Sci-Fi-London 2025: Line-up revealed for genre film festival

Out-of-this-world news sci-fi fans! The always-excellent Sci-Fi-London returns this year (in the brand new, shiny location of Picturehouse Finsbury Park) on 19-22 June 2025 and with it comes a plethora of new sci-fi movies for audiences to enjoy! The line-up has been revealed and includes movies that will make you think, laugh, cry, or eager to watch again.

Check up the full line-up here…

Thurs 19th June

19:30 MATTER OF TIME

What if you could hit pause on life itself?

Charlie (Myles Erlick), a 29-year-old aspiring video game designer, sees his world change when his friend Gibbs (Sean Astin), a toy shop owner, hands him a mysterious device that can stop time. Suddenly, Charlie’s world becomes a playground where seconds freeze and possibilities multiply.

But messing with time isn’t just a trick. As Charlie dives deeper into this strange power, he’s forced to confront the ethical dilemmas and personal consequences that come with bending reality. Caught between ambition, regret, and temptation, he must decide whether controlling time means controlling his fate or losing it altogether.

Friday 20th June

18:30 THE STRANGE DARK

Edgar thinks he can see the future, his wife thinks he’s lost the plot, and his daughter isn’t sure what to believe.

But when strangers appear at their door, saying they are from Double Star Accounting, it’s clear something very odd is going on.

Written and directed by Chris Messineo, this film is a sharp, unsettling and darkly funny feature that plays with perception, truth and quiet paranoia. Tightly scripted and confidently performed, it’s a story that keeps you guessing and leaves you thinking.

Low on budget but high on invention, this is a great debut and a fine example of indie sci-fi at its best—imaginative, clever, and just the right side of unhinged.

20:30 SCHIRKOA: IN LIES WE TRUST

Jump into a surreal, dystopian world where everyone wears a paper bag over their head— literally!

This breathtaking animated feature blends politics, philosophy and cyber-noir into an eclectic vision of the future.

In a city of conformity and control, one disillusioned government employee accidentally stumbles upon a mysterious rebel movement challenging the system. What follows is a hypnotic journey through dreamlike cityscapes, corporate nightmares, and whispered revolutions.

With stunning animation and a voice cast that includes Asia Argento, Gaspar Noé, and Anurag Kashyap, this movie isn’t simply another animated indie film, it offers something much more.

20:45 AFTER US, THE FLOOD

How would you live your life if you got a second chance?

By 2064, the planet is on the brink, devastated by climate collapse. Henrik is a brilliant young physicist whose team develops a fusion reactor capable of providing endless clean energy. But when their invention is hijacked for profit, the dream turns into a nightmare.

In a final bid to save humanity, the UN deploys a radical form of time travel, one that sends a person’s consciousness back to the moment of their birth. Henrik is chosen to go back and steer the world away from disaster. But when things go wrong, he wakes up in an unfamiliar body, facing a very different life, and the same ticking clock.

This is a thought-provoking and emotionally rich film that blends grounded drama with speculative sci-fi. It asks urgent questions about identity, accountability, and why, despite all we know, we still struggle to change.

Saturday 21st June

15:00 NORMA DORMA

Norma’s life has stalled since her partner Henri mysteriously vanished. Stuck in a dead-end job and raising their child alone, her only escape is sleep, where Henri still visits her in vivid, lucid dreams. But when she wakes one morning inexplicably pregnant, those dreams begin to bleed into waking life.

As reality twists and time unravels, Norma talks to a new employee at her firm, Mikka, a person linked to Henri and his sleep experiments, who has some secrets of her own.

Together, they explore the fragile boundary between the subconscious and the real, chasing answers buried deep in the mind.

A quietly surreal, hypnotic and deeply human story, the film explores grief, longing, and the power of dreams to both heal and haunt.

Dreams can be a refuge. But what if they become the only place that feels real?

17:45 THE SILENT PLANET

In a desolate future, Theodore (Elias Koteas) serves a life sentence alone on a remote planet, his only companion the haunting echoes of his past.

His solitude is disrupted by the arrival of Niyya (Briana Middleton), a new inmate whose presence forces Theodore to confront memories he thought he’d long suppressed. As their uneasy coexistence unfolds, paranoia and mistrust grow, blurring the line between reality and delusion.

A gripping piece of cerebral sci-fi, the film explores isolation, memory, and the fragile nature of identity. Both stark and lyrical, it’s a haunting meditation on what connects us—and what we try to leave behind.

Are memories real if they have no connection to the world we now live in? Can we ever truly leave it all behind?

18:00 CAIHONG CITY

Caihong City, a post-apocalyptic wasteland where glitches, unicorns and desperation swirl beneath neon skies.

In the slums of this fractured metropolis, a dying Chinese genius named Liu Junjie races to complete a Supertask—an impossibly complex challenge that could earn him passage into the neighbouring utopia, Furui City. But as he builds ‘the map’ (a perfect virtual replica of Caihong), a strange glitch appears, and with it, everything begins to unravel.

