MIFF launches full 2025 program with Jimmy Barnes: Working Class Man world premiere

Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) has launched its 2025 program, announcing an extraordinary lineup that includes the world premiere of Jimmy Barnes: Working Class Man and 10 films competing for the prestigious Bright Horizons Award. The festival runs from 7-24 August across Melbourne, regional Victoria and online, offering cinephiles an overwhelming array of features, shorts and extended reality experiences.

Melbourne International Film Festival 2025 continues to connect deeper with festival-goers, showcasing the best new Australian filmmaking alongside beloved auteurs and live-score cinema events. This year’s program boasts Julia Holter: The Passion of Joan of Arc and Parasite Live in Concert with composer Jung Jae il, presented by Orchestra Victoria. The festival features talks, panels, special events and blockbusters, including Ari Aster’s buzzy Eddington arriving hot from Cannes.

Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF)

• When: 7-24 August 2025
• Where: Melbourne cinemas, regional Victoria venues, and online
• Tickets: MIFF Members pre-sale 8pm 10-14 July, general public 9am Tuesday 15 July
• Website: miff.com.au

Stay up to date with what’s happening in and around Melbourne here.

Opening Night Gala

• If I Had Legs I’d Kick You – Mary Bronstein – Dark comedy about motherhood

If I Had Legs I’d Kick You by writer-director Mary Bronstein opens Melbourne International Film Festival as the Opening Night Gala feature on Thursday 7 August. This devastatingly honest and darkly comic vision of motherhood also screens as a Bright Horizons Competition film. Australia’s Rose Byrne leads a star cast that was judged best performance at this year’s Berlinale, alongside fearless appearances by Conan O’Brien, fellow Australian Danielle Macdonald, Christian Slater and A$AP Rocky.

Premiere With Purpose

• Prime Minister – Michelle Walshe, Lindsay Utz – Jacinda Ardern’s political leadership

Returning for its second consecutive year, the Premiere With Purpose gala presents Prime Minister by Michelle Walshe and Lindsay Utz. The documentary chronicles Jacinda Ardern’s tenure as New Zealand PM, from navigating crises to redefining global leadership through her empathetic yet resolute approach. The Victorian premiere will be celebrated with a special black-carpet event hosted at ACMI on Thursday 14 August.

Family Gala

• The Bad Guys 2 – Pierre Perifel, JP Sans – Animated sequel heist adventure

The festival’s beloved Family Gala returns on Sunday 17 August presenting The Bad Guys 2 by Pierre Perifel and JP Sans, based on the list-topping children’s book series by Australian actor-turned-author Aaron Blabey. The kid-friendly Ocean’s Eleven meets Baby Driver takes explosive action cues from Fast & Furious and Mission: Impossible. This bigger, badder sequel features an all-star cast including getaway driver Mr Wolf (Sam Rockwell), grumpy safecracker Mr Snake (Marc Maron), sensitive master of disguise Mr Shark (Craig Robinson), hacker Ms Webs Tarantula (Awkwafina), hot-tempered Mr Piranha (Anthony Ramos), the return of Professor Marmalade (Richard Ayaode), and new character Doom (Natasha Lyonne).

Bright Horizons Competition

• If I Had Legs I’d Kick You – Mary Bronstein – Dark comedy about motherhood
• First Light – James J Robinson – Crime drama exploring faith
• The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo – Diego Céspedes – Chilean AIDS crisis story
• Urchin – Harris Dickinson – London homeless addiction drama
• A Useful Ghost – Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke – Bangkok supernatural domestic satire
• Sound of Falling – Mascha Schilinski – German female desire exploration
• The Rivals of Amziah King – Andrew Patterson – 1960s Oklahoma conspiracy thriller
• A Poet – Simón Mesa Soto – Colombian mentorship drama
• April – Dea Kulumbegashvili – Georgian reproductive rights drama
• Renoir – Chie Hayakawa – 1980s Japanese family loss

Melbourne International Film Festival’s boundary-pushing Bright Horizons Competition features 10 extraordinary directors competing for the festival’s flagship prize worth $140,000 – the richest feature film prize in the Southern Hemisphere. The competition includes previously mentioned If I Had Legs I’d Kick You and First Light.

The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo by director Diego Céspedes won this year’s Cannes Un Certain Regard prize. Set in a remote Chilean mining town in 1984, it follows 12-year-old Lidia as she navigates fear and prejudice when a mysterious illness threatens her queer family and community. The film brings a tender child’s-eye view to the AIDS crisis, with newcomer Tamara Cortés delivering a remarkable performance alongside Matías Catalán and Paula Dinamarca.

Urchin marks an astonishing directorial debut from Babygirl star Harris Dickinson in this jaggedly heartbreaking portrait of addiction and survival on London’s streets. Dickinson cedes the spotlight to Frank Dillane in this raw film about Mike, a homeless person struggling to break free from self-destruction. Winner of the FIPRESCI Prize and Best Actor at Cannes Un Certain Regard, the film channels British social realism for a new era.

