HYPERSENSITIVE(2025) Cannes 2025

This is a stunningly beautiful journey inside the mind of a person on a road trip who is hypersensitive. It’s all visuals and sounds and absolutely hypnotic. You so need to see this on a big screen where the images can cover whelm you.

I watched this  a couple of times in a row just so I could get lost in the experience.

Highly recommended

Caravan (2025) Cannes 2025

Ester is a single mother who is forced to take her mentally challenged son on a trip to Italy

This is a very intense drama that is there is justice will be in the running for a lot of awards. This is a film that looks at parents and disabled children and doesn't shy away from the tough bits. It's a film that comes from director Zuzana Kirchnerová's personal experience with her son not only has Downs Syndrome and Autism, as a result the film shows both the ups and downs of the mother and child relationship. More importantly the film makes sure that we know how much love is there.

Anna Geislerová, plays Ester and should be on the Oscar short list. Because this isn't a big flashy foreign film the odds are it's not going to get the notice it needs to clean up. That's a shame because it is a fully invested performance that completely feels natural. I was moved. 

David Vodstrcil is incredible as David the young man with issues. As I write this just over two weeks from the film's premeire at Cannes it appears that CARAVAN is his first film, but I highly doubt that it will be his last. It's a staggering first cinematic performance.

I don't know what else to say other than this is one of the great films at Cannes.

Track this down.

BREAD WILL WALK (2025) Cannes 2025

One of a kind and deeply disturbing in the the best possible way, this film is a zombie film send up about people who eat a synthetic bread turning into nonviolent shambling loafs of bread.

Looking like a the work of someone like Ralph Steadman on acid (on more acid)  this film nails every zombie cliché perfectly it’s a wicked little film that almost every horror movie lover is going to go crazy for.

Artistically I’ve never quite seen an animated film like this. Yes the art looks similar to other films but at the same time I’ve never seen them movie.

This film is a blast. Its funny and yet nightmarish at the same time.

A must see.

Highly recommended

Dandelion's Odyssey (2025) (aka Planetes) Cannes 2025

When the world is destroyed in an atomic war some of the fuzzy danelion seeds are blown into space, through a black hole and to a new planet where the fuzzies try to find a place to grow.

Wordless animated science fiction tale looks spectacular. There are some really wonderful images in this film. Its a film I would love to see on a truly huge screen so I can really look at the things hidden in the images.

As great as the film looks, and as good as the animators are at giving the fuzzies life, this film kind of runs out of steam  about 20 minutes in. Yes, we are curious about where this is going, and yes the images impress, but at a certain point there isn't enough going on to keep us fully engaged. Yes I stayed to the end, but at the same time some of it seemed like some of the sequences were there to just show off what the animators can do.

And I know that makes it sound like I don't like the film, but I do. I like so much of the film that I wish it was a little tighter so that we had a perfect viewing experience.

Worth a look for the curious- especially on the big screen.

MILITANTROPOS (2025) Cannes 2025

Militanropos of the the title refers to the state  people adopt when entering the state of war.  The film is a look at the people of Ukraine as they fight the Russians and fight with themselves simply to survive.

Made up of a series of visually stunning images that place us into Ukraine in a way that Have never experienced in the dozens of documentaries that I have seen on the war. The images are both stunningly beautiful and heartbreaking. The result is the film gives us a sense of the country that I have never seen before.

I have not seen anything like this on a movie screen-this needs to b seen as big as possible  though I suspect it would be crushing in IMAX.

You need to see this. I find it hard to say more than that, not because I am being lazy, but rather this film is very visceral. The mix of sound and image move us on a level beyond words. Just go see this.

Hands down it is one of the best films on the fiasco in Ukraine and 2025 that I've seen.

Highly recommended.

Meteors (2025) Cannes 2025

Two slackers end a night by trying to steal a Maine Coon and up arrested in trouble. They end up working at a nuclear waste facility with one of their friends.

This off beat and off kilter dramedy doesn't do what you expect. This is a film that doesn't have characters we've see a dozen times before, nor does it do what we think it will.  Yes, it begins in a kind of stereotypical way but once the guys get in trouble the film begins to take it's own trajectory.  It's a move that ends up being very affecting.

I really liked this film. I liked that it mirrors it's characters and changes over the course of the film. If you told me as I was starting the film that some of the final images would make me misty I would have told you you were crazy.

 If you want off the beaten path film, and since you are reading Unseen Films I assume you do, METEORS is worth tracking down. While you may not find it to be your next great thing, you will like it and love that people are still making films that exceed expectations.

I ONLY REST IN THE STORM (2025) Cannes 2025

This is a love it or sleep on it slow film, which is going to make you wonder why it takes almost four hours to reach its conclusion.

The film follows Sergio who is hired by a West African nation to help with a road project. Along the way he gets involved in an intimate way with a couple from the city he is living in.

