Another year has come around, and that means we're looking forward to remotely covering the new edition of the Fantasia Film Festival. One of the major genre festivals over the years, this has always been home to some of the best features and long-standing classic entries which have gotten their start on the festival's screens. This year promises to be no different with a strong collection of works scheduled for in-person or remote viewing, and as a special introduction to what's on offer, here are some of the films we're most looking forward to at this year's edition.
JENN WEXLER RESURRECTS EVERYONE’S FAVORITE TROUBLEMAKER TO CRUSH THE FOURTH REICH IN THE LAST TEMPTATION OF BECKY
Fantasia’s family of returning filmmakers is large, and proudly includes director/producer powerhouse Jenn Wexler. Her breakout debut, THE RANGER, came to Fantasia in 2018 and was followed by the World Premiere of her supernatural Christmas crime heist, THE SACRIFICE GAME, in 2023. For Fantasia’s 30th anniversary, the fest couldn’t be happier to have her back with the next chapter of the popular BECKY franchise, THE LAST TEMPTATION OF BECKY!
Becky Hooper (Lulu Wilson, THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE) has annihilated Neo-Nazis and all manner of victimizers, but this time, she’s going straight to the source! Now a CIA agent, managed by genre favorite Kate Siegel (HUSH, MIDNIGHT MASS), she’s taking down a nefarious modern-day Nazi played with camp brilliance by the one and only Neil Patrick Harris (SUNNY DANCER, GONE GIRL)! Wexler shines here, highlighting the underdog heroine and going for broke with tons of gore and crazy kills. Meanwhile, Wilson reprises her beloved character with gusto, unleashing Becky’s signature rage on an army of insane baddies!
NO REST FOR THE WICKED BRINGS BOLD NEW VISIONS TO VAMPIRE LORE
A young fisherman’s first love with a stranded whaler unfolds in secrecy under the pressures of family, faith, and community in this haunting and subversive Queer vampire film with chilling folk horror flavors. Singular in scope and depth, Kasper Kalle’s NO REST FOR THE WICKED is a vivid new landmark in Danish genre cinema that brings imaginatively radical and nightmarish new elements into the vampire lore.
Adapted from Karl Heinrich Ulrichs’s iconic1884 novella “Manor”, the film is set against the harsh, unforgiving landscape of the 19th-century Faroe Islands. Its stark, yet dreamy, uncanny atmosphere recalls the work of Carl Theodor Dreyer or even Robert Eggers, while its full-blooded heart is just as much an ode to the painful longings of Gothic romance as it is to the genre’s cruelties and horrors. Anchored by a remarkable lead performance from screen newcomer Egor Venned, it co-stars Pilou Asbæk (LUCY, GAME OF THRONES, A HIJACKING, AQUAMAN AND THE LOST KINGDOM) alongside strong performances from Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson (CAPTAIN AMERICA: BRAVE NEW WORLD, SUCCESSION, VIKINGS: VALHALLA), and Sofia Nolsøe (LIMBO, MØRKELAND).
THE EYES IS A DISORIENTING SENSORY EXPERIENCE WITH A FRESH TAKE ON A CLASSIC OF THE GENRE
A year after being brutally attacked by a former boyfriend who had become obsessed with her, Seo-jin remains traumatized. Suffering from hereditary, degenerative blindness, her efforts to secure a corneal transplant are interrupted by the apparent suicide of her twin sister, just as her attacker is released from prison. Convinced it was murder, Seo-jin sets out to find the culprit before she loses her sight completely.
With his remake, or rather reinterpretation, of the Spanish thriller JULIA’S EYES, director Yeom Ji-oh (NEXT DOOR) draws on all his creativity by skillfully employing cinematography that varies perspectives and depths of field. The results are deliberately disorienting sequences with exceptional dynamism, which fully immerse the viewer. THE EYES is a thriller with horror undertones that offers a breathless sensory experience with numerous stunning twists. The fabulous Shin Min-a (A BITTERSWEET LIFE) delivers a dual performance of unprecedented intensity – one of the finest of her career – and is joined by the excellent Kim Nam-hee, of the popular TV series MR. SUNSHINE.
