The 78th Edition of the Edinburgh International Film Festival takes takes place from 14 Aug, and a full programme of premieres and classics has been announced. Our Managing Editor Kevin Ibbotson-Wight casts an eye over 10 potential highlights.

Bulk (Ben Wheatley/ UK/ 2025/ 95 mins) It’s fair to see Ben Wheatley was seen to have gone off the boil somewhat, with his glossy but inert version of Rebecca, to say nothing of joyless creature feature Meg 2. Happily, he’s embraced the weirdness of his early career with an unashamed midnight movie, a conspiracy thriller riffing on all manner of influences. It might be too weird for some, but it’s great to have him back playing in his own sandbox.

Sorry, Baby (Eva Victor/ USA/ 2025/ 105 mins) Another work of pure auteur-ship on opening night is Eva Victor’s Sorry, Baby. Victor writes, directs, and takes the lead in this Sundance hit which walks a tightrope between dark subject matter and equally dark comedy, as a traumatised academic starts to piece together her life after reconnecting with an old friend.

Case 137 (Dominik Moll/ France/ 2025/ 115 mins) The director of Only the Animals and The Night of the 12th returns with a morally complex thriller dealing with the aftermath of a riot in Paris. One rioter lies dead and there’s more than a small suggestions the police used excessive force. Moll is fantastic at boiling down societal issues into compelling human dramas. Don’t expect a neatly-wrapped happy ending, but do expect a taut, propulsive drama.

Crushed (Simon Rumley/ UK/ 2025/ 105 mins) A consistently uncompromising filmmaker, Simon Rumley hasn’t always had the budgets to match his vision, but anyone who watches the likes of Red White & Blue won’t soon forget them. Crushed is likely to have a similar impact. A morally murky and brutal drama sees a pastor and his wife searching for this missing daughter in Bangkok. Expect extreme physical and emotional trauma.

Redux Redux (Kevin & Matthew McManus/ USA/ 2025/ 125 mins). Multiverse narratives are hardly uncommon these days, but the McManus Bros’ (The Block Island Sound) Redux Redux is a tasty variation; a grieving mother is trapped in a loop of vengeance, killing the murderer of her daughter in each universe. It’s an intriguing premise, landing between the purgatorial thematic beats of I Saw the Devil and the quantum murder mystery of The 22 Murders of Madison May. Multiverse narrative can strip the potential stakes from a movie, but this character-driven genre flick should hopefully avoid such traps.

Mortician (Abdolreza Kahani/ Canada/ 2025/ 95 mins). A reclusive mortician faces an unusual request from a dissident singer in hiding in Abdolreza Kahani’s (A Shrine) return to EIFF. favouring lo-fi aesthetics, dry wit, and naturalistic performances, this restrained drama will be a likely tonic to the stylised, postmodern aesthetic of some of the other films on this list.

Best Boy (Jesse Noah Klein/ Canada/ 2025/ 95 mins). Tolstoy said, ‘Every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way’, which is what makes stories about dysfunctional families endlessly fascinating. In the blackly satirical Best Boy, three adult children and their mother reunite following the death of their abusive father. They compete in a series of cruel games echoing those that forged their childhood. Coming across like a slightly less savage spin on Festen, this could be a real highlight.

I Live Here Now (Julie Pacino/ USA/ 2025/ 110 mins). A nightmarish debut, riffing on Dario Argento and David Lynch (right down to having Laura Palmer herself, Sheryl Lee in the cast) is a pretty irresistible prospect. Julie Pacino’s I Live Here Now, a young woman staying in a derelict hotel is haunted by her traumatic past, blurring the boundaries between reality and memory. The excellent Madeleine Brewer of Handmaid’s Tale fame leads the cast of this psychological horror.

Young Mothers (Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne/ Belgium, France/ 2025/ 105 mins). The Belgian kings of socially-conscious realist cinema return with another film of precise and restrained humanity. Young Mothers follows the intersecting lives of a group of girls at a shelter for young mothers. Anyone who’s seen the likes of Rosetta, The Kid With a Bike, or Two Days, One Night will know exactly what to expect; deep empathy and formal style.

The Toxic Avenger (Macon Blair/ USA/ 2023/ 115 mins). Anyone disappointed by the new version of Street Trash earlier this year may have more joy with another reboot of a cult ’80s grindhouse property. The original Toxic Avenger became the tentpole franchise of the cheerfully extreme low-budget Troma studio, and this new version remains inhouse. Peter Dinklage becomes a mutant superhero after falling into a vat of toxic waste. Dinklage is one of several big names – Elijah Wood and Kevin Bacon are also involved – so the chance to see that weirdly charming Troma carnage with an added cash injection is irresistible.

Edinburgh International Film Festival runs from Thu 14 Aug to Wed 20 Aug 2025