Thai auteur Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke’s enigmatic debut A Useful Ghost blurs boundaries between the living and spectral in contemporary Bangkok. In this absurd domestic satire, a recently deceased woman returns as a ghost inhabiting a vacuum cleaner, determined to safeguard her family and cleanse their home of malevolent spirits.

German filmmaker Mascha Schilinski’s Sound of Falling features hypnotic sound design and striking visuals in this assured debut exploring female desire and repression. Starring Hanna Heckt, Lena Urzendowsky and Susanne Wuest, viewers are plunged into a sensory journey through memory, trauma and awakening.

Andrew Patterson returns with crime thriller The Rivals of Amziah King starring Matthew McConaughey, Kurt Russell and Angelina LookingGlass. This film ratchets up tension with small-town paranoia and conspiracy theories, transforming 1960s Oklahoma into a pressure cooker of suspicion and dread.

Colombian cinema finds a bold new voice in A Poet, Simón Mesa Soto’s Cannes Un Certain Regard Jury Prize winner. When a failed poet meets a talented young woman, their unlikely mentorship blooms into something beautiful and dangerous, brought to life through revelatory performances from Ubeimar Rios and Rebeca Andrade.

Uncompromising April sees Georgian powerhouse Dea Kulumbegashvili return with a searing exploration of reproductive rights and bodily autonomy. Winner of the Special Jury Prize at Venice, this meticulously crafted film confronts viewers with brutal realities faced by women denied agency over their own bodies.

Chie Hayakawa’s Renoir offers a delicate exploration of familial loss drawing on the director’s own childhood. Set in 1980s Japan, this tender coming-of-age story follows an imaginative 11-year-old girl navigating her father’s terminal illness, her mother’s mounting stress and the adult world.

Jury

Writer-director and producer Charlotte Wells serves as jury president, three years after her celebrated debut Aftersun was selected for the inaugural Bright Horizons Competition. Wells oversees a distinguished panel including Australian actress, writer and performer Tamala; American filmmaker Alex Ross Perry; Greek filmmaker Athina Rachel Tsangari; IMDb founder Col Needham; Vietnamese-Australian author Nam Le; and Australian composer Caitlin Yeo.

International Cinema

• It Was Just an Accident – Jafar Panahi – Iranian Palme d’Or winner
• Sorry, Baby – Eva Victor – A24-backed creative dramedy
• Blue Moon – Richard Linklater – Broadway lyricist fallen stardom
• Nouvelle Vague – Richard Linklater – French New Wave recreation
• The Chronology of Water – Kristen Stewart – Poetic memoir adaptation
• Left-Handed Girl – Shih-Ching Tsou – Taipei family margins drama
• The Mastermind – Kelly Reichardt – American masculinity exploration
• Sirat – Oliver Laxe – Moroccan desert family odyssey
• Two Prosecutors – Sergei Loznitsa – Soviet Gulag legal drama
• Splitsville – Michael Angelo Covino – Divorce screwball comedy
• Enzo – Robin Campillo – French queer coming-of-age
• The Love That Remains – Hlynur Pálmason – Icelandic co-parenting dramedy
• The Blue Trail – Gabriel Mascaro – Futuristic Brazilian flying dreams

This year’s Headliners strand presents buzzy new films hot off the festival circuit. Film-buffs will see Palme d’Or winning It Was Just an Accident by Iranian master director Jafar Panahi; A24-backed dramedy Sorry, Baby by creative multihyphenate Eva Victor; and Richard Linklater’s Blue Moon, a portrait of fallen stardom centred around Broadway lyricist Lorenz Hart.

Richard Linklater’s Nouvelle Vague affectionately recreates the moment Jean-Luc Godard and the French New Wave changed cinema forever. Evoking the film and era in black-and-white reproduction of turn-of-the-60s Paris, Linklater crafts a love letter to Godard’s genius. The film stars Guillaume Marbeck as the legendary cineaste, Zoey Deutch as Seberg and newcomer Aubry Dullin as Belmondo.

Kristen Stewart’s directorial debut The Chronology of Water poetically adapts writer Lidia Yuknavitch’s visceral 2011 memoir. Eschewing unnecessary exposition, Stewart invites comparisons to Terrence Malick as she tells Lidia’s story in intense, elliptical vignettes. Imogen Poots is tender and fierce on screen, dreamlike and sardonic in voiceover.

Following a single mum and her two daughters navigating Taipei’s margins, Left-Handed Girl is the Cannes-awarded solo directorial debut of Shih-Ching Tsou. The film draws on her memories of quiet rebellions emerging from traditional family constraints, featuring non-professional and experienced actors. Co-written and edited by long-time collaborator Sean Baker, with whom Tsou co-directed 2004’s Take Out.