FROM THE PRODUCER OF SKINAMARINK, ANCESTRAL BEASTS CASTS A DEMONIC LENS ON INTERGENERATIONAL TRAUMA
Red River Métis director Tim Riedel celebrates the Fantasia World Premiere of his psychological horror, ANCESTRAL BEASTS, which first appeared as a 2025 Frontieres Platform project at Cannes, and is backed by executive producer Edmon Rotea of SKINAMARINK fame. Family is complicated, even in the best of times, but when you have skeletons in the closet and grief as an unwanted houseguest, it becomes something that consumes you – and that’s what Elyse (Morgan Holmstrom, OUTLANDER, SHADOW OF THE ROUGAROU) finds out the hard way. Dealing with her mother’s death, a snarky sister, and a distant aunt, Elyse leaves the city for her aunt’s rural home to work on her mental health. But she’s not alone and will soon find that intergenerational trauma comes in many forms... and here, it’s demonic. Riedel draws on his talent for storytelling, personal experience, and genre to weave a tale of Indigenous mothers, sisters, and mental suffering. Look out for Canadian legend Gail Maurice (ROSIE, NIGHT RAIDERS) as Elyse’s Aunt Adele in this fresh new take on the haunted house film.
THE ADAMS FAMILY RETURNS WITH THE GLORIOUS DEAD, A HELLISH VISION OF SMALL-TOWN ANGER AND DEATH UNDYING
A small-town sheriff (Toby Poser) and her young deputy (Zelda Adams) wake to find the world they believed in no longer exists. Blood drips from faucets, people and pets are missing, and fleshy creatures walk the woods. Soon, the dirt can’t keep the dead down. Anger and fear spread through the community. Co-written and co-directed by John Adams and Toby Poser, the latter of whom also stars, and co-starring Zelda and Lulu Adams, THE GLORIOUS DEAD is a personal genre vision that speaks to the increasing horrors of American life in times of enormous, instigated division while retaining the interpersonal poetry, imagination, and dark humor that its creators are renowned for. This will be the sixth consecutive work from the singularly talented filmmaking family to World Premiere at Fantasia following the festival’s launches of THE DEEPER YOU DIG, HELLBENDER, WHERE THE DEVIL ROAMS, HELL HOLE, and MOTHER OF FLIES, the latter having won our 2025 Cheval Noir Award for Best Feature. In their words: “This film takes dangerous fundamentalism at face value and asks what remains for the rest of us.”
NIGHTBORN JOLTS WITH SINGULAR CRIES IN THE NIGHT
With dreams of starting a perfect family, Saga (Seidi Haarla, COMPARTMENT NO. 6, ICEBREAKER) and her British husband Jon (Rupert Grint, the HARRY POTTER series, SERVANT) move to the isolated house where she spent much of her childhood, deep in the Finnish forest. As soon as their baby is born, despite the reassurance of all around her, Saga knows there’s something terribly wrong with her son. Their marriage begins to crack, and Jon struggles to support his wife, but only Saga suspects the terrible truth about her newborn. The sophomore feature from gifted Finnish filmmaker Hanna Bergholm (HATCHING), NIGHTBORN launched in official competition at this year’s Berlinale and Fantasia is proud to be the site of its North American birthing. A deeply uncomfortable, viscerally gruesome, and darkly humorous look at the emotional rollercoaster of new parenthood through a genre prism, NIGHTBORN is stylishly directed and anchored by an astonishing, one-of-a-kind lead performance from Haarla.
OTHERWORLDLY AND MOVING, MOTHERWITCH SHINES DARKEST LIGHT ON CYPRIOT FOLK HORROR
Eleni (Margarita Zachariou) is a painter isolated from her wider community and consumed by unbearable grief after losing all three of her children in a senseless accident. In desperation, she enters into a Faustian pact with chthonic feminine forces to bring them back. Filmed on location in an abandoned settlement in Cyprus and making sublime use of its mountainous rural terrain, Minos Papas’ MOTHERWITCH weaves fairy tale, dark Gothic ambience, mythology, and stunning practical effects into the fabric of folk horror. The film becomes a profound exploration of motherhood, grief, and the act of creation itself, fueled by compelling performances from leads Zachariou and Sifis Katsoulakis. The historical backdrop of English-occupied Cyprus in the 1880s adds further layers of unease and colonial violence to its richly textured world.
