25 & Under

Thomas Clay’s unflinching story of teen drugs and violence scandalised the British film industry 20 years ago, but is arguably ripe for rehabilitation

Three stage actresses starring in Aristophanes’ classic play Lysistrata start to draw parallels with their own lives in Mai Zetterling’s feminist comedy.

Albert Serra’s hypnotic Palme d'Or-nominated drama about the greed and hypocrisy of colonial power in Tahiti.

Tatiana Huezo’s poetic documentary captures a holistic view of the rhythms of life in a remote Mexican village.

Three expectant mothers on a maternity ward recall their personal and sexual experiences in Mai Zetterling’s bold, subversive debut.

In Mai Zetterling’s scathing rebuke of European entitlement, a man returns to his childhood home and confronts his repressed memories and desire.

Stranded in a surreal winter landscape, a drunken applejack salesman must become North America's greatest fur trapper in Mike Cheslik’s gloriously anarchic slapstick comedy.

Unfolding against the stunning backdrop of a remote Italian mountain village, Maura Delpero’s film is a hauntingly beautiful period tale of family life gradually torn apart.

The importance of human connection lies at the heart of this powerful, nuanced portrait of a young Portuguese warehouse employee in Scotland.

Francois Ozon’s sly and seductive account of teenage girl’s dalliance with high-class prostitution.

Guillermo del Toro’s Cannes prize-winning directorial debut offers a unique take on the classic vampire story.

Payal Kapadia’s Cannes Grand Prix-winning portrait of three women is a transcendent tale of love and sisterhood.

After his mother wakes from a coma, a man goes to great lengths to pretend East Germany still exists in this wonderfully bittersweet tragicomedy.

Mathieu Kassovitz’s landmark mid-90s drama throws a cinematic Molotov cocktail at structural racism, police brutality and media manipulation.

Maggie Gyllenhaal gives a career-best performance as a kindergarten teacher who finds herself in an ethical quagmire after discovering the poetic talents of a precocious student.

Malcolm McDowell and Helen Mirren star in one of the most controversial films in cinema history, presented here in an entirely new cut compiled from the original rushes.

Writer-director Robin Campillo offers an exploration of memory and politics, in this boldly conceived story of boyhood in 1970s Madagascar.

A twelve-year-old boy befriends a mysterious girl with a dark secret, in Tomas Alfredson’s grownup tale of childhood vampirism.

High melodrama, creeping insanity and barely contained delirium abound in this dizzying tribute to the high tension thrillers of Alfred Hitchcock from director Brian De Palma.

Set in a pre-coup d’etat Argentina, successful lawyer Claudio (Darío Grandinetti, Wild Tales) leads a comfortable life – until an altercation in a restaurant and a split-second decision slowly unravel everything he has built up.

Ken Russell's second Hollywood film is a deliriously excessive erotic thriller with Kathleen Turner as an imperilled prostitute.

In this stylish, dark crime thriller, a policeman’s complex web of underworld relationships is threatened by an internal affairs investigator.

An enigmatic housemaid and her wealthy, totalitarian employer begin an affair that will have disastrous consequences for them both.

Ivan Sen follows his acclaimed Australian thriller Mystery Road with another distinctive, 'outback noir', with troubled indigenous detective Joe Swan (Aaron Pedersen) again on the trail of murder and corruption.

Francois Ozon’s sly and seductive account of teenage girl’s dalliance with high-class prostitution.

Claire Denis' fully formed debut offers a child’s-eye-view of racial and sexual tension that bubbles with unspoken desires.

A philosophy professor and an artist reach a crisis point in their marriage, in Kathleen Collins’ groundbreaking masterpiece.

The lives of two Oglala Lakota boys interlock in this coming-of-age drama set against the backdrop of South Dakota’s Pine Ridge Reservation.

Chantal Akerman's magnificent epic of experimental cinema offering a feminist perspective on recurrent events of everyday life.

Steven Soderbergh’s audacious debut, starring James Spader and Andie Macdowell, is an intimate exploration of sexual desire, and a landmark of 90’s American independent filmmaking.

Technology and sexuality meet in head-on collision in David Cronenberg’s controversial adaptation of writer J.G. Ballard’s transgressive 1973 novel.

Japanese cinema's enfant terrible, Sion Sono, unleashes this demented, whirlwind tale of cults, love, violence and perversion.

David O. Russell (Silver Linings Playbook) made his feature debut in 1994 with this biting black comedy, which caused a stir with its incestuous subplot and portrayal of adolescent restlessness.

Christopher Walken is the dogged drug-lord determined to keep his empire together, in Abel Ferrara's brutally gritty crime thriller.

Carine Adler’s sexy and dark debut, starring Samantha Morton in her first major feature film role.

Cheryl Dunye's smart and funny romance - thought to be the first feature directed by a black lesbian - remains a breath of fresh air decades on.

From Utopian dreams to concrete realities; charting the challenging, funny, and sometimes tragic story of the British new town of Basildon, Essex.

Rodney Ascher's enigmatic essay film weaves together the contrasting theories of five different narrators who believe Stanley Kubrick deliberately buried hidden messages in his 1980 adaptation of Stephen King’s novel.

The inspiring journey towards freedom of Raghda and Amer, a couple brought together by the turmoil of the Syrian Civil War.

Cuba’s rich and colourful past comes vividly to life in this legendary, Oscar-nominated documentary from director Wim Wenders (Paris, Texas, Wings of Desire).

The working-class community of Hoxton Street face the upheavals of gentrification, austerity and the eruption of Brexit, in this portrait of a rapidly changing London.