Film auteur Kelly Reichardt returns with The Mastermind, a characteristically patient exploration of American masculinity. Josh O’Connor leads an exceptional ensemble including Alana Haim, John Magaro and Hope Davis, reconfirming Reichardt as one of contemporary cinema’s most essential voices.

Oliver Laxe crafts a haunting desert odyssey in Sirat, as a father and son search for their missing daughter who vanished at a remote rave in southern Morocco. As they follow a trail of parties deeper into wilderness, their journey becomes a powerful meditation on grief, connection and endurance limits.

Sergei Loznitsa’s Two Prosecutors adapts a Soviet Gulag survivor’s story into a bitingly topical, darkly absurdist legal drama that won Prix François Chalais at Cannes. The Ukrainian filmmaker’s return to fiction delivers a Kafkaesque fable echoing loudly amid contemporary political corruption.

Michael Angelo Covino’s Splitsville gives divorce the screwball treatment, starring Dakota Johnson and Adria Arjona. When a couple’s amicable separation spirals wildly out of control, Covino delivers a narrative mining modern relationship anxieties for laughs and unexpected pathos.

Opening Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes, Enzo is a tender, queer coming-of-age drama about a privileged French teen rejecting comfortable life to work alongside immigrant labourers. Directed by Robin Campillo after co-writer Laurent Cantet’s passing, the film explores themes of alienation, masculinity and emotional awakening.

The Love That Remains is an intimate dramedy about a separated Icelandic couple learning to co-parent while navigating lingering attachments. Shot on 35mm and infused with personal touches from writer-director-cinematographer Hlynur Pálmason, the film blends melancholy, absurdity and warmth.

Gabriel Mascaro’s The Blue Trail won three awards at Berlin International Film Festival. This vibrant, surreal journey through futuristic Brazil follows 77-year-old Tereza defying a system treating ageing as obsolescence by pursuing her flying dream. Known for vivid colour, Mascaro brings his palette of saturated hues and surreal beauty to this imaginative ode to dignity and resistance.

World Cinema

• The President’s Cake – Hasan Hadi – 1990s Iraq child resilience
• Cactus Pears – Rohan Parashuram Kanawade – Indian caste system violence
• Resurrection – Bi Gan – Cinematic history meditation odyssey
• The Legend of Ochi – Isaiah Saxon – Fantasy girl-creature friendship
• The Ice Tower – Lucile Hadžihalilović – French adolescent transformation fable
• Dreams, Love, Sex – Dag Johan Haugerud – Norwegian intimacy trilogy
• Heads or Tails? – Alessio Rigo de Righi, Matteo Zoppis – Italian western Buffalo Bill
• Magic Farm – Amalia Ulman – Wellness culture capitalism satire
• Exit 8 – Genki Kawamura – Tokyo subway loop redemption
• Rebuilding – Max Walker-Silverman – Colorado rural resilience drama
• Peter Hujar’s Day – Ira Sachs – Photographer queer legacy tribute

Hasan Hadi’s The President’s Cake is a powerful debut from the Iraqi filmmaker. Set in 1990s Iraq, it follows nine-year-old Lamia tasked with baking the President’s birthday cake despite increasing poverty and food shortages. Winner of Cannes Directors’ Fortnight Audience Award and prestigious Caméra d’Or, the film offers a poignant child’s-eye view of life under Saddam Hussein.

Rohan Parashuram Kanawade’s Cactus Pears sees rural India’s caste divisions erupt into violence in this searing exploration of forbidden desire. When lower-caste Anand falls for upper-caste Suman, their romance triggers brutality exposing ugly truths beneath village tranquillity. Featuring powerhouse performances from Bhushaan Manoj and Suraaj Suman.

Bi Gan’s Resurrection is the third feature from the filmmaker behind Long Day’s Journey Into Night. This meditation on human and film history assembles myriad cinematic references – silent film, German expressionism, Andrei Tarkovsky, Alfred Hitchcock, Wong Kar-wai, Tsai Ming-liang – with the skill of both master storyteller and true cinephile.

Isaiah Saxon’s The Legend of Ochi brings together fantasy and coming-of-age in this visually stunning debut featuring Helena Zengel, Willem Dafoe, Emily Watson and Finn Wolfhard. When a young girl befriends a mythical creature, their bond challenges everything her isolated community believes about the world beyond their borders.

French auteur Lucile Hadžihalilović returns with The Ice Tower, another haunting exploration of adolescence and transformation. Reuniting Hadžihalilović and Marion Cotillard, this Australian premiere plunges viewers into a fractured fable as a young orphan becomes fixated by an actress starring in a Hans Christian Andersen adaptation.

