With the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) almost here, film go-ers are diligently preparing their TIFF 2025 schedules. And if you’re like me, you want to be a little more intentional with the films that you end up watching, talking about, and reviewing. That’s why I’ve put together a list of films directed by women that you should check out.
From HIKARI’s Rental Family to Nia DaCosta’s Hedda and Lucía Aleñar Iglesias’s Forastera, here are 15 films directed by women heading to TIFF 2025!
MORE: 10 LGBTQ+ Films Playing at TIFF 2025
1. Rental Family
Directed by: HIKARI
Starring: Brendan Fraser
Summary: Philip (Fraser) has lived in Japan for seven years. During this time, his biggest claim to fame has been a toothpaste commercial in which he’s costumed as a cross between Superman and Gumby. Everything changes when he’s recruited to play “sad American” at an actual funeral. Thus begins Philip’s tenure with a company that hires actors as surrogates to help clients through some of life’s biggest challenges.
2. The Testament of Ann Lee
Directed by: Mona Fastvold
Starring: Amanda Seyfried, Christopher Abbott
Summary: As a founder of the Shaker movement, Ann Lee (Amanda Seyfried) was one of the most important religious figures in pre-Revolutionary America. Mona Fastvold’s powerful, complex third feature digs deep into Lee’s story, especially the profound childhood and early adult traumas that impacted her psychology and shaped her influential religious views.
3. Couture
Directed by: Alice Winocour
Starring: Angelina Jolie, Ella Rumpf, Anyier Anei
Summary: Maxine (Jolie), an American film director, arrives in Paris to helm a video for a fashion event. Maxine thinks fashion is “useless and unnecessary,” but the opportunity is lucrative and she has financial burdens. She is in the midst of a divorce, has a teenage daughter, and is preparing her next feature film. But her tightly ordered life is about to unravel as Maxine is given a serious medical diagnosis.
4. Egghead Republic
Directed by: Pella Kågerman, Hugo Lilja
Starring: Ella Rae Rappaport, Tyler Labine
Summary: Even in an alternate timeline where the Cold War burned hot enough for an atomic bomb to fall on Soviet Kazakhstan, there persists a familiar constant: the unpaid internship. For Sonja Schmidt (Ella Rae Rappaport), it is thanks to this “exposure” economy that she is persuaded by hipper-than-thou culture mogul Dino Davis (Tyler Labine) to accompany a gonzo journalistic expedition to a joint Soviet/American military base that monitors a Kazak radioactive zone — one rumoured to be rife with irradiated centaurs(!).
MORE: 10 Most Anticipated TIFF 2025 Films
5. Forastera
Directed by: Lucía Aleñar Iglesias
Starring: Zoe Stein, Martina García, Marta Angelat
Summary: Cata (Zoe Stein) and Eva (Martina García)are spending the summer vacation with Catalina (Marta Angelat)and grandfather Tomeu (Lluís Homar) in their home in Mallorca, in the Catalan Mediterranean, with unparalleled views of the endless blue sea and unrepeatable sunsets. The sisters have a lot of time on their hands and not a care in the world — until tragedy strikes and their universe is hit by the loss of grandma Catalina. That is where this beautifully constructed and sensitive piece of cinema truly begins.
6. Hamnet
Directed by: Chloé Zhao
Starring: Paul Mescal, Jessie Buckley
Summary: Based on the novel by Maggie O’Farrell, Hamnet’s main character isn’t The Bard — played here by an impressive Paul Mescal — or even the child who gives the film its name. Hamnet belongs to Agnes, Shakespeare’s thoughtful wife, played by an enthralling Jessie Buckley, who bathes the film in her warmth.
Many historical accounts preface reports of Hamnet’s death with statistics about how common child mortality was in the 16th century, as though it barely made an impact. Hamnet rejects that premise, presenting Shakespeare not as a distant, untouchable genius but as a real man whose literary prowess was irrevocably impacted by his domestic life.
7. Hedda
Directed by: Nia DaCosta
Starring: Tessa Thompson, Tom Bateman, Nina Hoss
Summary: Newly wed and precariously dissatisfied with life, Hedda (Tessa Thompson), gun-loving daughter of the late General Gabler, has convinced her husband George (Tom Bateman), a timid but ambitious scholar, to throw a lavish party the couple cannot afford. On the teeming guest list is Eileen Lovborg (Nina Hoss), a celebrated author of a book exploring sexuality — and George’s key rival for a coveted academic post. Hedda sees the guests as pawns in an elaborate game she plans to orchestrate with ruthless precision.
8. If I Had Legs I’d Kick You
Directed by: Mary Bronstein
Starring: Rose Byrne
Summary: For Linda (Rose Byrne), being a working wife and mother in Montauk is not a life of serenity and joy but stress and anxiety. Her daughter is suffering from an unknown disease and is hooked up to a constantly beeping medical device. Her husband is away at sea working and unable to alleviate the crippling pressure weighing on her every minute. Tensions escalate when a hole in the ceiling bursts, a problematic event that metaphorically sums up the immense strain she’s under.
