHIFTY (d. Adam Curtis, U.K., 2025)
• SPRINGSTEEN: DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE (d. Scott Cooper, U.S., 2025)
• SUMMER TOUR (d. Mischa Richter, U.S., 2025)
• THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION (d. Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein, David Schmidt, U.S., 2025)
• THE BEND IN THE RIVER (d. Robb Moss, U.S., 2025)
• THE CYCLE OF LOVE (d. Orlando von Einsiedel, U.K./India/Sweden, 2025)
• THE HISTORY OF SOUND (d. Oliver Hermanus, U.S., 2025)
• THE MASTERMIND (d. Kelly Reichardt, U.S., 2025)
• THE NEW YORKER AT 100 (d. Marshall Curry, U.S., 2025)
• THE RESERVE (d. Pablo Pérez Lombardini, Mexico/Qatar, 2025)
• THE SECRET AGENT (d. Kleber Mendonça Filho, Brazil/France/Netherlands/Germany, 2025)
• THIS IS NOT A DRILL (d. Oren Jacoby, U.S., 2025)
• TUNER (d. Daniel Roher, U.S./Canada, 2025)
• URCHIN (d. Harris Dickinson, U.K., 2025)
The following short films will screen in the main program:
• ALL THE EMPTY ROOMS (d. Joshua Seftel, U.S., 2025)
• ALL THE WALLS CAME DOWN (d. Ondi Timoner, U.S., 2025)
• LAST DAYS ON LAKE TRINITY (d. Charlotte Cooley, U.S., 2025)
• SALLIE’S ASHES (d. Brennan Robideaux, U.S., 2025)
• SONG OF MY CITY (d. David C. Roberts, U.S., 2025)
Each year Telluride Film Festival pays tribute to individuals whose artistry has significantly contributed to the art of cinema. The 2025 Silver Medallion will be presented to Oscar-nominated writer/director Noah Baumbach (with JAY KELLY); Oscar-nominated actor/writer/director Ethan Hawke (with BLUE MOON, HIGHWAY 99 A DOUBLE ALBUM); and award-winning Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi (with IT WAS JUST AN ACCIDENT). Programs will include a compilation of clips, an on-stage interview and a screening of the recipient’s new work.
Telluride Film Festival is proud to announce Emmy- and Academy Award–winning producer and filmmaker Ezra Edelman as this year’s Guest Director. A cherished Festival tradition, the Guest Director program invites a distinguished artist to curate a special selection of films, offering audiences a fresh lens through which to explore cinema history.
Edelman, acclaimed for his Academy Award–winning documentary O.J.: MADE IN AMERICA, brings his distinctive voice and passion for storytelling to the Festival with a handpicked selection of films. His curated program is presented in partnership with Turner Classic Movies (TCM), the Festival’s proud sponsor of the Guest Director section this year.
• ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN (d. Alan J. Pakula, U.S., 1976)
• MALCOLM X (d. Spike Lee, U.S., 1992)
• NETWORK (d. Sidney Lumet, U.S., 1976)
• RASHOMON (d. Akira Kurosawa, Japan, 1950)
• THE INSIDER (d. Michael Mann, U.S., 1999)
“It is almost impossible to detect themes across culture at the moment given the absolutely fractured nature of our world,” remarks Festival director Julie Huntsinger. “Certainly, filmmakers are talking about myriad subjects. At Telluride though, there always seems to be a thread of beautiful humanism in the stories told and this year is no different. At the heart of every one of them is the essence of humanity that is profoundly illuminating and beautiful, even if they're also heartbreaking. We’re thrilled with what these filmmakers are sharing and proud to welcome back some old friends as well as new voices. Long live cinema, long live the theatrical experience.”
TFF annually celebrates a hero of cinema who preserves, honors, and presents important, meaningful films. British Producer Tessa Ross will be recognized with the Festival’s Special Medallion, at the presentation of BALLAD OF A SMALL PLAYER.
We are delighted to welcome new sponsor Google to Telluride Film Festival’s shorts section, Filmmakers of Tomorrow, which includes Student Prints, screening six films from the best in student-produced work from around the globe; and Calling Cards, screening ten exceptional new works by promising filmmakers.
