The TorinoFilmLab (TFL), one of Europe’s most prestigious platforms for the development of emerging filmmaking talent, has announced the 10 projects selected for the 2025 edition of its FeatureLab program. Focused on debut or second fiction features in advanced stages of development, the call received 179 submissions from around the world, from which only 10 were chosen.
Among the selected filmmakers is Argentine director Federico Luis, who will participate with his second feature film The Dog Trainer, produced by Fernando Bascuñán (Planta Producciones). His debut Simon of the Mountain was awarded the Grand Prize at the 2024 Cannes Critics’ Week. The Dog Trainer follows the story of “The Motionless Man,” a mysterious trainer of killer dogs who lives with his Nurse and twenty trained canines. The arrival of a young soldier, sent by the Army to learn the trade, disrupts the fragile power dynamics of the household.
Also selected was American filmmaker Lucy Kerr with The Passion of Angela Simmons, developed in collaboration with producer Megan Pickrell. Kerr received the Best Director award in the Filmmakers of the Present competition at Locarno 2023 for her debut Family Portrait, a film that was screened in Argentina as part of the Caligari Autores series organized by Revista Caligari.
Another standout project is La Canícula, by Dominican director Rod Llaverías, known for his short films screened at Rotterdam, San Sebastián, and Locarno. The film is produced by Wendy Espinal. Meanwhile, Franco-Senegalese filmmaker Linda Lô will participate with Lucky Girl, her solo debut, after previously co-writing screenplays with Rebecca Zlotowski.
FeatureLab 2025 will include 22 participants from 13 countries — including Argentina, Chile, the United States, the Dominican Republic, France, and Norway — and will run from June to November with in-person workshops in Oslo and Turin, as well as an online module. The program will be led by Violeta Bava and Amra Bakšić Čamo and will culminate at the TFL Meeting Event, the lab’s co-production market.
Among the recent films developed through FeatureLab are The Caravan by Zuzana Kirchnerová, Mama by Or Sinai, and Renoir by Chie Hayakawa — all selected for Cannes 2025 — as well as Little Trouble Girls by Urška Djukić, which premiered at the latest Berlinale.
Full list of selected projects:
LA CANÍCULA – 1st feature film (fiction)
Logline: Dolores, in her 50s, a hermit caring for her ailing mother and aunt in a decaying Dominican estate, yearns to escape her isolated life. When a long-lost aunt returns, she stirs up painful memories, forcing Dolores and the elder women to confront their generational traumas in a surreal world haunted by mongrel dogs.
Writer/Director: Rod Llaverías (Dominican Republic)
Producer: Wendy Espinal (Dominican Republic)
Production Company: 1981 Cinema Collective / Dominican Republic
CULEBRA CUT – 2nd feature film (fiction)
Logline: In 2000, following a century of American occupation, Panama regained control of the Canal Zone territory. A Panamanian soldier enters the old military bases for the first time. While assigned to clean an artificial lake, he stumbles upon a mysterious woman in the jungle. She is revealed to be the former leader of the Culebra community’s resistance who had once fought against forced displacement. Their encounter sparks a journey of personal transformation, forcing the soldier to confront his own roots.
Writer/Director: Ana Elena Tejera (Panama)
Producer: Tomás Cortés (Panama)
Production Company: Mestizio Cinema / Panama
THE DOG TRAINER – 2nd feature film (fiction)
Logline: Despite his deformed body, a small, immobile man is the best Belgian Malinois trainer in the country. He lives with his nurse and his twenty dogs trained to kill. The arrival of a young soldier, sent by the National Army, destabilizes the delicate balance of power that kept the house standing.
Writer/Director: Federico Luis (Argentina)
Producer: Fernando Bascuñán (Chile)
Production Company: Planta / Chile
INVERNO – 2nd feature film (fiction)
Logline: Within a week, the lives of three teenagers intertwine around the burning of a Roma camp. Alessandra is raped, Thomas is accused and Alex has to choose between the truth and bigger interests at play.
Writer/Director: Matteo Tortone (Italy)
Producer: Alessandro Carroli (Italy)
Writer: Zelia Zbogar (Italy)
Production Company: EIE film / Italy
LUCKY GIRL – 1st feature film (fiction)
Logline: During a vacation in Bordeaux, Lili, 4, and her brothers, aged 9 and 20, find themselves left to their own devices when their flamboyant mother returns without them to Gabon to run her restaurant- discotheque. Torn between the desire to return to her lost paradise and the duty to take her “chance” while making her mother proud, Lili will grow up, use all the strategies to survive, succeed and find the lights of her native Africa.
Writer/Director: Linda Lô (France/Senegal)
Producer: Didar Domehri (France)
Production Company: Maneki Films / France
MAR DE LEVA – 1st feature film (fiction)
Logline: Elena travels to her childhood beach house in a remote region of Colombia. There, she meets Teo, a 3-year-old boy, who disappears at sea just hours after their meeting. Haunted by the event, Elena returns to the city, forced to face her crippling doubts about becoming a mother.
Writer/Director: Mariana Saffon (Colombia)
Producer: Franco Lolli (Colombia)
Production Company: Evidencia Films / Colombia
THE PASSION OF ANGELA SIMMONS – 2nd feature film (fiction)
Logline: Amid the rituals of Texas sorority life and debutante season in 2004, a college girl spirals into obsession and a haunting sense of divine purpose after witnessing a traumatic collapse during rush and a near-suffocation at a wrestling match—unraveling her identity as she searches for meaning, or madness, within the pageantry that once defined her.
Writer/Director: Lucy Kerr (United States)
Producer: Megan Pickrell (United States)
Production Company: Conjuring Productions LLC / USA
THREE AGES – 1st feature film (fiction)
Logline: Xiaowei, a 7-year-old Chinese boy, arrives at Barcelona in 1992 to reunite with his parents who emigrated to Spain when he was still a baby. Kaiwen, his mother, struggles to create a bond with him, but Xiaowei is unable to correspond. Their difficult relationship will extend throughout his adolescence and adulthood, facing various moments of crisis such as the divorce of his parents and the closure of the family business.
Writer/Director: Jiajie Yu Yan (Spain)
Producer: César Esteban Alenda (Spain)
Production Company: SOLITA FILMS / Spain
TO LEAVE, TO STAY – 1st feature film (fiction)
Logline: On a Cambodian fishing island, Mera is turning 18. She rejects a marriage arranged by her aunt and instead organizes a trip with her close friend Bopha to a remote rocky island to visit a soldier who she met online. Weeks later, Mera vanishes. Bopha’s search begins. As the weeks pass without resolution, Bopha starts to understand the inner secrets and hidden desires of her missing friend, and her own.
Writer/Director: Danech San (Cambodia)
Producer: Daniel Mattes (United States)
Production Company: Anti-Archive / Cambodia
WOMAN WALKING – 1st feature film (fiction)
Logline: When his wife suddenly begins to wander endlessly and unresponsive around a meadow on their farm, Sigurd is thrown into an absurd and heartbreaking struggle to bring her back – while his nine-year-old daughter slowly slips away from him, and the truth about their family threatens to tear them apart.
Writer/Director: Kerren Lumer- Klabbers (Denmark)
Writer: Emil Wahl (Norway)
Producer: Ingvil Sæther Berger (Norway)
Production Company: Motlys as / Norway
