Arguably the world’s greatest genre festival, the Fantasia International Film Festival 2023 is on its way – and it’s time to take a look at what’s on offer. We’re lucky enough to have already seen some of the lineup for this year, so here are ten films we know are worth checking out!
Talk to Me
This is the best horror of the year so far – an engrossing watch that leads to somewhere horrifically, soul-destroyingly bleak. The kind of movie where you won’t want to go to bed straight away, that’s for sure. Sophie Wilde is incredible, and I think this might actually have an all-time horror movie ending, right up there with (let’s say) Fulci’s The Beyond.
Piaffe
Horny, and indeed horsey, Director Ann Oren’s channels her ongoing fascination with transformation, fantasy, eroticisation and gender into a clear and distinct vision of sexual and psychological liberation. Shades of Lucile Hadžihalilović (particularly Earwig) and perhaps Peter Strickland (with its interest in foley work, officious nurses and mad wigs). Superbly realised, and very sexy.
Late Night With The Devil
In this Ghostwatch-style 1976 broadcast, live from New York, a desperate Johnny Carson wannabe (David Dastmalchian) hosts a Halloween Special with a little help from a psychic, a sceptic… & the demon Abraxas. Playful, ominous, funny, and boasting a bravura climax. The period verisimilitude is especially good (ratio changes, “and now some messages” etc.). Aside from Dastmalchian, the MVP is Ingrid Torelli as the possessed girl brought out as the broadcast’s centrepiece. Spooky & hilarious, all the film’s best aspects distilled into one performance.
Birth/Rebirth
You mad doctor princess bitch! A wonderful entry in the mad doctor canon as a grieving mother and an obsessed doctor uneasily conspire to raise the dead. Frankenstein meets Pet Semetary – director Laura Moss’s ominous yet downbeat style should appeal to fans of Larry Fessenden.
New Normal
A kaleidoscope of alienation and sociopathy in the new South Korea. A set of unsettling linked tales that should appeal to fans of Black Mirror. Plus, it’s gorgeously shot.
It Lives Inside
It Lives Inside s one of the slicker, more mainstream horrors of the year, with a plot that may seem formulaic, but which is offset by the Indian cultural specificity which helps keep things fresh. Recommended for fans of It Follows.
Sometimes I Think About Dying
This sweet, somber film inhabits more of a lived-in world than the original short from which it is based… Director Rachel Lambert uses the additional runtime to let the material breathe. The decision to ditch the voiceover is also a strong one. Megan Stalter shines in a small role, doing lovely, well-considered work.
Divinity
This combination of camp plot and deadpan execution may not be for everyone, but the payoff is great – I gasped and laughed a few times at the final stretch.
Molli And Max In The Future
A sci-fi When Harry Met Sally for millennials, that uses a green screen to provide sci-fi backdrops as our will-they-won’t-they couple bicker and wrestle with existential doubt in a series of chamber piece episodes set over the course of several years. Some fun, broad satire of Covid, Trump, and other obsessions of recent years.
My Animal
Not many transformation shots in this lesbian werewolf coming of age story, but then again who needs VFX when you have Amandla Stenberg playing the love interest, with her beautiful face? My Animal is pretty erotic, treats its LGBTQ themes meaningfully, Lead actor Bobbi Salvor Menuez and Stenberg are both very strong, and the first two acts are engrossing although the climax may not be to everyone’s satisfaction. Note: this is set in the whitest town ever, so where is Amandla getting her braids done so well? A conundrum.
Between July 20 and August 9 2023, the Fantasia International Film Festival will celebrate its 27th edition in the heart of beautiful Montreal.
Whitlock&Pope 