9. It Would Be Night in Caracas (Aún es de Noche en Caracas)
Directed by: Mariana Rondón, Marité Ugás
Starring: Natalia Reyes, Sheila Monterola, Moisés Angola
Summary: In the aftermath of a chaotic night of violence that sees war unleashed in her very neighbourhood, Adelaida (Natalia Reyes) is left stranded in a nearby apartment, one located across the hallway from her own. Also sheltering here is Santiago (Moisés Angola), a former revolutionary student who has been coerced into being part of the paramilitary civilian units who are terrorizing citizens. The two have to hide to survive, and together find some common ground as they work to comprehend the full extent of the social collapse around them.
10. Nika & Madison
Directed by: Eva Thomas
Starring: Star Slade, Ellyn Jade
Summary: In Thomas’ solo directorial feature debut, Madison (Star Slade) returns home to her community from university, greeted by her less-than-enthusiastic former best friend and cousin, Nika (Ellyn Jade). When Nika rejects Madison’s offer to accompany her to the local bar, a fateful decision is made.
After some drinks, Madison winds up in the back of a young police officer’s car, and things go very wrong from there. He attacks her, and Madison comes to her rescue. While the pair are forced back together, on the run, two police officers (played by Amanda Brugel and Shawn Doyle, also at the Festival in Youngblood) investigate what really happened.
11. Renoir
Directed by: Chie Hayakawa
Starring: Yui Suzuki, Hikari Ishida, Lily Franky
Summary: Drawing on her own childhood experiences and set in the late 1980s when the director was the same age as her protagonist, Hayakawa’s narrative unfolds through the eyes of Fuki (Yui Suzuki), an 11-year-old girl coping with her father’s terminal illness. As Fuki navigates the emotional turbulence of preadolescence, she is left to fend for herself, with her mother (Hikari Ishida) overwhelmed by work and the stress of caring for a dying husband (Lily Franky).
12. Swiped
Directed by: Rachel Lee Goldenberg
Starring: Lily James
Summary: It is 2012. The tech industry remains a boy’s club. But 22-year-old Whitney (Lily James) refuses to observe Silicon Valley’s glass ceiling. In the wake of a failed startup, Whitney joins the development team at MatchBox, a company she would rebrand as Tinder. As vice president of marketing, she cracks Tinder’s college campus market and sees its user base explode.
Whitney is on top of the world — until tensions between her and her male counterparts burgeon, and she finds herself subject to sexual harassment. It’s a devastating blow, but Whitney powers through, leaving that toxic workspace, filing a lawsuit, winning a settlement, moving to Texas, and going on to develop a new dating app that empowers women. In 2014, Bumble is born. And behind the scenes, Whitney finds a surprising match all her own.
13. The Man in My Basement
Directed by: Nadia Latif
Starring: Corey Hawkins, Willem Dafoe, Anna Diop
Summary: Charles Blakey’s (Corey Hawkins) life is falling apart. He’s lonely, he can’t find work, and he’s boozing way too much and about to lose his family’s Sag Harbor home. When a mysterious white man, Anniston Bennet (Willem Dafoe), offers to rent his basement for a hefty sum, a hesitant Blakey acquiesces despite serious doubts, especially about the decidedly odd accommodations Bennet requests.
While prepping the room for his tenant, Blakey discovers some mysterious heirlooms, possibly African tribal masks, which hint at a history he knows absolutely nothing about. An antiques buyer (Anna Diop) is able to fill in the gaps while embodying a compassionate counterpoint to his apathetic views.
14. The Currents (Las Corrientes)
Directed by: Milagros Mumenthaler
Starring: Isabel Aimé González Sola
Summary: Lina (Isabel Aimé González Sola), an accomplished, uncompromising Argentinian artist and designer, is in Switzerland to receive an award. In a powerful and symbolic film opening for the times, she falls from a bridge into the frigid waters below. In that moment, she later confesses to an old friend, she encounters deep peace — until the thought of her young daughter pulls her back. The aftermath of the incident leaves her with a paralysing phobia of water, a painful disconnection from the world she has wilfully built for herself, and a growing sense of isolation and fragility that threatens her creative drive and personal relationships, while forcing her to confront buried questions about identity, purpose, and belonging.
15. Poetic License
Directed by: Maude Apatow
Starring: Cooper Hoffman, Andrew Barth Feldman, Leslie Mann, Nico Parker
Summary: Ari (Cooper Hoffman) and Sam (Andrew Barth Feldman) are longtime friends, despite being very, very different. Ari is goofy and self-centred and has to get the last word on everything. The far more conservative, buttoned-down Sam is pursuing a career in finance, in hopes of gaining financial security and mollifying his family.
Enter married mother Liz (Leslie Mann), who’s auditing the boys’ poetry class. Having just moved to this small college town at the insistence of her husband (Cliff Smith, a.k.a. Method Man), she’s utterly discombobulated, feeling increasingly distanced from her daughter (Nico Parker), who’s desperate to return to big-city life. The trio’s friendship is soon imperiled when both boys fall madly for Liz. The ensuing complications cause unexpected and hilarious friction between Ari and Sam — and in Liz’s family.
