Montreal's Festival du Nouveau Cinéma to screen some of this year's best films from Oct. 9 to 20

Next month, the 53rd edition of the Festival du Nouveau Cinéma will offer a perfect autumn treat for Montreal cinephiles. Opening on Oct. 9 with Universal Language, Matthew Rankin’s latest and Canada’s selection for the Best International Feature Film category at the 2025 Oscars, and will close on Oct. 20 with Alain Guirandie’s critically acclaimed Miséricorde, one of the critically acclaimed films out of this year’s festival circuit. Over the festival’s 12 days, audiences will be treated to some of the best films of the year so far, as well as a number of high profile activities and events.

Among the names playing as part of the National competition, we have new films from Sofia Bohdanowicz (Measures for a Funeral), Kazik Radwanski (Matt and Mara) and Heather Young (There, There), among others. The International competition is rounded out with new films from filmmakers like Nelson Carlo de los Santos Arias (Pepe), Rungano Nyoni (On Becoming a Guinea Fowl) and Concordia alumnus Meryam Joubeur (Who Do I Belong To).

As always, in the Incontournables section, a selection of some of the biggest on the festival circuit finally premiere in Montreal. Films that premiered at Cannes dominate: All We Imagine as Light, The Apprentice, Bird, Caught by the Tides, Emilia Pérez, The Girl With the Needle, Grand Tour, Oh, Canada, Rumours, The Seed of the Sacred Fig and Palme D’Or Winner Anora are all playing. Among other films in the section are auteur-driven projects like Tardes de Soledad, The Invasion and Dragon Dilatation.

The festival’s experimental section, Les nouveaux alchemistes, features new films from Ben Rivers (Bogancloch), Cristóbal León & Joaquín Cociña (The Hyperboreans) and Travis Wilkerson (Through the Graves the Wind Is Blowing). Temps 0, the festival’s rebellious genre section, features movies by Guillaume Nicloux (Dans la peau de Blanche Houellebecq), Quentin Dupieux (Le deuxième Acte) and Marie Losier (Peaches Goes Bananas). Panorama, a highlight of intimate future auteurs of world cinema, features a selection of films including Bluish, Flow, Realm of Satan and To a Land Unknown. The history of cinema program features two films by Leos Carax (C’est Pas Moi and Holy Moters), Bona, Les Ordres and Paris, Texas, among others.

The festival also features a dazzling short film program, which is always beautifully curated; there are sections devoted to children’s programming, national, international and experimental filmmaking. Few festivals offer a more exciting and adventurous short film selection.

Among this year’s events, audiences will be able to attend a discussion on Satanism in Quebec, Wapikoni’s Carte Blanche and a book launch associated with the 50th anniversary of Michel Brault’s Les Ordres. The Agora will host nightly events including DJ sets, an all-night Jaws marathon, karaoke, ramen and Thanksgiving Bingo.

Venues remain largely the same this year, with most screenings and events taking place at Cinéma du Parc, Cineplex Quartier Latin, Cinéma du Musée, the Cinémathèque Québécoise and Cinéma Moderne. Concordia University’s Hall building has also been added as a venue.

While much of the selection, particularly in the Incontournables section, speak for themselves, here are five of our other recommendations from this year’s program.

Who Do I Belong To

Concordia alumnus Meryam Joobeur has made a series of critically acclaimed short films including Brotherhood and Born in the Maelstrom. Who do I Belong To is her feature debut, about a Tunisian woman who is caught between her maternal love and her search for the truth when her son returns home from war and unleashes a darkness throughout their village. The film premiered earlier this year at the Berlinale and has been described as hypnotic and a great double-feature with last year’s Four Daughters.

Vous n’êtes pas seuls

A Quebec film that challenges genre expectations, Vous n’êtes pas seuls is a romantic science fiction about a pizza delivery driver, a taxi driver and… aliens. In their feature debut, directors Philippe Lupien and Marie-Hélène Viens promise a bittersweet twist on the classical rom-com. Letterboxd user Brendonross describes it as “Québécois Punch Drunk Love with sad aliens.”

The Invasion

From Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa (State Funeral), The Invasion was shot over two years and examines the consequences of the ongoing war following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The film is divided into two sections: a portrait of civilian life all over the country and a second part that paints a monumental canvas of a nation determined to defend its right to exist. Sergei Loznitsa is far from a classical documentarian, and has something of a poetic slowburn approach that challenges form and expectations.

Eat the Night

Caroline Poggi and Jonathan Vinel co-directed Eat the Night, a crime thriller about a young drug dealer Pablo and his sister Appoline who bond over an online game called Darknoon. Pablo falls for Night, neglecting his sister. While Appoline finishes the game, Pablo and Night become embroiled in a dangerous gang conflict. From the makers of Jessica Forever, a love or hate film that reimagined a world redefined by video games, Eat the Night will challenge how you understand cinema.

To a Land Unknown

Indiewire called To a Land Unknown “a Palestinian Twist on Midnight Cowboy.” This thriller is about a Palestinian refugee living on the fringes of society in Athens who gets ripped off by a smuggler and sets out to seek revenge. One of the year’s most critically acclaimed films, To a Land Unknown was made in the social-realist tradition of movies like Bicycle Thieves, using poetry and drama as a means of unveiling uncomfortable truths about society’s most vulnerable members.

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