Enter Serioja, a cryptic Russian drifter, and Lavinia, a fierce, self-destructive Romanian prostitute. Together, they set out across the rainbow-lit sectors of the city, chasing answers and uncovering a truth darker than any of them imagined.

A sci-fi fairy tale of filth, loneliness, and corrupted dreams.bIt’s glitchy. It’s grimy. It’s glorious.

20:45 SWORD OF VENGEANCE

Welcome to the badlands of post-apocalyptic Serbia—where everything’s broken, brutal, and boiling with rage.

When a young warrior’s family is slaughtered, there’s only one thing left to do: pick up a sword, hop on a bike, and carve a bloody path across the wasteland. But revenge isn’t simple, and neither is survival. Along the way, he must face deranged warlords, radioactive cults, and visions that may not be real… or may be worse than reality.

Ćeranić delivers a gritty, full-throttle epic bursting with punk energy, twisted folklore, and stunning set-pieces. With bone-crunching fights, strange visions, and a world held together with scrap metal and sheer anger, this film is a remarkable Serbian production and is a gloriously unhinged ride through the ruins.

If you like your cinema loud, mad, and covered in dust, this one’s for you. Maybe bring earplugs!

21:00 WE ARE ALIENS

A colourful group of furry, plush-like aliens descends from the sky with a seemingly grim mission: to exterminate humanity and put an end to the damage inflicted on Earth.

But these visitors are no ordinary invaders, brought to life through intricate puppetry rather than visual effects, they have a soft, almost playful feel that contrasts with their apocalyptic goal.

As the aliens meet a range of humans, their views begin to soften through a series of awkward yet heartfelt interactions. Blending musical numbers, dry humour, drama and a splash of classic sci-fi, the film explores themes of identity and human connection to oneself and the world around.

With a deliberately measured pace and lo-fi aesthetics, the story leans into surrealism, and through its puppetry and catchy soundtrack, this existential musical invites viewers to reflect on empathy, hope, and the possibility of coexistence in an increasingly fragmented world—think The Day the Earth Stood Still meets The Flumps!

Sunday 22nd June

14:00 STRANGE JOURNEY: THE STORY OF ROCKY HORROR

From its origins as a London fringe theatre play to its meteoric rise, fall and resurrection as the biggest cult film of all time, this is the definitive story of The Rocky Horror Show.

With intimate access to its creator Richard O’Brien and other major players such as Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon and Lou Adler, the documentary explores what makes the play and film so singular: Its groundbreaking and transgressive themes, iconic performances and epic songs that took over popular culture. The cult phenomenon that sprang around it is unparalleled, and created not only the midnight screenings which continue to this day, but also a safe haven for those who have ever felt different or marginalised.

16:30 AIRE, JUST BREATHE

The year is 2147. Earth is silent, scorched, and dying. A chemical war has rendered all men sterile, and humanity teeters on the brink of extinction.

In an underground bunker, conservation biologist Tania (Sophie Gaëlle) works tirelessly to preserve the species, aided by VIDA (voiced by Paz Vega), an AI system with a growing sense of self.

Their isolation is disrupted by the arrival of Azarías (Jalsen Santana), a mysterious traveller whose presence challenges the fragile balance they’ve maintained.

This is a visually arresting sci-fi drama that delves into themes of survival, trust, and the complexities of human–AI relationships.

A significant contribution to Caribbean science fiction cinema. This showing will also include a Q&A

19:00 THE FIX

In a future where Earth’s atmosphere has become toxic, survival depends on an expensive drug, manufactured and tightly controlled by the powerful biotech corporation Aethera.

The wealthy live safely behind sealed barriers, while the rest of the population struggles to survive in crumbling cities beneath a poisoned sky.

A rising model and the public face of Aethera is exposed to a mysterious experimental compound at a party, and her body begins to undergo frightening changes. As her transformation accelerates, she uncovers a disturbing conspiracy behind Aethera’s so-called miracle cure and the true cost of society’s dependence on it.

Egan delivers a slick and stylish sci-fi thriller exploring biohacking, identity, and the cost of corporate ambition. Visually striking and sharply told, The Fix offers a thought-provoking glimpse into a future where the boundaries of humanity are dangerously unclear.

This showing also includes a Q&A.

That’s not all that Sci-Fi-London has for audiences over its packed weekend. There will also be a showcase of shorts, a creator signing with author Henry Chebaane, a gallery of original artworks by internationally published sci-fi artist John R. Mullaney, a filmmaker mixer, a DVD swap meet, kosmic karaoke, a pub quiz PLUS Sci-Fido – bring your pet dressed-to-impress to win great prizes!

Sci-Fi-London will take place on 19 – 22 June 2025 at the Picturehouse Finsbury Park. Find out more here.