The Telluride Film Festival remains one of cinema’s most carefully curated showcases, a gathering that balances Hollywood prestige with global discovery and auteur daring. Tucked away in the Colorado mountains, the festival has long been a bellwether for awards season, while also celebrating formally adventurous and politically urgent works. More than a launchpad for Oscar hopefuls, Telluride has cultivated a reputation for intimacy and surprise, with its lineup often revealed only as audiences arrive in town. That mystery, paired with its discerning programming, has made Telluride an essential stop on the fall circuit.
Fall 2025 Preview: 61 Movies To Watch
This year’s slate reflects the festival’s signature mix of scale and subtlety: sweeping literary adaptations, long-anticipated auteur visions, provocative documentaries, and high-profile world premieres. Filmmakers as diverse as Chloé Zhao, Guillermo del Toro, Werner Herzog, Noah Baumbach, and Yorgos Lanthimos join rising voices like Daniel Roher and Philippa Lowthorpe, together shaping a program that is at once star-driven and risk-taking. From Shakespearean tragedies and gothic monsters to radical political exposés and cinephile tributes, Telluride 2025 promises a season-defining blend of the intimate and the epic. Below are ten titles already sparking buzz on the mountain.
“Hamnet”
Oscar-winning director Chloé Zhao (“Nomadland”) brings her luminous, meditative style to Maggie O’Farrell’s bestselling novel with “Hamnet,” a fictionalized story drawn from the real Shakespeare family. Jessie Buckley plays Agnes, the herbalist wife of William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal), as they raise their children in Stratford-upon-Avon. When their son Hamnet (Jacobi Jupe) falls gravely ill, the family is shaken by loss. The film imagines how grief transforms their marriage and influences Shakespeare’s art, with Emily Watson as Agnes’s mother, Joe Alwyn as William’s brother, and David Wilmot as a village elder.
“Ballad of a Small Player”
Academy Award-winning filmmaker Edward Berger follows his Oscar-winning “All Quiet on the Western Front” and Oscar-nominated “Conclave” with “Ballad of a Small Player.” Adapted from Lawrence Osborne’s novel of the same name, Colin Farrell stars as an inveterate British gambler drifting through Macau. Pursued by creditors and haunted by his past, he crosses paths with a wealthy widow (Tilda Swinton), a Chinese businesswoman (Fala Chen), and a mysterious old acquaintance (Deanie Ip). Alex Jennings and Jason Tobin appear as figures who complicate the gambling addict’s descent, as the story unfolds across casinos, hotels, and backroom deals.
“Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere”
Scott Cooper’s dramatization of the making of Bruce Springsteen’s 1982 album Nebraska stars Jeremy Allen White as the musician during a solitary creative period. The film depicts Springsteen’s decision to record alone on a four-track tape deck, contrasted with the doubts of his bandmates and label. Jeremy Strong plays Springsteen’s manager and producer Jon Landau. Paul Walter Hauser appears as recording engineer Mike Batlan, while Stephen Graham, Odessa Young, Gaby Hoffmann, Marc Maron, and David Krumholtz round out the ensemble.
“H is for Hawk”
Philippa Lowthorpe adapts Helen Macdonald’s memoir about coping with her father’s death by training a goshawk. Claire Foy plays Macdonald, whose grief drives her to the challenging world of falconry. Brendan Gleeson portrays her late father in memory sequences, with Sam Spruell as a fellow falconer, Josh Dylan as a student, and Eden Hamilton as a younger Helen. The story follows her grueling bond with the hawk, and how discipline and wilderness shape her mourning.
“Hamlet”
Riz Ahmed stars as the Prince of Denmark in Aneil Karia’s contemporary retelling of Shakespeare’s tragedy, set partly in London. After his father’s death, Hamlet suspects foul play and confronts his uncle Claudius (Ralph Fiennes), now king and married to his mother Gertrude (Claire Foy). Morfydd Clark plays Ophelia, Dev Patel is Laertes, Timothy Spall portrays Polonius, and Kingsley Ben-Adir plays Horatio. The film traces Hamlet’s pursuit of truth, spiraling into betrayal, madness, and revenge.
