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\u201cWatching films with our audience brings me so much joy. I feel I\u2019m the luckiest person on Earth,\u201d says Fantasia artistic director Mitch Davis, seen at the 2025 edition of the festival. (Vincent Fr\u00e9chette)<\/p>\nThe Fantasia International Film Festival \u2014 opening Thursday and running through Aug. 2 \u2014 turns 30 this year. Its long-standing artistic director Mitch Davis has been there since Year 2, and his enthusiasm for this continent\u2019s largest genre film fest has only escalated over the decades.<\/p>\n
Davis took in the fest\u2019s inaugural edition as a spectator and was not only immediately smitten, but also convinced it had a future \u2014 one that included him.<\/p>\n
He had figured he would be among 10 people standing in line outside the Imperial Theatre for the premi\u00e8re screening of the Hong Kong action flick My Father Is a Hero, starring a then-little-known Jet Li. He figured wrong. There were hundreds of people in line, and some couldn\u2019t even get in.<\/p>\n
\u201cI knew then I had to get involved,\u201d Davis loves recalling. \u201cI also realized there was a market for absolutely everything in this city.\u201d<\/p>\n
Montreal has been inundated with every kind of film festival imaginable. Not all survive. But Fantasia has flourished with its idiosyncratic focus on auteur-driven, indie esoterica.<\/p>\n
As Davis puts it: \u201cFantasia is a celebration of the eccentric and unclassifiable, playing all films with equal importance.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fantasia has also made quite the name for itself beyond the city. Quentin Tarantino \u2014 who chose the fest for the North American debut of Inglourious Basterds \u2014 was effusive in his praise, calling Fantasia \u201cthe most important and prestigious genre film festival on this continent.\u201d Director Guillermo del Toro was equally blown away, marvelling: \u201cFantasia is a shrine.\u201d<\/p>\n
No surprise that Fantasia has drawn the likes of John Carpenter, Ken Russell, Robert Pattinson, Mark Hamill, the Safdie brothers and Adam Wingard over the years.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a real privilege and gratifying to be able to do this,\u201d Davis says. \u201cYears ago, when the festival began, there was always a sense that so many of the filmmakers that we admired were almost single-handshakes of cinephilia, because many of the most interesting European and Asian genre films just didn\u2019t get distributed in North America properly. If they did get released, it would often be years later in a dubbed version, retitled, rescored, even recut in bastardized fashion that didn\u2019t represent what the films were really about.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the first years, half the Hong Kong films I knew about were from going to Chinatown and renting original laser discs just to be able to see them for their visual film language. We had no idea there could be such massive audiences that cared for these films as much as we do. That\u2019s just the most surreal and fantastic thing. And now everything has changed so much in the way these films are distributed and the access filmgoers have to them.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWatching films with our audience brings me so much joy. I feel I\u2019m the luckiest person on Earth,\u201d says Fantasia artistic director Mitch Davis, seen at the 2025 edition of the festival. (Vincent Fr\u00e9chette)<\/p>\n
Davis has always credited Fantasia\u2019s success to the open-mindedness of its fans. \u201cFilmmakers take risks here, but so do the audiences,\u201d he notes. \u201cBut I\u2019ve always felt that Fantasia is a place where risks are rewarded.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs the world grows increasingly more unstable and irrationally volatile, genre cinema is getting at once dreamier, angrier, sadder, more poignant and poetic, and even more open to extreme experimentation in terms of story, structure and tone, taking even bolder, more radical swings into hugely individualistic places.\u201d<\/p>\n
More than 200 shorts and 125 features from 54 countries will be unspooled at this 30th\u00a0edition. The festival\u2019s opening film is the Canadian premi\u00e8re of Nicolas Winding Refn\u2019s Her Private Hell (Concordia\u2019s Hall Theatre, Thursday at 6:30 p.m.). Closing the fest will be the world premi\u00e8re of Canadian Zach Lipovsky\u2019s Freaks Part II (Hall Theatre, Aug. 2 at 6:15 p.m.).<\/p>\n
Fantasia will also be presenting\u00a0career achievement awards to Refn and Takashi Shimizu, as well as the Prix Denis H\u00e9roux for achievement in Quebec cinema to Robert Lepage and the Canadian Trailblazer Award to Bruce McDonald.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Among the special guests attending are Hacks star and Emmy winner Hannah Einbinder, who\u2019s at the fest for Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma (Hall Theatre, Friday at 9:30 p.m.); Patrick Wilson, one of the leads in the new TV iteration of Cape Fear, who will be on hand for a screening of the final two episodes of the series (Cin\u00e9ma du Mus\u00e9e, July 30 at 9 p.m.); and Vera Farmiga (Up in the Air, The Departed) for the Canadian debut of The Leader (Hall Theatre, July 30 at 6:15 p.m.).<\/p>\n
