The Göteborg Film Festival, Sweden’s leading film fest, has unveiled its 2025 line-up, which features several award season contenders, including Brady Corbet’s Golden Globe winner The Brutalist, Magnus von Horn’s The Girl with the Needle, and Luca Guadagnino’s Queer.
The Brutalist picked up 3 Golden Globes this past Sunday, including for best picture, drama, best director for Corbet and best actor, drama for star Brody. In the historical epic, Brody plays László Tóth, a Jewish architect who arrives in America from Budapest after surviving World War 2. The film co-stars Felicity Jones as László’s wife and Guy Pearce as billionaire Harrison Lee Van Buren Sr.
Daniel Craig scored a best actor, drama nomination at the Globes for his starring role in Queer as William Lee, based on William S. Burroughs’ alter ego, following his journey through Mexico and South America with Drew Starkey as Gene. The Girl with the Needle, a major Oscar contender in the best international feature category, tells the story of 1920s Danish abortionist Dagmar Overbye, played by Trine Dyrholm, and the poor, and pregnant factory worker Karoline, portrayed by Vic Carmen Sonne. in 1920s Copenhagen.
The festival opens January 24 with Eirik Svensson’s Safe House, centered on Norwegian aid worker Linn (Kristine Kujath Thorp) and her efforts to protect a Muslim refugee during the Central African Republic’s civil war. Mads Hedegaard’s Stranger, starring Angela Bundalovic and Danica Curcic, closes the festival on Feburary 2 with its world premiere.
Among the highlights of Göteborg’s Nordic Competition are Maria Eriksson-Hecht’s debut Kevlar Soul, following two brothers living with their alcoholic father, and Fanny Ovesen’s Live a Little, about a woman’s experiences during a European trip. Ragnhild Ekner’s documentary Ultras examines global football supporter culture from Sweden’s Ullevi Stadium.
Oscar-winning Danish director Thomas Vinterberg will receive the festival’s Nordic Honorary Award for his life’s work. The director of The Celebration, The Hunt, and Another Round, will take part in a director’s talk following the award ceremony on Jan. 28.
The festival will screen Tomas Alfredson’s Swedish TV series Faithless, an Ingmar Bergman-penned infidelity drama which frequent Bergman collaborator Liv Ullmann (Cries and Whispers) adapted as a feature film in 2000. The series stars Frida Gustavsson, Gustav Lindh, and August Wittgenstein.
Additional international premieres include Sofia Bohdanowicz’s Measures for a Funeral, about violinist Kathleen Parlow, and Charles Williams’ prison drama Inside starring Guy Pearce. Joshua Oppenheimer’s musical The End, featuring Tilda Swinton and Michael Shannon, receives its Swedish premiere, with Oppenheimer scheduled for a Directors Talk on January 26 at Stora Teatern.
The festival also presents Aster Urbeita’s Pheasant Island, competing in the International Competition, which follows a Basque couple’s encounter with refugees, starring Jone Laspiur and Itziar Ituño from Money Heist.
