What is Obsession, If Not Grief Persevering? – ‘Twinless’ (2025) by James Sweeney
SUNDANCE 2025: The Alaska-born writer-director’s sophomore feature is just as playful as it is devastating, also featuring a very versatile Dylan O’Brien.
Emancipatory Road-Tripping – ‘Where the Wind Comes From’ (2025, ‘Tunis–Djerba’) by Amel Guellaty
SUNDANCE/ROTTERDAM 2025: Two young Tunisians set off on a cross-country journey with the end goal of escaping their systemic social conditions in this genuinely sincere, vibrant, and hopeful debut from Tunisian writer-director Amel Guellaty.
You Are Being Watched – ‘Plainclothes’ (2025) by Carmen Emmi
SUNDANCE 2025: In this stylistically creative debut feature, a young police officer in ‘90s upstate New York tasked with entrapping gay men must decide between staying true to himself and his rising career.
There is Hope, I Think – ‘Trans Memoria’ (2024) by Victoria Verseau
TROMSØ 2025: The Swedish filmmaker offers a raw and personal collage of her medical transition by returning to the treatment centre where her gender-affirming surgery took place in 2012, accompanied by others preparing to do the same.
Charm in the Wake of Colonialism – ‘We Were Dangerous’ (2023) by Josephine Stewart-Te Whiu
TROMSØ 2025: In 1950s New Zealand, three teen girls boldly take on the dark and violent surviving institutions of British colonialism —and the result is surprisingly cutesy, if not a little too much so.
Brusque Brushstrokes – ‘My Old Ass’ (2024) by Megan Park
A flipped heteronormative script is not enough to make up for the emotional nuance lacking in this story of a young lesbian-identifying teen who unexpectedly falls for a young man.
Pomp in the Strangest of Circumstances – ‘Emilia Pérez’ (2024) by Jacques Audiard
Transgressive acts collide in this not-so-subversive crime musical with a handful of compelling moments that buckle under the pressure of critical interrogation.
Deep Cuts in the Catskills – ‘Good One’ (2024) by India Donaldson
Lush forests reveal unfortunate life truths to a teen girl on a backpacking trip with her father and his friend.