As with most events this year, the Fantasia International Film Festival is heading back to theaters for its 2022 edition, the 26th year of its existence. From July 14 to August 3, Montreal, Quebec, will fill its screens at Concordia Hall Cinema, the Cinémathèque Québécoise, Cinéma du Musée, and the McCord Museum with the best genre fare the industry has to offer. If you’re in town there won’t be a better ticket this summer.
The festivities are bookended by the world premiere of KC Carthew’s eco-action fantasy Polaris on opening night and, as closer, the North American premiere of July Jung’s Cannes alum Next Sohee. Between them comes the usual mix of festival favorites heading to Canada for the first time and eagerly anticipated titles making their debut. From a special screening of Bodies Bodies Bodies to Neil Labute’s House of Darkness or Wai Ka-Fai’s Detective vs. Sleuths to the return of the Ringu wraith with Hisashi Kimura’s Sadako DX, you’d be hard-pressed not to get excited for a handful of selections at minimum.
Don’t forget the other treats on offer too—whether it be 4K restoration screenings (Álex de la Iglesia’s Acción Mutante from 1993 and Jeff Lieberman’s Blue Sunshine from 1978 among them), honors for John Woo (Career Achievement Award) and Kier-La Janisse (Canadian Trailblazer Award), or a massive selection of over 200 shorts. There’s a reason Fantasia lasts three weeks.
And if the schedule seems a bit daunting, here are a few thoughts the Film Stage team wrote down about 10 highlights:
The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future (Francisca Alegria) – July 18 & 20
Chilean filmmaker Francisca Alegria’s The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future opens on pensive shots of the river and its inhabitants, most of whom are dead. As the dying and already passed fish sing a song of sadness, a woman, motorcycle helmet in tow, rises from the water. She walks aimlessly, hopping on a local bus and appearing outside a story, scaring her ex-husband into enough anxiety to land him in the hospital. The next 90 minutes of Alegria’s meditative drama exist largely in silence or one-sided conversation––people confronting their past like a monster that grows with each passing day. – Michael Frank (review)
Dark Glasses (Dario Argento) – July 30
As you watch Dark Glasses, Dario Argento’s first film in a decade, it’s nice to think back on his recent performance as the aging film critic in Gaspar Noé’s Vortex—a man who wistfully quoted Edgar Allen Poe’s theories on dreams as he wandered through an apartment covered with canonical posters and movie detritus—only to look back up and see the blind protagonist of his latest film, and the young Chinese boy who has become her valet, attacked by a pack of unruly river snakes. Yes, Dario Argento’s first film in ten years is pretty fun, for a while—and no, not near his best. – Rory O’Connor (review)
Happer’s Comet (Tyler Taormina) – July 24 & 27
Happer’s Comet is a hypnotic, sensory, dialogue-free film that comes in at a polite 62 minutes. The director is Tyler Taormina, an LA filmmaker who directed the great suburban surrealist work Ham on Rye in 2019. His latest is both a bewitching ode to the night owl and, given its constraints, quietly energizing artistic expression. – Rory O’Connor (review)
Heaven: To the Land of Happiness (Sang-soo Im) – July 30
I have nothing against broad comedies, and Heaven: To the Land of Happiness is one designed to appeal to the broadest base possible. It’s very clear from the get-go who we should sympathize with, what they need to overcome on their journey (for 203 to reconnect with his estranged daughter, for Namsik to find a new outlook on life), and that there will be some comical ha-ha hardships along the way courtesy the clueless criminals and law enforcement. Nothing contentious or out-of-the-ordinary happens to offend anyone’s sensitivities, the principal weapon used throughout the film is a taser. Judged on those terms, the film is quite successful—it delivers on the promise of an undemandingly enjoyable night at the cinema. – Zhuo-Ning Su (review)
Huesera (Michelle Garza Cervera) – July 29
Huesera is a psychological thriller dealing more in the myriad uncertainties that have ravaged Valeria’s life. There’s her individualism constantly being undermined by family. There’s her sexual orientation, career, post-partum depression, and more causing fight-or-flight impulses to go into overdrive until you can’t help worrying about her safety. And when that journey to the “inside” finally arrives it’s less about ghosts and blood than it is a reinvention. Cervera and co-writer Abia Castillo are breaking Valeria down to build her back up. Will it be as the maternal force her family always wished she’d become? Or as the independent free spirit dying to laugh and run? – Jared Mobarak (review)
Incredible But True (Quentin Dupieux) – July 31
Dupieux’s popularity on the festival circuit can be tied to that succinctness as much as his auteur credentials (sepia colors, a cocktail of genres, stoner tones) and uncanny sense of humor. (If you’re only sticking around for 70 minutes, his films seem to say, why not spend them on a puerile laugh.) His latest, another rough absurdist gem, goes one further in offering a playful, compelling twist on an enduring sc-fi trope. There is also some uneasy gender stereotyping. There is also what one medical practitioner refers to as an “iPenis.” For better or worse, it’s over in a flash. – Rory O’Connor (review)
Lynch/Oz (Alexandre O Philippe) – July 17
Lynch/Oz explores the connection between the famous film and dream-focused director. From documentarian Alexandre O. Philippe, this six-chapter inquiry acts as a video essay on that link, each section narrated by a critic or filmmaker, from Amy Nicholson to David Lowery. A mixture of archival footage, interview snippets, and a vast collection of movie scenes, the segments traverse the landscape of Lynch’s directorial efforts and clear parallels to aspects of The Wizard of Oz, nearly all of which bear dramatic and literal gravity. The documentary becomes repetitive in this way, acting as a video assignment for each film lover allotted 20 minutes to riff on the history of cinema through such lens. – Michael Frank (review)
Resurrection (Andrew Semans) – July 26
Not all is well from the opening scenes of Andrew Semans’ Resurrection, based on his own Black List-charting script, which begins as a chilly, slick workplace and mother-daughter drama before exploding into a stomach-churning psychological thriller. Though its preposterous narrative ends up getting into rather silly territory that obfuscates its initial, more pertinent thematic ideas, the film is another stellar showcase for the immense talent of Rebecca Hall. One also can’t entirely fault the director for following through and taking his rather illogically extreme set-up to its most logically absurd conclusion. – Jordan Raup (review)
Sharp Stick (Lena Dunham) – July 30 & August 1
Lena Dunham’s Sharp Stick, her first feature since 2010’s Tiny Furniture, finds the writer-director again taking big swings with mixed results. Set in Los Angeles, as Dunham herself moved to the West Coast in 2020, the sex-filled comedy / drama follows Sarah Jo (Kristine Froseth), a 26-year-old virgin who begins an affair with Josh (Jon Bernthal), hunky father of the child she cares for. Once she starts having sex she cannot stop, determined to cross every carnal act and scenario off her construction-paper bucket list. – Michael Frank (review)
Speak No Evil (Christian Tafdrup) – July 29 & August 1
Speak No Evil is terrifying, shocking, and deeply, deeply unsettling. There’s no getting around the upset factor. Audiences who catch this Sundance entry from Denmark should be warned: this one’s gonna hurt. The latest from Christian Tafdrup has the brutal shock value of George Sluizer’s The Vanishing and gut-punching, visceral impact of Haneke’s Funny Games. Speak No Evil does not reach the level of ingenuity and freshness found in those similarly potent antecedents. But what it lacks in originality is compensated in chilling execution. – Christopher Schobert (review)
We’ll be sharing more reviews of Fantasia premieres over the next few weeks, so please check back. For full schedule and information, visit their website.