In 2025, Zurich Film Festival celebrated its 21st year. Over 11 days, the festival attracted an impressive 135’000 visitors. A total of 115 films were shown, including 140 World and European Premiers, 16 of which were Swiss movies. The whole city was buzzing with good vibes, filled not just with movie lovers, but also with international and national stars.
First held in 2005, Zurich Film Festival established itself very quickly on the national and international film festival scene. The formula for its success it's probably a mix of an attractive location: an international but small city of Zurich; a great selection of movies and different programs/events like ZFF Masters, ZFF for Kids, and a few others. I loved that this year most of the movies were shown in the cinemas I prefer: Frame, Corso, and Arthouse. I love these cinemas for their quality and awesome location (close to my house 😎).
Looking at all these years, I have been visiting or reviewing (since 2017) Zurich Film Festival. The way I like to explain its success is to quote/paraphrase the sentence I found in the industry booklet a few years ago. Basically, the organizers agree on a few basics for a successful film festival: “Content is king, Collaboration is key and Encounters among creative folks are essential”. I am glad to confirm that even after many years, the organizers are still taking “these basics” seriously while developing the festival further and, most importantly, in the right direction.
This is why I keep coming back and reviewing Zurich Film Festival.
From the perspective of Gimme A Beat, exploring *the female factor* of the festival is easy. Zurich Film Festival always provides a significant number of female stories and movies from female directors, and a good balance of different genres, aspiring filmmakers, and (potential) blockbusters.
As listeners of Gimme A Beat (and my family and friends) already know, having a busy schedule is business as usual for me, even if it felt that 2025 was busier than ever before, and with so many great movies, definitely a pleasure. For me, Zurich Film Festival is all about watching movies. My most enjoyable moment is sitting in the dark cinema, fully immersed in the storyline. This year, even though many fabulous events were happening on the festival grounds, I haven't attended/seen any of them.
Most importantly, I have seen more than 30 movies this year, and I had the opportunity to interview 4 female filmmakers and 1 music composer.
With so much more material, I have decided to dedicate several whole Gimme A Beats to Zurich Film Festival, the one happening tonight, and a few others later on. In most cases, I will adapt my radio show to the Swiss screenings of movies, to make sure that these movies receive the attention they deserve.
Considering the number of movies I've seen, I will not be reviewing all the movies and posting them on the Gimme A Beat page. But I will continue posting the reviews after tonight's show, since most of the movies from the festival are coming to the cinemas next year. This year again, I will be focusing on my highlights only. To find them, you should follow the search with the following hashtags: #zff #zff2025 #highlight #gimmeabeat.
In tonight's Gimme A Beat, I will be focusing on one of my movie highlights, Hedda, directed and co-written by Nia DaCosta, with a soundtrack composed by Hildur Guðnadóttir.
Since the 29th of October, the movie has been available on Amazon Prime.
Tune in to Gimme a Beat (17.11.2025) to hear my impressions of the Zurich Film Festival, the reviews of the movie Hedda, featuring interviews with Nia DaCosta and Hildur Guðnadóttir, as well as the movie soundtrack composed by Hildur.
Check also the relevant Spotify or Deezer playlist.
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For the info about old shows, please go to previous entries
