Article by Andrea Dosio
Translation by Alice Ivaldi Lessona
No Woman’s Land is a photo feature shot in Afghanistan by Kiana Hayeri for the World Press Photo 2025. It is a testament to the resistance and dignity of Afghan women, which has a lot in common with Cinema Jazireh, Gözde Kural’s second feature film presented in competition at the TFF.
Continua la lettura di “CINEMA JAZIREH” BY GÖZDE KURAL (ENG)Article by Marta Mastrocinque
Translated by Maria Iacovone
Todas las fuerzas, directed by Luciana Piantanida, proposes an analysis of the Latin American migrants’ situation in Buenos Aires through a controlled use of fantasy. Set in district Once, the movie combines social observation and more visionary narrative constructions, without fully adhering to the rules of a single genre.
Continua la lettura di “TODAS LAS FUERZAS” BY LUCIANA PIANTANIDA (ENG)
Article by Niccolò Bedino
Translation by Alessandra Di Paola Seminara
«I am not in danger, I am the danger». Walter White’s legendary line from Breaking Bad could easily serve as the plot twist in Untitled Home Invasion Romance, the directorial debut of Jason Biggs. The actor of American Pie (Paul Weitz, 1999) trades teen comedy for dark comedy and shows an unexpectedly sharp command of timing, both before and behind the camera. He does not reinvent the genre, but he navigates it with a confidence many veteran filmmakers lack.
Continua la lettura di “UNTITLED HOME INVASION ROMANCE” BY JASON BIGGS (ENG)Article by Marilina Rita Monzo
Translation by Francesca Corino
Everything starts with a deed both creepy and moving: Eva kidnaps children, she is convinced that she must save them from a threat, visible only to her. The topic of child protection, already touched upon by the director Emanuela Rossi in Buio (2019), assumes in this film a key role. Eva’s impulse does not come from violence but follows a primordial instinct. Her mission seems to stem from a grief that can be read in her actions, a grief born from a traumatic event that changed her: it is a deep crack that swallowed her, like a wound that cannot be healed.
Continua la lettura di “EVA” BY EMANUELA ROSSI (ENG)Article by Elisabetta Pala
Translation by Chiara Ventura
«How great is it to be white?». It is Joan Huang the one who has to answer this question in Slanted, presented at the 43rd TFF. Once she moved with her parents to the south of the USA, Joan began to be bullied for her Chinese origins until she became a teenager and decided to undergo plastic surgery to obtain the appearance of a young Caucasian girl.
Continua la lettura di “SLANTED” BY AMY WANG (ENG)Article by Dina Aghaei
Translated by Giorgia Cattaneo
To mark his daughter Sofia’s twenty-fifth birthday (Vic Carmen Sonne) –now his sole heir after the death of his son– Marcos Timoleon (Willem Dafoe), a wealthy Greek shipowner, hosts an elaborate celebration on his private island. A party that seems to be choreographed down to the last detail. But things don’t unfold quite according to his script.
Continua la lettura di “THE BIRTHDAY PARTY” BY MIGUEL ÁNGEL JIMÉNEZ (ENG)Article by Vittorio Barbieri
Translation by Giulia Zanotto
The life of Dane (Ferdinand Mbaïssané), a driver for an NGO in N’Djamena, proceeds normally until a tragic incident exposes him to the burden of diya: the bloody price a family wants him to pay for running over their son. From this moment on, the movie turns into an introspective journey into which responsibility, guilt and redemption intertwine, dragging the audience into a syncopated thriller.
Continua la lettura di “DIYA” BY ACHILLE RONAIMOU (ENG)
Article by Giada Franzoni
Translation by Carlotta Anna Antonacci
What would happen if Fellini’s naïve Cabiria suddenly ended up in John Waters’ irreverent film universe? Fucktoys, the debut feature directed by and starring Annapurna Sriram, answers this question by creating a glamourous and glittering atmosphere which recalls the 1970s and camp aesthetics, while competing in the 43rd edition of the Torino Film Festival.
Continua la lettura di “FUCKTOYS” BY ANNAPURNA SRIRAM (ENG)Article by Andrea Dosio
Translation by Patrick Zaffalon
A director asks AI to generate multiple stories about Dracula, looking for one that tells his myth in a new, original way. Will he achieve his goal?
Continua la lettura di “DRACULA” BY RADU JUDE (ENG)Article by Dina Aghaei
Translation by Viola Suria
With Mo Papa, her second fiction feature film after Mo Mamma (2023), Estonian director Eeva Mägi returns to explore the most fragile part of human relationships, this time choosing the bond between father and son. The film speaks with intensity and clarity: the story of a man who longs for an ordinary life and strives to act rightly, yet remains trapped by his past and unresolved traumas. Haunted by a city that condemned him and a stolen childhood, he is slowly driven toward self-destruction.