Norwegian filmmaker Dag Johan Haugerud delivers his ambitious Sex trilogy with Dreams, Love, Sex. Across three interconnected films exploring modern intimacy, Haugerud weaves a tapestry of desire, connection and vulnerability confirming his status as one of Europe’s most insightful chroniclers of contemporary relationships.

Alessio Rigo de Righi and Matteo Zoppis craft a sumptuous western in Heads or Tails? that both lovingly adheres to and surrealistically subverts genre touchpoints. John C Reilly looks born to play Buffalo Bill in this spectacularly beautiful Italian western exposing lies behind myth and history, shot on 35mm, 16mm and super-16mm.

Amalia Ulman’s Magic Farm is a deliciously twisted satire of wellness culture and late capitalism following a too-hip media company on a clueless quest in Argentina. The bungling crew features Chloë Sevigny as an irate presenter, Alex Wolff as a bratty producer, newcomer Joe Apollonio as an amorous sound guy and Simon Rex as a higher-up with better things to do.

Genki Kawamura’s directorial debut Exit 8 makes its Australian premiere, offering a mind-bending journey into regret and redemption. The video game adaptation is an existential puzzle box seeing a salaryman caught in an endless Tokyo subway station, with each time loop presenting new opportunity to confront decisions leading to his predicament.

Max Walker-Silverman’s Rebuilding gives Americana a lyrical makeover in this tender portrait of rural resilience following a small Colorado town’s efforts to resurrect their community after economic collapse. Josh O’Connor plays a rancher rising from wildfire ashes, seeking lodging in a FEMA campsite near where his nine-year-old daughter (Australian actor Lily LaTorre) lives with his ex-wife (Meghann Fahy).

Ben Wishaw stars in Peter Hujar’s Day, an emotional tribute to the legendary photographer under direction of regular creative collaborator Ira Sachs. Merging intimacy and art history, Sachs crafts a sensual exploration of queer legacy and images that outlive us, blending archival footage with contemporary meditation.

Non-Fiction Cinema

• Mistress Dispeller – Elizabeth Lo – China’s love industry professionals
• Fiume o morte! – Igor Bezinović – Croatian punk revolution chronicle
• Cutting Through Rocks – Mohammadreza Eyni – Iranian art under oppression
• Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958-1989 – Göran Hugo Olsson – Media bias coverage analysis
• Twiggy – Sadie Frost – Fashion icon cultural transformation
• Zodiac Killer Project – Charlie Shackleton – Serial killer obsession deconstruction
• Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk – Sepideh Farsi – Palestinian photojournalist Gaza documentation
• The Perfect Neighbor – Geeta Gandbhir – Smart home surveillance nightmare
• Videoheaven – Alex Ross Perry – Video store cultural impact
• Chain Reactions – Alexandre O Philippe – Texas Chainsaw Massacre analysis
• The Librarians – Kim A Snyder – US book censorship fight
• 1000 Women in Horror – Donna Davies – Female horror industry contributions

Elizabeth Lo’s Mistress Dispeller offers an extraordinary peek behind the curtain of China’s booming love industry. With unprecedented access to all parties involved, this intimate portrait reveals the surprising profession of mistress dispellers – professionals hired by faithful parties to go undercover and break up their cheating partner’s affairs.

Igor Bezinović’s Fiume o morte! is an explosive chronicle of a forgotten revolution seeing Croatian punk spirit meet political fury. This archival treasure trove shows how Italian fascists seizing Fiume in 1919 inadvertently sparked an anarchist uprising prefiguring punk by half a century.

Mohammadreza Eyni’s Cutting Through Rocks continues Iranian cinema’s tradition of finding light in darkness through this poetic exploration of art under oppression. Following sculptors who literally carve beauty from stone, this metaphor-rich documentary celebrates creativity’s power to transcend harsh conditions.

Göran Hugo Olsson meticulously excavates how television shaped perceptions of conflict in Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958-1989. This forensic treatment dissects three decades of coverage revealing how framing and editing transform identical events into radically different narratives.

Sadie Frost’s Twiggy explores the life and times of the fashion icon who launched the Swinging Sixties. Going beyond the pixie cut and doe eyes, the film reveals Lesley Lawson as a savvy businesswoman who transformed modelling from mannequin work into true performance art.

Charlie Shackleton’s Zodiac Killer Project gives true crime a meta treatment in this ingenious deconstruction of our obsession with unsolved mysteries. This Victorian premiere turns the camera on the cottage industry of Zodiac theorists, asking what our fascination with serial killers says about us.

Sepideh Farsi’s Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk is an inspiring portrait of Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassona, who documented life in Gaza through defiant images. Pieced together from video calls between Hassona and the Iranian filmmaker, the documentary captures everyday plight and suffering. Tragically, the day after the film’s Cannes premiere announcement, Hassona and her family were killed by an alleged targeted Israeli missile strike.

