Japanese filmmaker Sho Miyake’s Two Seasons, Two Strangers has won the top prize, the Golden Lion, at Locarno’s 2025 edition.
Based on a manga by surrealist artist Yoshiharu Tsuge, the film stars Korean actress Shim Eun-kyung as a screenwriter who reflects on her life through a journey sparked by a chance encounter with a stranger.
The Golden Leopard for best film comes with a cash prize of CHF 75,000 ($86,650) to be shared equally between the film’s director and producer.
The special jury prize was awarded to Elsa Kremser and Levin Peter’s Austria-Germany co-production White Snail, which comes with a prize of CHF 35,000 ($40,400), again to be shared equally between the director and producer. The heavily improvised film focuses on the relationship between a model and a mysterious loner. The film also picked up the acting prize for Marya Imbro and Mikhail Senkov.
The other performance prize went to Chile’s Manuela Martelli and Croatia’s Ana Marija Veselčić for Hana Jušić’s God Will Not Help.
Iraqi-French filmmaker Abbas Fahdel was awarded the prize for best direction for Tales Of The Wounded Land, worth CHF 20,000 ($25,000), which chronicles the devastation of war in south Lebanon.
Alexandre Koberidze’s Germany-Georgia co-production Dry Leaf received a special mention.
Filmmakers of the Present and other prizes
The jury of the Filmmakers of the Present competition awarded its top prize to Hair, Paper, Water, directed by Belgium’s Nicolas Graux and Vietnam’s Trương Minh Quy, with a prize of CHF 35,000 ($40,400).
Best emerging director went to Argentina’s Cecilia Kang for Hijo Mayor, a co-pro with France, with a prize of CHF 20,000 ($25,000), while the special jury prize Ciné+ went to Italy’s Margherita Spampinato, for Sweetheart. The film also received one of the category’s best performance prizes, for Aurora Quattrocchi, while the other best performance prize went to Levan Gelbakhiani for Jacqueline Zünd’s Don’t Let The Sun.
The Swatch first feature award, worth CHF 15,000, went to Sophy Romvari’s Canada-Hungary co-production Blue Heron.
“A successful edition beyond our wildest expectations that celebrates the enduring and gentle power of cinema and its manifolded ways of bringing communities together to share the wonderful gifts of peace,” said Giona A. Nazzaro, Locarno’s artistic director. ”We are grateful to all the directors that trusted the festival with their works. It allowed us to create a forward-looking edition, with its gaze firmly set in the future. We are certain these works will stand the test of time and become beacons of hope for young talents that are just starting to dream the films they want to make tomorrow. A festival is like building a better tomorrow. One film at the time.”
Locarno will return in 2026 from August 5-15.