When will The Secret Agent (2025) premiere? Release date, cast details and more

Kleber‍‌‍‍‌‍‌‍‍‌ Mendonça Filho’s next feature, The Secret Agent (2025), is probably the most talked-about foreign film of the year. After a long period of development and the making of a multinational production, the Brazilian director returns to narrative cinema with a political thriller.

The story is steeped in the history of Brazil’s military dictatorship, with stylistic touches of neo-noir, and it deals with the topics of surveillance, resistance, and state violence.

The Secret Agent (2025) made an overnight impression at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival, where it was shown in the main competition and won multiple top prizes. Its reception turned the film into a major awards contender and Brazil’s official submission for the Best International Feature Film category at the 98th Academy Awards.

The Secret Agent (2025) premieres in North American theaters on November 26, 2025, following its Cannes debut and featuring Wagner Moura in the lead role.

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When and where is The Secret Agent releasing?

After its Cannes premiere on May 18, The Secret Agent (2025) went on to screen at festivals such as Telluride, Toronto, New York, Rome, and Adelaide. The Brazilian premiere of the film took place at Cinema São Luiz on September 10, 2025. The movie then had a wide release in Brazil and Germany on November 6, with Vitrine Filmes and Port au Prince Films handling the distribution.

In North America, Neon will release The Secret Agent (2025) on November 26, and Ad Vitam plans to distribute the film in France, starting December 17. Mubi has the rights to distribute the film in the UK, Ireland, Hispanic America, and India.

This was a three-year production that followed Kleber Mendonça Filho through the writing and directing stages. The financing included companies from Brazil, France, Germany, and the Netherlands. They shot the movie on Panavision equipment, and this is Wagner Moura's first Portuguese-language film in eight years.

The film also features the second collaboration between Mendonça Filho and German actor Udo Kier, who worked together on Bacurau previously.

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What is The Secret Agent (2025) about and who stars in it?

The Secret Agent (Image Via Neon)

The Secret Agent (2025) takes place in 1977, the last years of the Brazilian military dictatorship. The film revolves around Armando, a former educator who tries to stay out of the persecutors’ sight. During the carnival season, he goes to Recife and hides in the house of Dona Sebastiana, who is taking political dissidents under her wing.

While on the run from the authorities, Armando also pieces together bits of his family's past.

Contrary to his father’s efforts to stay off the radar, Armando’s son Fernando is with his grandfather, Sr. Alexandre, a cinema projectionist. On the other hand, police chief Euclides and his sons come across something strange during the carnival week: the leg of a human being found in a tiger shark, which eventually becomes a major factor in the general public's confusion over the carnival atmosphere.

As the political situation becomes more heated, the people who want Armando dead pay for his assassination. To survive, he escapes to a safe place. The story subsequently goes back to the present time, where Flavia, a history student, is investigating the resistance movement and is trying to figure out the details of Armando's life and death.

She meets Fernando, now a doctor, and he tells her that he hardly remembers his father or his childhood.

Wagner Moura is the lead actor in The Secret Agent (2025), who plays Armando and is also the actor for the older version of Fernando. The cast features Carlos Francisco, Tânia Maria, Robério Diógenes, Maria Fernanda Cândido, Gabriel Leone, Hermila Guedes, Alice Carvalho, Isabél Zuaa, and Udo Kier.

The film’s supporting characters are portrayed by Roney Villela, Laura Lufési, Thomás Aquino, Kaiony Venâncio and João Vitor Silva, among ‍‌‍‍‌‍‌‍‍‌others.

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The movie is set to release on 17 December 2025.

Edited by Sakshi Singh