SPECIAL: The Best of the Fest

By Chris Luckett

Image property of Fox Searchlight Pictures

The 2012 AGH BMO World Film Festival proved a success, showcasing award-winning indies and giving glimpses of buzz-worthy new films.

The Art Gallery of Hamilton’s fourth year of presenting films from around to world yielded a varied selection of films from Canada, Sweden, Italy, Japan, France, England, Spain, Norway, Ireland, New Zealand, Germany, and the U.S.

Over the course of ten days, nearly thirty movies were screened at the Art Gallery of Hamilton, Empire Jackson Square 6, Ancaster SilverCity, and Westdale Theatre.

With approximately 10,000 tickets sold during this year’s festival – a 60 per cent increase over 2011’s festival ticket sales – the AGH has nearly perfected their formula for selecting films. As such, many fantastic movies were screened, like the underworld thriller Easy Money, the heart-warming crowd-pleaser The Intouchables, the entertaining comedies The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and Moonrise Kingdom, and the fascinating documentary The World Before Her.

The following five movies led the pack, however, as the best films of the 2012 AGH BMO World Film Festival:

5) Hysteria – A delightful comedy about the era when dissatisfied women were diagnosed with hysteria, leading to the inadvertent invention of the vibrator. It’s one of the most genuinely enjoyable movies of the year.

Image property of Magnolia Pictures

4) 2 Days in New York – A fish-out-of-water/culture-clash comedy superbly written and acted. Julie Delpy and Chris Rock play a couple in the Big Apple whose lives are perfectly on-track until Delpy’s family visits from France. It deftly juggles farce and a 1980s Woody Allen feel.

3) Your Sister’s Sister – A gripping three-person dramedy involving a grieving, thirty-something guy, his female best friend, and her sister. One by one, they all end up in a Washington cottage, where they unwind and bond, until a shattering secret comes out that affects all three.

2) Beasts of the Southern Wild – An otherworldly tale about a community existing outside the New Orleans levees, living off the grid and on their own. The whole movie is seen through the eyes of six-year-old Hushpuppy, a young girl trying to understand the world around her.

Image property of Alliance Films

1) Headhunters – Stuffed full of red herrings, double-crosses, and bait-and-switches, this is a movie that expertly unfolds its plot and leaves you guessing at every turn. The plot twists are many and frequent, but all fit together by the end. It’s the best thriller in a year or two, and possibly the best film of 2012.