WHEN YOU OPEN THE DOOR IS A WEREWOLF MOVIE LIKE YOU’VE NEVER SEEN
Miki, a 27-year-old working in an architectural firm, wakes up in her small apartment, pulled out of her sleepy memory. Her world is quiet and strange, but will soon be interrupted by a transformative experience spurred by a half-remembered wolf bite. As Miki searches for answers, she soon finds herself drawn into the woods and to the center of a ritual at a shrine cared for by elderly maidens. Director Eriko Katagiri was the recipient of the Japan Horror Award, a prize previously won by the director of NEW GROUP and BEST WISHES TO ALL, and her film tackles feminine isolation and alienation uniquely and powerfully. Viewers who allow themselves to be carried into Miki’s mind will find themselves pulled into one of the most unique werewolf stories ever put to the big screen. Cinematographer Akiko Ashizawa (TOKYO SONATA, CREEPY), Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s frequent collaborator, lends the film a unique visual identity, creating images built in ephemera, silhouettes, shadows, and nature. WHEN YOU OPEN THE DOOR isn’t just a great film; it’s the announcement of a bright new talent.
ASHLEA WESSEL’S FEATURE DEBUT BRINGS CREEPY CREATURES, PTSD, AND PLENTY OF ACTION IN JUNCTION ROW
Ashlea Wessel has directed festival-favorite shorts like 2018’s TICK and 2020’s WEIRDO, and rounded them out with segments in the 2024 horror anthology CREEPY BITS. Now, audiences can see the World Premiere of her feature debut, JUNCTION ROW. Canadian horror icon Katharine Isabelle (GINGER SNAPS, AMERICAN MARY, BACKROOMS) is Juno, a recovering addict who leaves a fringe housing compound for a better life, leaving her beloved Ruby (Natalie Brown, of FX’s The Strain and THE BREACH) behind. When she learns that Ruby has gone missing, Juno returns, only to find Junction Row has become a hotbed of criminal activity, but she encounters much more than menacing drug dealers on her mission to find Ruby. Isabelle continues to be a crowd-pleaser as an action star, and supporting roles by Glen Gould (Paramount+’s Tulsa King, AT THE PLACE OF GHOSTS) and Kyle Mac (Netflix’s Between, AppleTV’s Government Cheese) don’t disappoint. With distinct Lovecraftian dread, this creature feature, penned by Adam Cesare (CLOWN IN A CORNFIELD), Matt Serafini, and Wessel, conjures a story where the fear of the unknown isn’t confined to what lies above, but what waits beneath.
WHO WILL DIE FIRST IN MYANMAR CHILLER THE LAST FOOTAGE?
Aside from a small handful of arthouse dramas screening at Locarno and such, the national cinema of politically isolated, conflict-plagued Myanmar remains all but invisible outside its borders. Few are aware of its lively, low-budget genre-film scene, circulating mostly online or on VCDs, but writer/director Arkar Soe Oo aims to change that with his innovative feature THE LAST FOOTAGE. Myanmar’s first found-footage horror film, shot entirely in first-person POV, is possibly the first Burmese chiller to hit the global genre-festival circuit. The events of THE LAST FOOTAGE unfold in almost-realtime, as the sun sets on the haunted Wingabar Forest and eerie howls pierce its night. That, the first-person perspective, and the absence of conventional horror gimmicks (rapid edits and bass-heavy scores, not to mention gratuitous gore and cruelty) make THE LAST FOOTAGE feel more like an immersive work of in-situ theatre. Or perhaps more accurately, like a gleeful romp with friends through a haunted-house attraction at a regional fair, with various creepy creatures leaping suddenly out of the darkness.
These are just some of the numerous intriguing, highly anticipated films to be screening at this year's festival, set to run July 16 through August 2, 2026, returning to the Concordia Hall and J.A. de Sève cinemas, with additional screenings and events at Montréal’s Cinéma du Musée. For tickets to these and much more, check out their WEBSITE and be sure to follow us for our coverage of this year's films!
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