“Manages to thrill and tantalize” THE PLAYLIST

“A smart, scathing masterwork about our modern madness” THE DAILY BEAST

“It is satirical, polemical, infuriated… a scattershot fusillade of scorn” THE GUARDIAN

Sovereign is proud to announce the release of Radu Jude’s brilliantly irreverent social satire Kontinental ’25 in select UK cinemas on 31st October 2025. The film will be shown at this year’s BFI London Film Festival in partnership with American Express, in the ‘Create’ strand, celebrating the electricity of the creative process.

Winner of the prestigious Silver Berlin Bear for Best Screenplay at the Berlin International Festival, and nominated for Best Film, Kontinental ’25 is acclaimed Romanian filmmaker Radu Jude’s follow-up to his award-winning film Do Not Expect Too Much From The End Of The World, and the controversial Golden Berlin Bear winner Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn. Once again he casts his sardonic eye on the modern world with dry, and often unexpected, wit - not to mention the occasional dinosaur statue.

Eszter Tompa (who appears in Jude’s forthcoming take on the Bram Stoker classic Dracula) stars as a bailiff caught in a moral quandary after a tragedy occurs connected to her work, in a film that is urgently up to the minute and strikingly provocative. The Daily Beast says: “at once incisive and ambiguous, it’s proof that Jude is operating on a completely different level than most of his contemporaries.”

Shooting back-to-back with his Dracula project, Jude’s film was made in 10 days and shot on an iPhone - giving it a naturalistic energy, and allowing the writer/director to say what he wanted to say on his own terms. “Many films about poverty or social violence are made with multimillion-dollar budgets,” says Jude. “There’s a mismatch sometimes, and I wanted to push against that.”

A playful, persuasive homage to Roberto Rossellini’s Europe ’51, but definitely unique and surprising, Jude shows once again that he is one of the most innovative, exciting and daring directors working today.

SYNOPSIS
Orsolya is a bailiff in Cluj, the main city in Transylvania. One day she must evict a homeless man who lives in the basement of a building. An unexpected event creates a moral crisis she tries to solve as best she can.

Kontinental ‘25 will be released in selected UK cinemas on 31 October 2025

Kontinental ‘25 screens at the BFI London Film Festival in partnership with American Express on 17/18 October 2025

KONTINENTAL ‘25: FESTIVAL SCREENINGS
Kontinental ‘25 had its world premier at the Berlin International Film Festival, where it won the Silver Berlin Bear for Best Screenplay, and the Golden Silver Bear for Best Film; it was nominated for the Grand Prix at the Luxembourg City Film Festival.

ABOUT SOVEREIGN
Sovereign releases auteur-driven feature films in the UK, from emerging and established international talent. Our carefully curated titles have played to strong critical and audience acclaim, often premiering at renowned international film festivals, including Cannes, Berlinale, Toronto, Venice and many more.

Previously acquired titles include Peru’s entry into the Oscars Song Without A Name, which screened in the Directors’ Fortnight section at the 72nd Cannes Film Festival; Philippine crime drama Verdict, which received the Special Orizzonti Jury Prize at the 76th Venice Film Festival; historical drama Malmkrog, which won Best Director in the Encounter section and opened the 70th Berlin Film Festival; Argentinian psychological thriller A Common Crime, which received its world premiere at the 70th Berlin Film Festival; Bad Luck Banging Or Loony Porn, which won the Golden Bear at the 2021 Berlin International Film Festival; and Kirill Serebrennikov’s Petrov’s Flu, winner of the prestigious CTS Artist award at last year’s Cannes Film festival, and also nominated for the Palme d’Or; Memoria, from Palme d’Or winner Apichatpong Weerasethakul, starring Tilda Swinton, which won the Cannes Jury Prize in 2021; Bolivian director Kiro Russo’s The Great Movement, winner of the Special Jury Prize in the Horizons strand at the 2021 Venice Film Festival; Ruben Östlund’s Triangle of Sadness, starring Woody Harrelson, which won the Palme d’Or at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival; Bent Hamer’s award-winning The Middle Man starring Pål Sverre Hagen and Paul Gross; Francisca Alegría’s The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future, which was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival; the thriller Inside, from writer/director Vasilis Katsoupis and starring Willem Dafoe; Laurent Nègre’s World War two drama A Forgotten Man, starring Michael Neueschwander as a Swiss diplomat; Kirill Serebrennikov’s astonishing biopic Tchaikovsky’s Wife; Sonia Kronlund’s conman documentary The Man With A Thousand Faces; Radu Jude’s satire Do Not Expect Too Much From The End Of The World; and Christopher Murray’s mystical drama Sorcery; Viggo Mortensen western Eureka; the extraordinary documentary A Wolfpack Named Ernesto; and the powerful, award-winning Red Path

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