I need to say two things up front. First I like some of the director Pedro Pinho's documentaries. Yes they are told in a measured (slow) way but they work. The second thing I want to mention is that no film of any length should make you question the length. At no point should a film review mention a length, except as a courtesy (for example SATANTANGO runs over seven hours so plan accordingly).  I should not be saying this film is too long and could use several sequences removed.(SATANTANGO is rambling but pulls it together)

The thing is its not that the film is bad, but a number of sequences don't seem to go anywhere. Yes they build a sense of place and character but they don't add enough. How many sequences do you need in a 211 minute film? Not to argue length but there is a point where you stop going along  and wonder where is this going and why is this taking so long? The great long movies never make you question the length. Somewhere around the half way point I was still waiting for a reason for this to be taking the long way home. I completely understand the structure comes from Pinho's documentary background, but docs are not narratives and you can't always do what you can in a doc.

Again this is not a bad film, it's just one that rambles aimlessly for two hours too much. There simply isn't enough here to support more than a 100 minute film. Yes I made it to the end, but even so I still don't know why much of this film is part of this story. Yes, its good unto itself, but in the end it felt pointless.

I fully expect this film to show up at festivals in the fall and bore audiences to tears.

Only recommended for people who like long rambling films that go nowhere.

Love Letters (2025) Cannes 2025

Celine and her wife are expecting their first child. However she has to get testimonials from a wide variety of people saying she would be a good parent so that she can legally adopt the child.

I am in awe of this film. I went from thinking it wasn't going to be anything special, to enjoying the technical aspects of the film, to suddenly finding I was full on invested. I wasn't watching a movie, I was hanging out with friends.  This went from being a movie to being a real life adventure. By the time the end came and I was reaching for tissues and I found myself screaming out loud "DON'T STOP NOW"

I have no idea who Alice Douard is but by god is she a masterful filmmaker. She isn't telling a story she is recording life. Every moment feels real. I don't know when I ever felt that every moment was real and right. There doesn't seem to be scripted drama any where in this film, it is just people living their lives. More importantly she knows how to tell her story. The perfect music drops in at just the right moment, the images become what ever they need to be (split screen? If that would make the sequence work better, absolutely).

The cast is absolutely spot on. Everyone is in their perfect role. Most importantly the relationship between the two women at the center bleeds off the screen. You can feel their connection and love as a physical ray. We fall in love with them, so much so that by the time the line "you two look beautiful" is uttered we are ready to burst into joyous tears.

This is not only one of the great films of 2025 but it could be argued that, in its way, it is one of the greatest love stories ever put on film.

This film is an absolute materpiece and I am in absolute awe of it. Words fail me because I simply can not believe what I have seen. More to the point I have a slate of other films from Cannes and I can't wait to revisit this jewel in the crown of cinema in order to write it up perfectly. 

Do yourself a favor and search this film out. I expect it to have its fans but I also expect that the cineastes who choose the big awards films may ignore it, or worse shunt it to smaller fests. Truth be told if this were an American film and was coming from Hollywood this film would win every damn award under the sun.

See LOVE LETTERS.

A USEFUL GHOST (2025) Cannes 2025

A woman who dies because there is dust in the air, returns to earth as a vacuum cleaner in order to protect her family

This is a low key, very dry, very dead pan c omedy that you are going to love or hate. More so when you consider that the film is wildly overlong at 130 minutes.  It's absurd in the extreme and not beyond using people who walk funny for laughs.

This is the sort of film that the cineastes will seize upon as something wonderfully wacky and fall down funny while most other people will be left scratching their heads. Yes, I see the humor, but at the same time seeing the humor doesn't mean it works well enough to produce a laugh or even a smile. 

This film bored me.Truthfuly it may not be the humor or the story but rather the direction and the presentation. Much of the the film is long static shots, many of which are held longer than they need be, The result is not so much a dry comedy but a partched one.

If you like done dry dead pan humor and don't mind over long tales give the films a try.

Death Does Not Exist (2025) Cannes 2025

Hélène goes with a bunch of friends to the estate of the rich land owners. The idea is to kill them and start a revolution. As the attack happens her friends are killed and she flees. Wandering the forest she is haunted by the spirits of her friends, her guilt and her life. Meanwhile the forest seems to be changing everything in it and outside it.

This is a great looking, even better sounding sounding film. The images are frequently striking. There are several that I would love to hang on my wall. The sound design is incredible with the mix of music and effects creating a mood and place most films only hope to achieve.

I just wish the film's plot matched the technical achievement. This film is a journey through Helene's head space. What we see and experience is what she does, and that is fine, but the material is very literary. This is a film where the filmmakers are more interested in making a point  with the result that there are times where the characters get lost. I never connected to the actual people on screen as much as I did to the images and sound. It doesn't mean it's a bad film, but rather one you may just watch once and not revisit.

Worth a look for animation fans.