Geeta Gandbhir’s The Perfect Neighbor reveals how devices designed for convenience become tools of control in this chilling exploration of smart home technology gone wrong, turning connection promises into exposure nightmares.

Alex Ross Perry’s decade-in-the-making essay movie Videoheaven, narrated by Maya Hawke, surveys video stores’ cultural impact via their film and TV representation. Perry undertakes a deep dive into video stores, having worked behind the counter of legendary New York establishment Kim’s Video.

Alexandre O Philippe returns with Chain Reactions, winner of Venice’s Best Documentary on Cinema prize, revving up and ripping into The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Released for the film’s 50th anniversary, Philippe’s documentary features commentary from comedian Patton Oswalt, director Karyn Kusama, J-horror maestro Takashi Miike, novelist Stephen King and Melbourne film critic Alexandra Heller-Nicholas.

Kim A Snyder’s The Librarians is a rousing documentary on the US war on books, following passionate bibliophiles fighting censorship. As democracy faces threats, librarians – ordinary people serving communities through legislative activism – stand as the only barrier.

Donna Davies’ 1000 Women in Horror reveals how nightmares haunting screens for over a century have been sculpted and embodied by women, with many artists unrecognised. From silent era until today, Davies’ world premiering documentary obliterates historical oversight, featuring interviews with powerhouse women in horror and assembling clips from classic and little-known films.

Local Cinema

• The Golden Spurtle – Constantine Costi – World porridge making championship
• Signorinella: Little Miss – Shannon Swan – Italian migrant women’s contributions
• Never Get Busted! – David Anthony Ngo – Ex-cop cannabis advocate transformation
• Yurlu | Country – Yaara Bou Melhem – Aboriginal homeland asbestos reclamation
• Lesbian Space Princess – Emma Hough Hobbs, Leela Varghese – Alien princess Melbourne comedy
• Birthright – Zoe Pepper – Perth Hills generational wealth insights
• Went Up The Hill – Samuel Van Grinsven – Haunting grief-stricken New Zealand film
• We Bury the Dead – Zak Hilditch – Found footage burial horror
• Alphabet Lane – James Litchfield – Isolated couple imaginary correspondence
• Westgate – Adrian Ortega – Melbourne west multicultural communities
• Surviving Malka Leifer – Adam Kamien – Three sisters legal justice
• Beast of War – Kiah Roache-Turner – WWII shark monster horror
• Zombucha! – Claudia Dzienny – A Kombucha themed zom-com

Constantine Costi’s The Golden Spurtle stirs up Scotland’s competitive spirit with this delightful dive into the world championship of porridge making. Kitchen amateurs and aficionados from across the globe gather to vie for World Porridge Making Champion, armed with only water, salt and oats. Contenders include a Sydney taco chef, a wellness CEO, a young hopeful with grandma’s recipe and two ex-champs.

Shannon Swan’s world premiering Signorinella: Little Miss follows unsung contributions of Italian migrant women taking centre stage. Twelve years after delighting audiences with Lygon Street – Si Parla Italiano, Swan returns with this charming film focusing on tenacity and spirit of Italian-Australian women through wonderful cast of pioneering politicians, designers, chefs and farmers.

David Anthony Ngo’s Never Get Busted! sees YouTube culture hit the big screen in this wild ride through an ex-cop turned cannabis advocate’s career. This Australian premiere follows Barry Cooper’s transformation from drug warrior to YouTube sensation teaching viewers how to outsmart police he once served alongside.

Yaara Bou Melhem’s Yurlu | Country is a vivid ode to Country and intimate portrait of Banjima Elder Maitland Parker’s fight to reclaim his asbestos-tainted homeland. Directed by two-time UN Media Peace Award and five-time Walkley Award winner, this powerful documentary bears witness to Australia’s largely unknown Chernobyl-style disaster.

Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese’s Lesbian Space Princess sees queer comedy reach cosmic heights in this intergalactic romp. When an alien princess crash-lands in suburban Melbourne, she discovers Earth’s lesbians are more confusing than her home planet’s three-gendered mating rituals. Featuring all-star cast voiced by Shabana Azeez, Gemma Chua-Tran, Richard Roxburgh and Aunty Donna.

Zoe Pepper’s Birthright is a razor-sharp debut exposing dark secrets in Perth Hills through pitch-black comedy. Delving into generational wealth and millennial desperation, the story unfolds as Cory, suddenly unemployed and evicted, moves back with retiree parents and pregnant wife. What starts as temporary stay escalates into psychological warfare with Travis Jeffery and Maria Angelico clashing against Michael Hurst and Linda Cropper.

Samuel Van Grinsven’s Went Up The Hill sees grief take otherworldly forms in this haunting sophomore feature starring Dacre Montgomery and Vicky Krieps. Delivering mesmerising performances as strangers drawn together by loss in Aotearoa wilderness, the line between healing and haunting blurs with each passing night.