Continua la lettura di “MO PAPA” BY EEVA MÄGI (ENG)Article by Martina Oliva
Translation by Chiara Ventura
After Juliette Binoche took part in the performance In-I In (2008), a piece both danced and acted in which she performed alongside the British dancer and choreographer Akram Khan, she filmed the documentary In-I In Motion (2025).
Continua la lettura di “IN-I IN MOTION” BY JULIETTE BINOCHE (ENG)Article by Niccolò Bedino
Translation by Valeria Marconi
Hollywood promises you the world. However, after stealing your soul, it often gives you only a pale reflection of what you were looking for in return. Billy Knight, Alec Griffen Roth’s debut film is a love letter to cinema, a tale which is halfway between reality and imagination. This is the journey of a young artist who is trying to understand if cinema can save him or if it is only a sweet illusion.
Continua la lettura di “BILLY KNIGHT” BY ALEC GRIFFEN ROTH (ENG)Article by Davide Lassandro
Translation by Alice Ivaldi Lessona
Revolutions, of any kind, have always existed and have incessantly shaped the course of history. But what is their purpose? What are they fought for? And against whom? These are the questions that define Daniel Vidal Toche’s first feature film, La anatomía de los caballos, presented at the 43rd Torino Film Festival. The Peruvian director creates an unusual and personal cinematic work, depicting the relationship between a land and its people filtered through the complex and contradictory theme of revolution.
Continua la lettura di “LA ANATOMÍA DE LOS CABALLOS” BY DANIEL VIDAL TOCHE (ENG)Article by Luca Delpiano
Translation by Virginia Milazzo
Presented to the 43rd Torino Film Festival’s documentaries competition, About a Hero ponders over the concept of representation itself during the era of generative technologies. A true-crime style mockumentary – guided by a fake AI generated Werner Herzog – intertwines the figure of the great German director with a sequence of real interviews: artists, scientists and philosophers who discuss the increasingly uncertain boundary between man and machine.
Continua la lettura di “ABOUT A HERO” BY PIOTR WINIEWICZ (ENG)Article by Marilina Rita Monzo
Translation by Giacomo Patterlini
In Avemmaria, what stands out is not the story, but a perspective: that of a man who, on the threshold of fatherhood, realises he cannot move forward without coming to terms with the child he once was. This insight gave rise to Fortunato Cerlino’s directorial debut, presented at the 43rd Turin Film Festival. The work naturally weaves together two periods of life, building a continual debate between the adult Felice, the director’s alter ego – played by Salvatore Esposito – and the young Felice, played by Mario Di Leva.
Continua la lettura di “AVEMMARIA” BY FORTUNATO CERLINO (ENG)Article by Sveva Keiko Abbatantuono
Translated by Luca Perrone
With Il protagonista (2025), Fabrizio Benvenuto delivers a debut that stands out for its connection to the Italian tradition and, at the same time, for its desire to find its own voice, guided by a bold drive to experiment with the audiovisual medium.
Continua la lettura di “IL PROTAGONISTA” BY FABRIZIO BENVENUTO (ENG)Article by: Ludovico Franco
Translated by: Alessandra Di Paola Seminara
Just like Magellan (Gael García Bernal), who keeps veering off course as he crosses the oceans, Lav Diaz probes new stylistic perspectives for his cinema: with Albert Serra as producer, Diaz shoots for the first time in a language other than Tagalog and adopts color. He brings the violence of colonialism back to its archaic roots, reinterpreting the figure of the explorer and the myth of the Age of “Discoveries.”
Continua la lettura di “MAGELLAN” BY LAV DIAZ (ENG)Article by Greta Maria Sorani
Translation by Francesca Corino
A woman lays motionless on a bed, seemingly lifeless. On top of her, a man, panting, abuses her. The second feature film by Lino Escalera, Hamburgo, opens with this violent image. After his debut with No sé decir adiós (2017), the Madrid-born director returns on the topics of drug addiction and loneliness by adopting the conventions and atmospheres of noir cinema.
Continua la lettura di “HAMBURGO” BY LINO ESCALERA (ENG)Article by Carlotta Profico
Translated by Giorgia Cattaneo
After decades in the industry, a renowned music producer fights to preserve his record label, Stackin’ Hits Records, as it faces a looming takeover by a global corporation. His efforts are suddenly disrupted when, from his penthouse overlooking the Brooklyn Bridge, he learns that his teenage son has been kidnapped.
Continua la lettura di “HIGHEST 2 LOWEST” BY SPIKE LEE (ENG)Article by Marta Mastrocinque
Translation by Maria Iacovone
Dolph: Unbreakable tells the life and career of Dolph Lundgren, starting from his most vulnerable moment: his illness. Andrew Holmes’ documentary opens and closes there, in the moment the actor – action cinema icon – stops being just a “tough guy” and becomes a man fighting in silence, still working, exercising and living.
Continua la lettura di “DOLPH: UNBREAKABLE” BY ANDREW HOLMES (ENG)
