{"id":54245,"date":"2025-09-10T02:10:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-10T02:10:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/54245\/"},"modified":"2025-09-10T02:10:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-10T02:10:07","slug":"the-15-wildest-coolest-films-we-cant-wait-to-see-at-fantastic-fest-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/54245\/","title":{"rendered":"The 15 Wildest, Coolest Films We Can\u2019t Wait to See at Fantastic Fest 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

The most fantastic time of year is here again. io9 is about to head down to Austin, Texas<\/a>,\u00a0for a week of\u00a0fun, fucked-up films<\/a>\u00a0at Fantastic Fest, one of the\u00a0coolest, most unique genre film festivals<\/a> in the entire world. It\u2019s a festival that focuses on only showing the weirdest, most out-there, totally badass films, and we\u2019re excited to jump right in as always.<\/p>\n

What makes attending Fantastic Fest difficult, though, is that every single movie sounds awesome. It was curated that way. So how do you choose what to see? Well, this year, as always, a few movies have names you\u2019ve heard of\u2014stuff like the horror sequel Black Phone 2\u00a0or the streaming anthology V\/H\/S\/Halloween. But beyond that, you just have to go with your gut.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been attending Fantastic Fest for about 15 years and, over that time, I\u2019ve come up with my own unique system to pick out which films I want to see most. First, I go through the entire list of feature films and read about every single one. I then rank them based on a) what I think the readers of io9 will be interested in, and b) what I want to watch. Then, I start at the top of the nearly 100-film list and attempt to work my way down it.<\/p>\n

What follows are the 15 films currently at the top of that list, which also happen to be a great example of just how weird and wonderful Fantastic Fest can be. The festival runs from September 18 to 25 in Austin, Texas. Click here for more<\/a>. And stay tuned to io9 for our coverage from the festival.<\/p>\n

\"BulkBen Wheatley\u2019s new movie, Bulk. \u2013 Fantastic Fest Bulk <\/p>\n

Director Ben Wheatley (Kill List, Meg 2) is back with a bonkers-sounding movie about a man who is sent to find someone in a house but realizes that every door in the house opens to a new dimension. As a huge fan of alternate realities, multiple timelines, and all that kind of Primer\/Back to the Future Part II stuff, this sounds like that fused with House of Leaves<\/a>. Sign me up.<\/p>\n

Vicious <\/p>\n

Dakota Fanning stars in this film that is actually being released by Paramount, but I wasn\u2019t quite aware of it yet. Fanning plays a girl who is presented with a box. Inside the box, she is to put three things: something she needs, something she hates, and something she loves. And, apparently, all hell breaks loose.<\/p>\n

Bad Haircut <\/p>\n

Getting a haircut can be one of the most relaxing, invigorating things ever. That is, unless it\u2019s a bad one. And in Bad Haircut, not only does someone get a bad haircut, they get it from a barber they slowly realize is completely psychotic and maybe supernatural, and, well, we are in.<\/p>\n

Disforia <\/p>\n

Teasing shades of Funny Games and Hostel, Disforia is set in a dystopian future where a family is targeted by a group that pays to watch humans torture other humans. Yeah, like I said, Fantastic Fest can be messed up.<\/p>\n

Whistle <\/p>\n

Director Corin Hardy (The Nun) is at the helm of this simple, scary-sounding movie about a group of students who find a whistle. A whistle that, when you blow it, your death immediately starts coming for you.<\/p>\n

\"DontDon\u2019t Leave the Kids Alone, good title and rule to live by. \u2013 Fantastic Fest Don\u2019t Leave the Kids Alone <\/p>\n

Imagine you\u2019re a kid. Your parents just bought a new house and scheduled a babysitter so they can go out. The babysitter cancels. So, your parents leave you home alone for a few hours. What could go wrong? Well, then you find out your new house is haunted, and it\u2019s just you at home? A lot. This is nightmare fuel at its finest.<\/p>\n

Appofeniacs <\/p>\n

Sean Gunn and Jermaine Fowler lead an ensemble cast in the story of a hacker who causes violent havoc by creating and releasing deepfake videos all over the world.<\/p>\n

The Curse <\/p>\n

Inspired by films like The Ring and The Grudge, The Curse is about a woman who investigates her friend\u2019s death, only to realize the truth may lie in some sort of social media-driven evil.<\/p>\n

A Useful Ghost <\/p>\n

All ghosts don\u2019t have to be bad, right? Case in point, this film is about a man who loses his wife, only to discover that she is reincarnated as their vacuum cleaner. The Fantastic Fest site tagged this one with the phrase \u201cvacuum sex.\u201d What else needs to be said?<\/p>\n

The Plague <\/p>\n

Joel Edgerton co-stars in this film about a group of tight-knit, upper-middle-class kids, many of whom have a mysterious skin disease that infects you if you touch it.<\/p>\n

\"ObsessionObsession is playing at Fantastic Fest 2025. \u2013 Fantastic Fest Obsession <\/p>\n

A man with a crush on a co-worker buys something that allows him to make one wish. He wishes for the co-worker to like him, which unleashes an otherworldly force neither of them is ready to deal with.<\/p>\n

Dolly <\/p>\n

Seann William Scott and Ethan Suplee co-star in the film about a couple who are abducted and subsequently put through hell by a murderous psychopath wearing a giant doll mask.<\/p>\n

Beast of War <\/p>\n

Think of the USS Indianapolis speech from Jaws, but as its own movie. That\u2019s the vibe we get from Beast of War, which follows a group of downed soldiers during World War II who have to deal with a killer shark.<\/p>\n

Decorado <\/p>\n

Imagine an animated version of The Truman Show with a mouse. That\u2019s what Decorado sounds like, as an animated mouse must try to escape a world he believes to be false.<\/p>\n

The Ice Tower <\/p>\n

Marion Cotillard stars in a reimagining of The Ice Princess set in the 1970s French film industry. She\u2019s an actress making a version of the story who is befriended by a runaway orphan. What does that even mean? I can\u2019t wait to find out.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s just a few of the movies we\u2019re interested in seeing. Fantastic Fest runs from September 18 to 25, so keep checking io9 for more reactions, reviews, and more.<\/p>\n

\n

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel<\/a>, Star Wars<\/a>, and Star Trek<\/a> releases, what\u2019s next for the DC Universe on film and TV<\/a>, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The most fantastic time of year is here again. io9 is about to head down to Austin, Texas,\u00a0for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54246,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[263],"tags":[18,117,39444,19,17,327],"class_list":{"0":"post-54245","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-fantastic-fest","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-movies"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54245"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54245\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}