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Hacks star and Emmy winner Hannah Einbinder is among the special guests attending the Fantasia International Film Festival\u2019s 30th edition. Frederic J. Brown \/ AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
\u201cWe play every kind of film one could imagine,\u201d Davis says. \u201cThis year\u2019s mix entertains, challenges and thrills while addressing themes of bodily autonomy, ecological devastation, loss of agency, the intersections of poverty and exploitation and authoritarian misuse of technology.\u201d<\/p>\n
That it?<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s super-varied genre storytelling of every stripe for just about everybody, from ultra-gripping thrillers with dancing yakuza gangsters to queer body horror, from alien pregnancies to animated romantic dramedies, from vampirism to class war. What ties all these films together is an extreme purity of vision \u2014 films made with a point of view with genuine conviction.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gotcha. Can\u2019t think of a genre Davis doesn\u2019t cover. You\u2019ve got to respect his passion for the craft.<\/p>\n
\u201cWatching films with our audience brings me so much joy. I feel I\u2019m the luckiest person on Earth.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Buddy is a \u201cgonzo horror\/comedy set largely inside the world of a children\u2019s TV show,\u201d Fantasia\u2019s Mitch Davis says. (Fantasia International Film Festival)<\/p>\n
Mitch Davis\u2019s Fantasia picks<\/p>\n
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma<\/a><\/p>\n (Concordia\u2019s Hall Theatre, July 17 at 9:30 p.m.)\u00a0\u201cAbsolutely brilliant. Jane Schoenbrun is one of the most exciting and inspired talents in film today. We\u2019re showing its Canadian premi\u00e8re, with Schoenbrun and Hannah Einbinder attending.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Cherry and Virgin<\/a><\/p>\n (Hall Theatre, July 18 at 8:05 p.m.) \u201cA moving, animated Japanese romantic dramedy that we\u2019re world-premi\u00e8ring, about two illustrators in their 30s falling in love\u00a0for the first time. With director Masanao Kawajiri attending.\u201d<\/p>\n Hot Spot<\/a><\/p>\n (Hall Theatre, July 24 at 9:30 p.m.) \u201cThe Lure is one of my favourite films of the last 20 years and I\u2019m absolutely thrilled that we\u2019re world-premi\u00e8ring new work from its director, Agnieszka Smoczynska, who will be attending. Hypnotic sci-fi\/thriller set in a future world controlled by sentient AI, starring Noomi Rapace.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n I Love Paris<\/a><\/p>\n (Concordia\u2019s J.A. DeS\u00e8ve Cinema, July 26 at 6:40 p.m. and July 28 at 1:25 p.m.) \u201cUnbelievably engaging and entertaining mockumentary on a young, rising star in Paris\u2019s hip-hop scene taking a hard turn when the singer is vampirized mid-shoot. The first mockumentary that I\u2019ve loved in years \u2014 fresh, funny and full of personality and invention. World premi\u00e8re, with director Nicky Murphy and actors Louiza Aura and Leonor Oberson attending. Very likely to be one of this year\u2019s big breakout films. It\u2019s just so terrific.\u201d<\/p>\n Buddy<\/a><\/p>\n (Hall Theatre, Aug. 1 at 6:25 p.m.) \u201cAmerican gonzo horror\/comedy set largely inside the world of a children\u2019s TV show where a homicidal Barney-like character (Keegan-Michael Key) bends time and space. Crazy fun and more than a little unsettling, with a cast including Cristin Milioti and Michael Shannon. A major breakout at Sundance; we\u2019ll be presenting the film\u2019s international premi\u00e8re, with writer\/director Casper Kelly attending.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n God Skin<\/a><\/p>\n (Hall Theatre, Aug. 1 at 9:20 p.m.) \u201cMind-blowing cyberpunk, Muay Thai action, sci-fi techno thriller. Spectacular! Also a world premi\u00e8re, with director Paween Purijitpanya and star Sutthirak Subvijitra attending.\u201d<\/p>\n The Fox<\/a><\/p>\n (Hall Theatre, Aug. 2 at 3:40 p.m.) \u201cEccentric, smart adult fable from Australian filmmaker Dario Russo, set in a parallel reality where animals talk and scheme. I could not possibly adore this film more and I can\u2019t wait to see it play in front of our audience. Inspired, twisted, brilliant and hilarious, and oh so sharply subversive, with insane puppeteered animal characters and an absolute dream cast: Emily Browning, Jai Courtney and singular voice performances from Olivia Colman and dearly departed Sam Neill.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\tEditor\u2019s Picks\t<\/p>\n AT A GLANCE<\/p>\n The 30th Fantasia International Film Festival starts Thursday and runs through Aug. 2. For full schedule and more information, visit\u00a0fantasiafestival.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n