Just ahead of International Women’s Day this Saturday, we present the line-up for our International Feature Film Competition for women directors.
Black comedies, biting satires and surreal dramas covering topics ranging from family and gentrification to turbo-capitalism. Unexpected angles on unwanted, creativity-crushing motherhood. Looking back at feminist history to help us understand the present.
The eight competition entries tell stories of resistance through their characters – against private capitalism’s excesses, against oppressive social mechanisms of self-empowerment and against the growing lack of empathy in the Western world.
Mar Coll, Rima Das, Antoinette Jadaone, Sudabeh Mortezai, Aslı Özge, Sonja Prosenc, Roya Sadat and Athina Rachel Tsangari all have films nominated for the €15,000 International Feature Film Award 2025.

Click here for the International Feature Film Competition.

Changes in Competition
The competition was created in Dortmund in 2005, back in the days when programmes at many festivals were lagging way behind in terms of gender equality and only a handful of feature films made by women were shown in cinemas. Since then, IFFF Dortmund+Köln’s lucrative award has steadily contributed to raising the profile and visibility of female directors. The 50:50 target may still be some way off. But the lobbying for equal rights in the film industry is finally starting to see results – women have a greater presence at festivals and reach larger cinema, TV and streaming audiences. Many of our previous award winners are now established names in the film world, including Andrea Arnold, Maren Ade, Naomi Kawase, Małgorzata Szumowska and Jasmila Žbanić.
There is huge interest in discovering and promoting new talented filmmakers, which is why debut films are now usually quickly followed by a second feature film. The big hurdle, especially for women, is continuing to make films once they get past the newcomer phase. This is clear from the submissions of the past few years, and from the long waits between the films. We are now reflecting this development going forward, and only take entries for the Dortmund competition from filmmakers with their third feature film. We present established directors who we see as the potential big names of the future.
To support the distribution of films by women, the prize of €15,000 will be split between the director (€10,000) and the German distributor (€5,000).

Jury
The winner is chosen by a three-strong top-class international jury made up of African-American director Julie Dash, producer and director of Seoul International Women’s Film Festival Hei-rim Hwang and German director Yasemin Şamdereli.