Telluride Film Festival’s Education Programs present students with the opportunity to experience film as an art form and to expand participants’ worldviews through film screenings and filmmaker discussions, including:
• Student Symposium – an immersive seminar for graduate and undergraduate students, underwritten by Golden Globes Foundation
• City Lights Project – pairing high school students and teachers with Festival films and guests, made possible by the Artemis Rising Foundation
• FilmLAB – leading filmmakers meet with American Film Institute Fellows
• FilmSCHOLAR – program for young critics and scholars in partnership with University of Wisconsin
Backlot, Telluride’s intimate screening room featuring behind-the-scenes movies and portraits of artists, musicians and filmmakers will screen the following programs, all free and open to the public:
• ALL I HAD WAS NOTHINGNESS (d. Guillaume Ribot, France, 2025)
• CAROL & JOY (d. Nathan Silver, U.S., 2025)
• CHAPLIN: SPIRIT OF THE TRAMP (d. Carmen Chaplin, Spain/U.K./Netherlands, 2024)
• EARTH TO MICHAEL (d. Nico López-Alegría, ZZ, U.S., 2025)
• ELIE WIESEL: SOUL ON FIRE (d. Oren Rudavsky, U.S., 2024)
• KING HAMLET (d. Elvira Lind, U.S./Denmark, 2025)
• MEGADOC (d. Mike Figgis, U.S./U.K., 2025)
• SHOOTING (d. Netalie Braun, Israel, 2025)
• THE GOLDEN SPURTLE (d. Constantine Costi, U.K./Australia, 2025)
• THEIR EYES (d. Nicolas Gourault, France, 2025)
Telluride Film Festival’s Talking Heads programs allow attendees to go behind the scenes with the Festival’s special guests. The Conversations series, sponsored by Indian Paintbrush, is devoted to cinema and culture. The outdoor Noon Seminars feature a panel of guests discussing a wide range of film topics. These programs are free and open to the public.
Special Screenings and Festivities include:
• CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS 3D 2025: Restoration and Recreation (d. Werner Herzog, France/Canada/U.S./U.K./Germany, 2010)
• LEARNING TO FLY (d. Max Lowe, U.S./France/Switzerland/Italy/China/Hong Kong, 2025)
• STEAL THIS STORY, PLEASE! (d. Carl Deal, Tia Lessin, U.S., 2025)
• 4K restoration of THE GOLD RUSH (d. Charles Chaplin, U.S., 1925)
Hi, everybody! I’m doing my favorite festival again and thought this might be a good opportunity to rejoin the community here after ~2 years of relative silence (assuming swo doesn’t ban me on sight).
Got in to Telluride earlier than usual, so was able to enjoy one of the pre-festival screenings: an open-air showing of Linklater’s
Before Sunrise (which it later became clear was part of the fest’s tribute to Ethan Hawke) under the stars and with fireflies streaking overhead. As one of Linklater’s films that address his thematic obsessions about the passage of time, memory, and the ephemerality of experience,
Sunrise was a very different experience solidly into my forties than as a much younger man, and I came away with a new, deepened appreciation for it in that context. Also was even more struck by the quality of the performances by the baby-faced Hawke and Delpy, delivering long single-take scenes both convincingly monologuing and actively listening and responding to their partner. Good movie that — as is also typical for Linklater — improves as it (and its viewer) ages.
Warning: for a bit here, this is going to double as a “The Weather and Everybody’s Health” post — avoid as needed.
After a year-plus slow motion divorce that ended the 24-year relationship I’d been in since high school, and sitting there watching this film with my girlfriend — a woman I’ve known for ~20 years and a truly lovely human — I was also struck by the closing montage. Linklater revisits the spaces and objects that seemed so significant for the characters the night before, now rejoining the banal everyday fabric of life in a world too big and ever-evolving and varied to linger on even the most momentous of events — personal, political, environmental, whatever. Despite the inherent impermanence of our lived experiences and their mutable significance in our life, it still seems really important to try to remember and value them wherever they land on the spectrum from painful to joyful. A lot of the people, objects, and signifiers that defined my life for so long have changed over the last 24 months, but they still matter a lot to me — and that sentiment includes this place and many of the people reading this. Not sure how regularly I’ll be able to contribute around here, but I still check the forum daily and occasionally ban spambots, and I’ll try to add to it constructively when I can.
Anyway, this is a pretty packed festival, and it’s already clear I’m going to miss a handful of top priorities. Today’s plan is to hit at least three of: the first installment of Ken Burns’ new documentary on the American Revolution; Ethan Hawke’s three hour documentary on Merle Haggard; the much-hyped Rose Byrne performance vehicle
If I Had Legs I’d Kick You; and the BDSM queer romance
Pillion out of Cannes.
Should be getting to the new Lanthimos, Trier, Poitras, and Zhao films over the next few days, along with ~9-10 others as scheduling allows — trying to figure out how to fit a Panahi tribute and screening of his Palme d’Or winner in there too. Pained to miss the new Adam Curtis doc, but six hours on post-Thatcher British neoliberalism shoves out too many other precious time slots; also bummed to miss the only showing of a restored and seemingly retouched
Cave of Forgotten Dreams in 3D.