Zak Hilditch’s We Bury the Dead brings found footage horror to local settings starring Daisy Ridley and Mark Coles Smith. When a film crew documents a remote community’s bizarre burial rituals, they uncover secrets that should have stayed underground, confirming Hilditch as one of Australia’s masters of atmospheric terror.

James Litchfield’s Alphabet Lane sees an isolated couple reinvigorate their relationship with parallel imaginary correspondences in this first-time directorial feature starring Tilda Cobham-Hervey and Nicholas Denton. Shot on a family cattle farm in New South Wales’ Monaro region, Litchfield draws on strong landscape affinity for this exploration of private universes lovers create.

Adrian Ortega’s Westgate turns his gaze to unsung multicultural communities shaping Melbourne for generations. Over a single day, an Italian-Australian single mother in Melbourne’s working-class west must draw on all resources as she confronts her past ghosts.

Adam Kamien’s Surviving Malka Leifer documents the struggle undertaken by three sisters and supporters to bring Leifer back to Australia and carve out a path for fellow survivors. Filmed over five years featuring firsthand testimony from Dassi Erlich, Nicole Meyer and Elly Sapper alongside interviews with politicians and journalists, this world premiering film is a compelling courage portrait.

Kiah Roache-Turner’s Beast of War is a world premiering gripping blend of wartime drama and monster horror. After their ship sinks during WWII, young Australian soldiers – including Indigenous soldier Leo (Mark Coles Smith) and 17-year-old Will (Joel Nankervis) – must survive adrift at sea while hunted by a monstrous great white shark.

Claudia Dzienny’s Zombucha! brings fermentation meets undead in this hilarious horror-comedy starring Jackie Van Beek. The zom-com putting culture in kombucha culture begins at a trendy café where signature brew turns customers into walking dead. Minimum-wage baristas become humanity’s last hope in this caffeinated survival tale.

MIFF Premiere Fund

• Iron Winter – Kasimir Burgess – Mongolian steppes horse herders
• But Also John Clarke – Lorin Clarke – Comedian father intimate portrait
• Pasa Faho – Kalu Oji – Melbourne migrant community story
• One More Shot – Nicholas Clifford – Y2K tequila-fueled comedy
• Spreadsheet Champions – Kristina Kraskov – Competitive Excel documentary
• Careless – Sue Thomson – Aged care crisis exploration
• First Light – James J Robinson – Faith-corruption crime drama

This year’s MIFF Premiere Fund presents seven new Australian features showcasing diverse storytelling across the continent.

Kasimir Burgess’ Iron Winter follows two young horse herders through East Asia’s breathtaking and forbidding Mongolian steppes, exploring themes of survival and connection in harsh landscapes.

Lorin Clarke’s But Also John Clarke offers an intimate portrait of her father, the late-great funny man John Clarke, providing personal insights into the beloved comedian’s life and legacy.

Kalu Oji’s Pasa Faho presents a quintessential suburban Melbourne tale of life in a migrant community, starring Tyson Palmer and Okey Bakassi in this exploration of contemporary multicultural Australia.

Nicholas Clifford’s One More Shot delivers a Y2K tequila-fueled comedy featuring Emily Browning, Sean Keenan, Ashley Zukerman and Aisha Dee in this nostalgic trip to millennium celebrations.

Kristina Kraskov’s Spreadsheet Champions charts six young people in the world of competitive Excel through this observational documentary revealing unexpected drama in corporate software competitions.

Sue Thomson’s Careless explores Australia’s aged care crisis through humorous and playful examination of systemic issues affecting vulnerable populations.

James J Robinson’s First Light marks a feature debut with this slow-burn crime drama exploring faith and corruption, which also screens as part of Bright Horizons Competition.

Music on Film

• Pavements – Alex Ross Perry – 90s indie rockers meta
• Jimmy Barnes: Working Class Man – Andrew Farrell – Cold Chisel frontman’s journey
• Move Ya Body: The Birth of House – Elegance Bratton – Chicago underground dance revolution
• It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley – Amy Berg – Singer’s ethereal voice legacy
• Monk in Pieces – Billy Shebar, David Roberts – Meredith Monk documentary
• The Extraordinary Miss Flower – Iain Forsyth, Jane Pollard – Australian woman’s love letters
• Butthole Surfers: The Hole Truth and Nothing Butt – Butthole Surfers documentary

Alex Ross Perry’s Pavements combines scripted set-ups, archival documentary footage and musical mise-en-scene composed of songs from the prolific 90s American indie rockers’ discography. Part concert film, musical and meta fake biopic starring Joe Keery as band’s lead creative Stephen Malkmus, it deliriously explores Pavement’s legacy and slacker iconography.

Andrew Farrell’s Jimmy Barnes: Working Class Man offers a comprehensive portrait of the Cold Chisel frontman. Picking up where 2018’s Working Class Boy left off, this world premiering documentary follows the iconic musician from Glasgow tenements to Australian stadiums, tracing his journey from troubled youth to national treasure.

