The 12th European Film Festival in South Africa is a cinematic journey unfolding at select cinemas in Joburg, dissecting themes of love, identity, family and belonging. Running from 9 to 19 October 2025, 10 contemporary European films reflecting on the realities of Europe and its place in the world today are being screened locally. Here’s what you need to know.
What’s in store for the 12th European Film Festival in South Africa?
The European Film Festival in South Africa is brought to you by the Encounters South African International Documentary Festival, and sponsored by the Delegation of the European Union, Cineuropa, and the Embassies and cultural institutes of Denmark, Flanders, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom.
The Goethe-Institut is involved in the European Film Festival as part of a European Commission initiative to support and enhance EU film festivals worldwide. Their role includes curating European films, securing screening rights, providing technical support such as subtitling, and organizing cultural events like Q&As and workshops, aligning with their mission to promote cultural exchange and showcase European diversity through cinema.
The 10 contemporary European films being screened portray strong characters in unusual situations, carefully crafted stories, and breath-taking landscapes, making the films a road trip for the heart and mind. Live film screenings take place at The Bioscope at 44 Stanley and Nu Metro Hyde Park in Johannesburg.
A curated selection of films will also be available for online streaming in Southern Africa at eurofilmfest.co.za.
The European Film Festival in South Africa programme:
Event 1: Miroirs #3 (Germany)
From acclaimed German filmmaker, Christian Petzold, comes Miroirs #3, a haunting, character-driven exploration of loss, memory, and unexpected recovery.
After a tragic car crash claims her boyfriend’s life, young Berlin piano student Laura (Paula Beer) survives with barely a scratch. Taken in by Betty, a woman who witnessed the accident, Laura finds herself welcomed into a mysterious family in the countryside. What begins as comfort soon turns into uncertainty as Laura starts to question the intentions of those around her.
Cost: R94.50pp, book online
When: Friday, 10 October 2025 from 8.15pm to 9.45pm
Where: The Bioscope Independent Cinema, 44 Stanley Ave, Milpark, Johannesburg
Event 2: The North (The Netherlands)
Directed by Bart Schrijver and called “the best hiking movie to date,” The North follows two old friends walking 600 kilometers through the Scottish Highlands to reconnect with each other, nature and the parts of themselves they lost.
A decade after being best friends and roommates, Chris (35) and Lluis (34) set out on a 600-kilometer trek through the Scottish Highlands, following the West Highland Way and the remote Cape Wrath Trail. Over 30 days, the two men push through harsh weather, aching muscles, and deep silence, not just to reach their physical destination, but to try to rekindle a powerful friendship that has quietly drifted apart.
Cost: R94.50pp, book online
When: Saturday, 11 October 2025 from 2pm to 4.10pm
Where: The Bioscope Independent Cinema, 44 Stanley Ave, Milpark, Johannesburg
Event 3: The Mohican (France)
Director Frédéric Farrucci weaves a story set in the sun-scorched hills of Corsica, where shepherd Pierre Rocca leads a quiet life until property developers (and the mafia protecting their interests) threaten his land and legacy.
Forced to abandon his flock and flee, Pierre becomes an unlikely fugitive, slipping through forests, hills, and villages as he resists a system determined to erase him.
As the manhunt escalates, Pierre’s defiance turns him into a folk hero for a fractured island grappling with gentrification, corruption, and a fading way of life.
Cost: R90pp, book online
When: Saturday, 11 October 2025 from 5pm
Where: Nu Metro Hyde Park, Cnr Jan Smuts Ave and, 6th Rd, Hyde Park, Johannesburg
Event 4: Sirât (Spain)
Directed by Oliver Laxe, this action-adventure drama is about a father who goes looking for his missing daughter in North Africa, accompanied by his son.
Luis is traveling through the vast, unforgiving deserts of southern Morocco with his teenage son, Esteban. They are searching for Luis’ daughter, who vanished five months ago after attending a dance festival deep in the desert. As the two move from one rave to another, they begin hearing whispers of a semi-mythical party near the Mauritanian border, a place where reality and illusion begin to blur.
Cost: R94.50pp, book online
When: Sunday, 12 October 2025 from 2pm to 3.55pm
Where: The Bioscope Independent Cinema, 44 Stanley Ave, Milpark, Johannesburg
Event 5: Real Faces (Belgium)
Leni Huyghe directs this coming-of-age drama.
Bustling Brussels is the city where a genuine, unlikely friendship unfolds between Julia, a casting director for advertising, and Eliott, a quiet microbiologist. Julia (29), having relocated after a breakup, tries to maintain a confident façade as she builds a new life. But when she meets Eliott (32), their unexpected connection challenges both to let go of expectations and embrace the messy, unfiltered realities of life.
