Selections from Festivals (2025): Sundance & Venice

Sundance & Venice

Once again this year, Sundance carried that unique contradiction of pairing the silence of snow with the loud emotions of cinema. Nestled among mountains and seemingly cut off from the world’s noise, this small town becomes, every January, a stage for humanity’s most fragile, honest, and raw stories. The pulse of independent cinema beats here; films in which the personal turns political, and small moments transform into vast meanings, appear before audiences one after another. This year, works focusing on family, memory, and resistance stood out in particular—some burned quietly, others erupted like a powerful scream. Sundance’s untouched snowy landscapes seem to render every film more inward, more intimate, more human. In this section, we aim to evoke this atmosphere by briefly touching on a few of the festival’s standout films.

Venice, as always, was immersed in a sense of grandeur carried by gentle winds and rippling waters; a magical island where time seems to slow and light fractures on the surface of the lagoon, turning into cinema. Once again, the world’s most ambitious films gathered here. Under Lido’s golden glow, boundary-pushing auteurs stood side by side with new voices, creating a world where aesthetics and politics, beauty and fragility, lightness and weight intertwined. This year’s Venice selection stood out especially for its formal boldness and its willingness to stretch narrative boundaries. Alongside grand stories, small and personal tales shone with equal seriousness; each film seemed to leave its own shade of color suspended in the time hovering over the lagoon. In this article, we open brief windows onto a few of the festival’s most notable films.

SUNDANCE

Mad Bills to Pay

Joel Alfonso Vargas’s debut feature navigates complex themes such as class struggle, coming of age, and family relationships. With its semi-improvised dialogue and naturalistic performances, the film carries forward the tradition of Neorealism while still managing to awaken something new in its audience.

The story follows Rico, a Dominican-American teenager who spends his summer days selling mixed drinks on the beach. Rico shares a Bronx apartment with his mother and younger sister, Sally. Vargas plays with notions of intimacy and loneliness, both in his cinematography and in the relationships between characters. Over the course of the film, a loving yet complicated family portrait emerges, shaped around Rico’s transition into adulthood. Complex characters, narrative turns, and richly textured settings create a dense, immersive world that immediately pulls the viewer in. As Vargas tells the story of a contemporary New York, he invites the audience into Rico’s small universe—and when the film ends, leaving it feels genuinely sad.

Awards & Festivals

• Sundance Film Festival (2025) – Award: NEXT Special Jury Award for Ensemble Performance

• Berlin Film Festival (2025) – Nominee: Best First Feature

• London Film Festival (2025) – Nominee: Best First Feature

• Toronto Diaspora Film Festival (2025) – Official Selection

All That’s Left of You

Directed by Cherien Dabis, All That’s Left of You is a sweeping family epic that traces the collective memory of the Palestinian people and the traumas passed down through generations. Spanning from the Nakba of 1948 to the present day, the film recounts a family’s losses, resilience, and struggle for continued existence. The story begins with a young Palestinian man confronting Israeli soldiers during a protest in the West Bank, then expands as his mother recounts her past, forced displacement, and the bonds that hold the family together.

Premiering at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival, the film went on to win Best International Feature at the Sydney Film Festival and was screened out of competition at Cannes. Critics described it as “an emotionally shattering epic experience” and “a masterpiece that gives voice to generations of Palestinians.” The cast’s powerful performances reveal both the fragility and the resilience of humanity throughout the film.

Due to the ongoing war conditions in Palestine, Dabis completed the film across Cyprus, Greece, and Jordan. The story conveys loss, resistance, and the search for identity through a universal language. The emotions, traumas, and hopes of characters living in the shadow of the past are rendered so vividly that each scene feels like a lesson, each moment a form of resistance.

All That’s Left of You is not merely a family story; it is also a portrait of Palestinian individuals’ struggle to hold on to their land, culture, and identity. Presenting memory, resistance, and human continuity as a whole, the film invites viewers not only to witness but to empathize, to feel, and to draw closer to Palestine’s enduring resistance.

Awards & Festivals

• Sydney Film Festival (2025) – Award: GIO Best International Feature (Audience Award)

• San Francisco International Film Festival (2025) – Award: Golden Gate Award

• San Francisco International Film Festival (2025) – Award: Best Narrative Feature – Audience Award

• Red Sea Film Festival (2025) – Award: Silver Yusr

• Sundance Film Festival (2025) – Official Selection

• Shanghai International Film Festival (2025) – Nominee: Audience Choice Award

VENICE

Komedie Elahi

“Are you not even ashamed in front of Godard? What about Kiarostami?”
Asgari’s latest film, Komedie Elahi (Divine Comedy), is a journey that questions the invisible boundaries of Iranian cinema, skillfully juxtaposing absurdity and tragedy. Through the story of a director struggling to complete his final film while entangled in censorship, the film explores the search for freedom, creativity, and justice. As characters navigate bureaucratic traps and unseen authorities, humor emerges—sometimes as a subtle needle, sometimes as a sharp truth—provoking thought as much as laughter, and presenting tragedy through a gently ironic lens.

Premiering in the Orizzonti section of the 2025 Venice Film Festival, the film examines the paradoxes of contemporary Iranian society, individual resistance, and the boundless nature of creativity with an absurd lyricism. It invites the audience into both cinema history and today’s complex realities; each scene simultaneously amuses and reminds us of the value of human will, art, and freedom.

With its finely woven references and its blend of humor and tragedy, the film draws a portrait of resistance, creativity, and human agency beyond borders. Viewers are invited not only to watch but to discover their own imagination and empathy—to participate in the complexity of a world, rather than merely observe it.

Awards & Festivals

• Venice Film Festival (2025) – Official Selection, Orizzonti Section

A Sad and Beautiful World

Cyril Aris’s first narrative feature, A Sad and Beautiful World, is a thirty-year love story unfolding in the shadow of Beirut, where hope and sorrow coexist. Nino is idealistic and full of life; Yasmina is pessimistic yet deeply resilient. From childhood to marriage, as they confront their country’s ongoing crises, the couple clings to one another, constantly redrawing the line between love and survival. Yasmina’s dilemmas—whether to have children or leave the country—collide with Nino’s persistent dreams of the future.

Beyond its depiction of historical shifts and political and social crises, the film reveals the fragility and endurance of the bond between two people. The camera’s gently melancholic gaze, visual richness, and the turbulence of the characters’ inner worlds hold the viewer captive. Street sounds, archival footage, and a rhythm shaped by music create a sharp contrast between hopeful and sorrowful moments.

Premiering in the Giornate degli Autori section of the 2025 Venice Film Festival, the film was met with great applause from audiences. A Sad and Beautiful World offers an intimate cinematic experience, showing that love is not only a test between two bodies, but also of a country, identities, and shared hopes.

Awards & Festivals

• Venice Film Festival (2025) – Official Selection, Giornate degli Autori

• Venice Film Festival (2025) – Award: Audience Award

• Red Sea Film Festival (2025) – Award: Best Screenplay (Yusr Award)