Elegance Bratton’s Move Ya Body: The Birth of House celebrates Chicago’s underground dance revolution. From disco’s death ashes, Black and queer pioneers created a sound conquering the world, with Bratton’s documentary capturing both music’s infectious energy and radical politics of inclusion on the dancefloor.

Amy Berg’s It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley explores the singer whose ethereal voice and tragic death at 30 left an indelible mark on music history. This documentary dives deep into Buckley’s artistic process and complicated relationship with his father, featuring rare footage and intimate interviews illuminating a talent gone too soon.

Billy Shebar and David Roberts’ Monk in Pieces gives avant-garde icon Meredith Monk the prismatic documentary portrait she deserves. Blending performance footage spanning five decades with intimate glimpses of Monk’s creative process, this Victorian premiere captures an artist who defied categorisation and expanded boundaries of voice, movement and music.

Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard’s The Extraordinary Miss Flower follows the remarkable story of Australia’s Geraldine Flower and discovery of a suitcase full of passionate, heartfelt love letters sent to her in the 60s and 70s. Decades later, the letters inspired acclaimed Icelandic singer-songwriter Emilíana Torrini to create an entire album of original songs.

Tom J Stern’s Butthole Surfers: The Hole Truth and Nothing Butt captures the beautiful insanity of Texas’s most demented noise merchants. With flaming cymbals, pornographic projections and music sounding like civilisation gleefully collapsing, the Butthole Surfers’ live shows were unhinged legend.

Sound and Screen

• Julia Holter: The Passion of Joan of Arc – Carl Theodor Dreyer/Julia Holter – Silent masterpiece’s new score
• Parasite Live in Concert – Bong Joon-ho/Jung Jae il – Oscar-winner with a live orchestra

Julia Holter: The Passion of Joan of Arc combines Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 silent masterpiece with a spellbinding new score, transforming cinema into transcendent experience. The acclaimed LA composer brings her ensemble to craft an immense sonic tapestry matching the spiritual intensity of Renée Jeanne Falconetti’s legendary performance, accompanied by Holter’s band and The Consort of Melbourne.

Parasite Live in Concert with composer Jung Jae il sees the composer conduct Orchestra Victoria through his warped baroque score while Bong Joon-ho’s Academy Award-winner plays on the big screen. Fresh from scoring Squid Game and Mickey 17, Jung makes his Australian debut with this exclusive Melbourne performance revealing new layers in the film that conquered the world.

MIFF Shorts

• Three by Wim Wenders – Wim Wenders – German filmmaker’s pivotal shorts
• I’m Glad You’re Dead Now – Tawfeek Barhom – Brothers’ resurfaced secrets – Short Film Palme d’Or Winner
• I’m The Most Racist Person I Know – Leela Varghese – Date’s prejudice unravelling

The work of German filmmaker and photographer Wim Wenders returns with Three by Wim Wenders, featuring the auteur’s most pivotal shorts. The retrospective includes Wenders’ second-ever short Same Player Shoots Again; Reverse Angle, reflecting his time working in America with Francis Ford Coppola on Hammett; and restoration of Room 666, the 1982 Cannes film where 15 famous directors gave opinions on cinema’s future.

Tawfeek Barhom’s I’m Glad You’re Dead Now marks the directorial debut of the actor who also stars in this recent Cannes Short Film Palme d’Or Winner. The short follows two brothers grappling with resurfaced secrets that unknowingly bind them together.

Leela Varghese’s I’m The Most Racist Person I Know won the Special Jury Award in SXSW’s Narrative Shorts Competition. When Lali (Shabana Azeez) unexpectedly ends up on a date with another woman of colour for the first time, it unravels prejudices she has long ignored.

MIFF XR

• The World Came Flooding In – Van Sowerwine, Isobel Knowles – Climate disaster flood experience
• 8 Billion Selves – Tibor de Jong – Human connection VR exploration
• Limbophobia – Wen-Yee Hsieh – Psychological horror VR experience
• Dani: the Portrait of a Beauty – Cooper Yoo – Korean dynasty VR journey

Melbourne International Film Festival partners with Now or Never for the world premiere of The World Came Flooding In, co-directed by Van Sowerwine and Isobel Knowles. Through virtual reality, projections, miniatures and sound, this installation brings together experiences of three flood-affected individuals united by climate disaster.

Tibor de Jong’s 8 Billion Selves uses cutting-edge VR to explore what connects us across continents and cultures in this ambitious Australian premiere. Each user’s journey through this immersive experience is unique, creating a meditation on individuality within collective human experience.

Taiwanese artist Wen-Yee Hsieh’s Limbophobia plunges viewers into psychological horror through this immersive VR experience asking us to contemplate life’s fragility, consequences of losing it and catastrophic impact of a world without empathy.