Cost: R90pp, book online
When: Sunday, 12 October 2025 from 2pm to 3.35pm
Where: Nu Metro Hyde Park, Cnr Jan Smuts Ave and, 6th Rd, Hyde Park, Johannesburg
Event 6: Unicorns (United Kingdom)
Directed by Sally El Hosaini & James Krishna Floyd, this coming-of-age drama romance tells the story of a queer South Asian nightclub performer living a double life, and a young, single father who works as a mechanic.
When Luke, a straight white single father and car mechanic, crosses paths with Aysha, a queer South Asian drag performer living a double life, both their worlds begin to unravel and reform. Aysha is caught between the dazzling freedom of nightlife and the suffocating expectations of her conservative Muslim family. Luke is navigating fatherhood and masculinity in a society that offers little room for vulnerability.
As their connection deepens, the central conflict isn’t desire, but identity. The question is not whether they can be together, but whether they can be fully themselves.
Cost: R94.50pp, book online
When: Friday, 17 October 2025 from 8pm to 10pm
Where: The Bioscope Independent Cinema, 44 Stanley Ave, Milpark, Johannesburg
Event 7: FUORI (Italy)
Director Mario Martone presents a biographical, feminist drama with FUORI, based on the real-life experiences of one of Italy’s most iconic feminist voices.
Rome, 1980. Goliarda Sapienza, a fiercely independent writer, has just spent over a decade crafting her masterwork, The Art of Joy, only to face rejection from the Italian publishing world. In a spontaneous and defiant act, she is arrested for stealing jewelry and lands in prison, a place she never imagined she’d end up, but one that will change her life forever.
Inside, Goliarda meets a group of younger women, including Roberta, a repeat offender and political activist. A bond of trust and solidarity forms. Once released, the women continue to meet throughout a long, sweltering Roman summer, their connection defying social expectations and rebuilding Goliarda’s sense of self. Through this intense and unconventional friendship, Goliarda finds joy again, and the will to write.
Cost: R94.50pp, book online
When: Saturday, 18 October 2025 from 2pm to 4pm
Where: The Bioscope Independent Cinema, 44 Stanley Ave, Milpark, Johannesburg
Event 8: A Perfectly Normal Family (Denmark)
Malou Reymann directs this poignant Family Drama.
Eleven-year-old Emma thinks she has a perfectly normal family, until the day her father, Thomas, reveals that he is transgender and begins transitioning into Agnete. What follows is a gentle but powerful exploration of a family reconfiguring itself in the face of emotional upheaval and societal scrutiny.
Cost: R94.50pp, book online
When: Saturday, 18 October 2025 from 6pm to 7.35pm
Where: The Bioscope Independent Cinema, 44 Stanley Ave, Milpark, Johannesburg
Event 9: Under The Volcano (Poland)
Damian Kocur directs Under The Volcano, rooted in current events.
On the final day of a family holiday in Tenerife, a Ukrainian father, his new wife, and two children are jolted from their sunlit bubble by the devastating news that Russia has invaded their homeland. As flights are grounded and uncertainty sets in, Roman, a father and husband caught between the past and present, must navigate the emotional fault lines of a newly blended family in exile.
Tensions simmer between his teenage daughter Sofia, young son Fedir, and his second wife Nastya. What begins as a frustrating disruption soon transforms into a reckoning with belonging, identity, and helplessness, as the family faces an unfolding war from a paradise they can no longer enjoy.
Cost: R90pp, book online
When: Sunday, 19 October 2025 from 2pm
Where: Nu Metro Hyde Park, Cnr Jan Smuts Ave and, 6th Rd, Hyde Park, Johannesburg
Event 10: Great Yarmouth: Provisional Figures (Portugal)
Directed by Marco Martins, this Drama depicts Hundreds of migrants descending on the UK village of Great Yarmouth seeking work in the region’s turkey processing plants.
October 2019, three months before Brexit, the English coastal town of Great Yarmouth becomes a grim limbo for hundreds of newly arrived Portuguese migrant workers, all seeking low-paid work in the region’s turkey factories. Among them is Tânia, known as “The Mother of the Portuguese”, a former factory worker who has married an English hotel owner and now acts as the local fixer for incoming laborers.
Tânia dreams of becoming a British citizen and leaving this brutal world behind. But the arrival of a new group of desperate migrants shakes her fragile position of power, igniting a chain of events that threatens to consume her carefully built life.
Cost: R94.50pp, book online
When: Sunday, 19 October 2025 from 2pm to 3.55pm
Where: The Bioscope Independent Cinema, 44 Stanley Ave, Milpark, Johannesburg
Note that some films are screening at both Nu Metro and The Bioscope. Find out which ones at the European Film Festival in South Africa website.
Get in touch
Website: eurofilmfest.co.za
Email: [email protected] | [email protected]
Facebook: @EUFFSA#
Instagram: @euffsa
