Minneapolis St. Paul International Film Festival

MSPIFF returns April 2-13 to The Main Cinema and other venues around the Twin Cities. As the largest annual celebration of international cinema in the region, MSPIFF44 promises another exciting lineup of 200+ films from around the world, plus an exciting array of parties, panels, visiting filmmakers, and special guests.

Film Schedule

April 10, 2025

Caught By the Tides

Dir. Jia Zhangke

111 min

Chinese auteur Jia Zhang-Ke’s paean to leading actress Zhao Tao takes over 20 years of footage, seen and unseen, from his past films in this kaleidoscopic epic. Examining his past work and fusing it with a new story, Caught by the Tides is a celebration of the power of Jia’s cinematic vision.

Time: 7:05 pm

Venue: The Main 4

The Flamingo

Dir. Adam Sekuler

78 min

63-year-old Mary Phillips is not about to let divorce and age stop her from being happy. Determined to find love and sexual pleasure, she not only attends dungeon parties and engages in BDSM, she helps others navigate this world as well. Adam Sekuler’s delightful and warmhearted documentary introduces us to a woman fully connected with her own body and soul.

Time: 9:30 pm

Venue: The Main 4

Sicilian Letters

Dir. Fabio Grassadonia, Antonio Piazza

130 min

The great Toni Servillo stars in this sly black comedy inspired by the search for real-life mob boss Matteo Messina Denaro. The story takes place in Sicily in the early 2000s. After serving several years in prison for Mafia-related crimes, Catello (Servillo), a long-serving politician, has lost everything. When the Italian Secret Service “persuades” him to help capture Matteo (Elio Germano), the last major Mafia boss still on the run, whom Catello has known since he was a boy, he sees an opportunity to stage a comeback. A shrewd man of a hundred masks, a tireless illusionist who turns truth into falsehood and falsehood into truth, Catello begins a correspondence with the fugitive, as unique as it is improbable, exploiting the younger man’s emotional emptiness. A gamble which, with one of the most wanted criminals in the world, is always going to involve a degree of risk… –AS

Time: 6:55 pm

Venue: The Main 5

Sima’s Song

Dir. Roya Sadat

98 min

Writer/director Roya Sadat attending.

During the Afghan civil war, good friends Suraya and Sima struggle to find common ground. Suraya is rich and a communist, and Sima is from a more traditional background. Fighting for their country, and their civil rights in a world where women’s lives are undervalued, this friendship is put to the test. Director Roya Sadat, the first woman director in post-Taliban Afghanistan, has crafted a moving and exciting drama that plays much like a thriller.

Time: 7:00 pm

Venue: Edina Theatre

Somalia in the Picture

Dir. Mark Brecke

89 min

Filmmakers attending.

Somalia in the Picture traces a century of cinema in Mogadishu, where today gorgeous movie palaces lay in ruin. Director Mark Brecke brings this story into even clearer focus, following fellow director Said Salah Ahmed, as Ahmed tries to find a single print of his lost masterpiece, The Somalia Dervishes, a nearly 5 hour epic from 1985.

Time: 7:10 pm

Venue: The Main 3

Suburban Fury

Dir. Robinson Devor

118 min

Suburban Fury revisits the 1975 assassination attempt on US President Gerald Ford through the perspective of would-be assassin Sara Jane Moore, a conservative mother from the San Francisco suburbs who became radicalized while working as an FBI informant.

Time: 6:50 pm

Venue: The Main 2

The Swedish Torpedo

Dir. Frida Kempff

120 min

In 1939, Swedish single mother Sally Bauer was a long-distance swimmer who took on the ultimate challenge–to swim the English Channel. Facing sexism, raising a seven-year-old, and finding enough money (not to mention World War II) might be more daunting than the swim itself. Josefin Neldén is riveting as Bauer, in Frida Kempff’s triumphant biopic.

Time: 1:20 pm

Venue: The Main 1

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Date: April 2 - 13, 2025