Cooper Yoo’s Dani: the Portrait of a Beauty reimagines paintings by Shin Yunbok for the digital age in this Australian premiere. Using volumetric capture, Yoo creates a VR experience taking users on a journey into the Joseon Dynasty of the 1700s, exploring Pansori storytelling, traditional Korean dance and more.

Classic Cinema

• Looking for Alibrandi (4K Restoration) – Kate Woods – Australian coming-of-age story
• Sweetie (4K Restoration) – Jane Campion – Sister’s psychological warfare
• Salt, Saliva, Sperm and Sweat – Philip Brophy – Visceral bodily taboos assault
• No Dance – Philip Brophy – Movement music deconstruction
• Chantal Akerman: Traces – Various – Belgian filmmaker retrospective
• Critical Condition – Various – Cinema nostalgia exploration

Looking for Alibrandi receives a lively 4K restoration for the first time as Kate Woods’ beloved adaptation makes its world premiere return to screens. Melina Marchetta’s novel adaptation arrives 25 years after first capturing hearts, with Pia Miranda, Kick Gurry and Anthony LaPaglia looking better than ever in this crystalline restoration.

Jane Campion’s audacious debut Sweetie receives a 4K restoration highlighting every frame of Sally Bongers’ candy-coloured cinematography. Karen Colston and Geneviève Lemon deliver fearless performances as sisters locked in psychological warfare, with Campion’s singular vision looking more radical than ever 35 years later.

Philip Brophy returns with restorations of two essential works. Salt, Saliva, Sperm and Sweat remains a visceral assault on bodily taboos, while No Dance deconstructs movement and music with typical Brophy perversity, arriving as testament to an artist who refused to play nice with Australian cinema’s polite conventions.

Chantal Akerman: Traces presents the festival’s largest-ever retrospective of a single director, showcasing 27 films across 13 sessions. 2025 marks three milestones for the iconic Belgian filmmaker: what would have been Akerman’s 75th birthday, the 10th anniversary of her passing, and 50th anniversary of landmark film Jeanne Dielman.

Critical Condition screening series returns to reckon with cinema as nostalgia. Internationally attending guest critics Amy Nicholson, Angelica Jade Bastién and Lovia Gyarkye host films exploring the present through the past’s lens, including Herbert Ross’ Pennies from Heaven, Haile Gerima’s Sankofa and Juraj Herz’s Beauty and the Beast.

MIFF Talks and Industry

The MIFF Talks program expands with a dynamic lineup designed to spark dialogue and deepen engagement with screen culture. Theory to Practice, presented by the University of Melbourne, is a brand-new industry series exploring academic insight and creative application intersection. The ever-popular Consuming Culture panel event returns with support from The Wheeler Centre, bringing together thought leaders to dish on the cultural landscape.

MIFF and the AFL present Footy Shorts Gala on Tuesday 12 August – a celebration of five compelling new short documentaries exploring Australian rules football through a fresh lens. The initiative showcases powerful storytelling from emerging voices, celebrating footy’s culture, diversity and community impact. Selected titles include Breaking the Line: The Peta Searle Story, Bush Boots, Eye of the Game: The Deaf Ruckman, House Divided and No Prior Opportunity.

Regional and Online

The MIFF Regional showcase tours across festival weekends of 15-17 and 22-24 August with venues in Bendigo, Ballarat, Castlemaine, Morwell, Geelong, Rosebud, Sale and Shepparton ready to screen much-loved titles, supported by VicScreen and Screen Australia.

MIFF Online returns from 15-31 August – one week after the festival wraps – featuring a limited suite of festival films and free short films available on demand via ACMI’s dedicated online streaming platform Cinema 3.

Awards

Across MIFF Awards presented by Penfolds and accompanying MIFF Shorts Awards, the festival continues celebrating cinematic excellence and talent with an awards suite of over $300,000 – one of the world’s most significant filmmaking prize pools. The festival’s top accolade – prestigious Bright Horizons Award – recognises first and second-time filmmakers with $140,000 making it the richest feature film prize in the Southern Hemisphere.

Food and Festival Culture

MIFF-revellers can discover lively festival hotspots and post-screening hidden gems. The Festival Hub and bar at ACMI hosts residencies by Skylab Radio and beverages by Campari, Penfolds, Asahi, Padre Coffee and more. Across the road, Wax Music Lounge joins MIFF to expand the festival footprint – a new late night haunt where film musings continue into early hours.

MIFF’s delectable Food and Film pairings return, matching seven of Melbourne’s hottest eateries with a curated selection of tantalising films. This year’s participating venues include Bossley Bar & Restaurant, Barra, Cumulus, Supernormal, Elio’s Place, Antara and MIFF’s own Festival Hub at ACMI.

For more information, head here.