Cine Fan Summer International Film Festival 2025

EVENT DESCRIPTION

Cine Fan Summer International Film Festival (Summer IFF) will take place from 13 to 25 August, showcasing over 40 films.

The opening and closing films will be Jafar Panahi’s Cannes Palme d’Or-winner, It Was Just an Accident, and Ikeda Chihiro’s Kowloon Generic Romance. Highlighted in the programme are the latest works from three former Palme d’Or winners: Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne’s Best Screenplay-winning Young Mothers, and Julia Ducournau’s body horror thriller Alpha. France’s Cannes representatives at Summer IFF also include Stéphane Demoustier’s architectural saga, The Great Arch, and Stéphane Ghez’s captivating documentary, Welcome to Lynchland. Equally attractive are two inspiring dramas by female filmmakers from the United States: Kelly Reichardt’s The Mastermind and Eva Victor’s directorial debut, Sorry, Baby. South Korean auteur and festival regular Hong Sang-Soo’s lyrical What Does That Nature Say to You, Ira Sachs’s Peter Hujar’s Day, and acclaimed Ukrainian documentarian Vitaly Mansky’s gripping Time to the Target are all hot picks from this year’s Berlin International Film Festival. A new addition to Summer IFF is a short film selection from NOWNESS, a global creative culture platform, featuring A Very Straight Neck, directed by Neo Sora and starring Ando Sakura.

The Fantastic Beats section features a diverse range of genres and styles, offering young audiences a broad selection of choices and topical options. Highlights include the spine-chilling horror New Group, the moving coming-of-age drama Enzo, the sci-fi adventure Arco, and the exquisite animation A Magnificent Life. For an intimate look at family relationships or a quiet reflection on urban and human landscapes, Family Matters and Brand New Landscape are excellent choices.

This year’s special programme, Beyond the Closed Curtain – The Cinema of Jafar Panahi, pays tribute to the Iranian filmmaker who boldly challenges the theocratic regime. The retrospective features all ten of his seminal feature films, including his directorial debut The White Balloon and 3 Faces, both of which won awards at Cannes; The Circle and No Bears, which received the Golden Lion and the Special Jury Prize at Venice, respectively; and Taxi and Offside, which won the Golden Bear for Best Film and the Silver Bear Jury Grand Prix at Berlinale.

The complete programme is now available on the HKIFFS official website at http://cinefan.com.hk.