Sentimental Value
Monday January 26, 2:00 p.m.
Only Screened once.
Ratings
5 - Excellent 55
4 - Very Good 19
3 - Good 13
2 - Poor 2
1 - Bad 4
From the January 26 screenings $1000 donated to the Hamilton Out of the Cold Program
133 min
Season Sponsor: Rastins PharmaChoice Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Ron Lancaster
https://www.memorialarts.ca/films/ancaster-film-fest-january-aft
Norwegian and English with English subtitles
Nora (Renate Reinsve), a gifted stage actress, and her younger sister Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) were abandoned years ago when they were children by their actor father, Gustav Borg (Stellan Skarsgård), who has always prioritized his work. As a child, Agnes played a role in one of her father's movies and is now a married woman with a child.
Nora is conflicted and still angry by her father's abandonment. She wants nothing to do with him so when he comes to her with a script he's written especially with her in mind for the lead, she refuses. He finds a surprising source of support after a Hollywood star, Rachel Kemp (Elle Fanning) discovers his films at a festival retrospective.
Expected to be nominated for a number of Oscars.
Winner of the Grand Prize at Cannes and first runner of People’s Choice Award at TIFF.
Nominated for 91 international awards including 8 Golden Globes
Won 13 awards to date
Reviews
Following a failed father and filmmaker attempting to connect with his daughters by turning the former family home into a set, Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value is a subtle yet sweeping tapestry of art, family and connection that takes the breath away. Chase Hutchinson/The Wrap
A story about home, inheritance, and fiction’s ability to reveal truths capable of bringing alienated individuals together, it’s a tumultuous, moving triumph. Nick Schager/The Daily Beast
It’s a movie that sneaks up on you like great fiction, blending theme and character in a way that allows it to live in your mind after you see it, rolling around what it means to both the people in it and your own life. Brian Tallerico/RogerEbert.com
It Was Just An Accident
Monday January 26, 7:15 p.m.
Screened twice.
Ratings
5 - Excellent 19
4 - Very Good 36
3 - Good 49
2 - Poor 31
1 - Bad 25
From the January 26 screenings $1000 donated to the Hamilton Out of the Cold Program
103 min
Season Sponsor: Rastins PharmaChoice Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Ron Lancaster
Persian with English subtitles
https://www.memorialarts.ca/films/ancaster-film-fest-january-evening
Nominated for 45 international awards including 4 Golden Globes
Won 15 awards to date
Vahid, an unassuming mechanic, has a chance encounter with Eghbal, a man he strongly suspects to be his former sadistic jailhouse captor. Panicked, Vahid gathers several former prisoners, all abused by that same captor, to try and confirm Eghbal's identity. As the bickering group drives around Tehran with the captive, they must confront how far to take matters into their own hands with their presumed tormentor. From master filmmaker Jafar Panahicomes a searing moral thriller that engages with complex ideas about the uncertainty of the truth and the choice between revenge and mercy, as Panahi turns his personal dissonance into a profound and galvanizing work of art.
Reviews
If anyone has the right to make a revenge fantasy, it’s Jafar Panahi. And yet, this movie isn’t that. Panahi doesn’t make statement films; he makes question films, designed to instigate soul-searching and debate. Janice Page/Washington Post
Shot in secret under constant threat, [It Was Just an Accident] draws on [Jafar Panahi's] own harrowing experiences, infusing every frame with urgency and authenticity. Peter Howell/Toronto Star
Undoubtedly one of the year's best, It Was Just An Accident is yet another moving, prickly and hopeful morality tale from Panahi about people (and a society) trying to find a way forward while processing the trauma of the past. Redheyan Simonpillai/CBC Radio
DJ Ahmet
Monday Febuary 23, 2:00 p.m.
99 min
Season Sponsor: Rastins PharmaChoice Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Dorothy Richardson, Marion McQueen, Sandra Langton and Mabel Hickerson
Proceeds to Hamilton Out of the Cold
Macedonian with English subtitles
Nominated for 19 international awards. Won 9 awards to date
Buy tickets at memorialarts.ca
Ahmet, a 15-year-old boy from a remote Yuruk village in North Macedonia, finds refuge in music while navigating his father’s expectations, a conservative community, and his first experience with love.
Seattle Film Festival: New Directors Competition
Sundance: World Cinema Dramatic Audience Award and Jury Prize
Seville Film Festival: Best Actor
South East European Highway (los Angeles):Audience Award, Jury Prize
Montenegro Film Festival: Grand Prix- Best Film
Desertscape International Film Festival: Best Film
Unkovski’s coming-of-age comedy finds much to smile about in a North Macedonian village where conservative traditions clash with modern times. Peter Howell/Toronto Star
Beautiful landscape cinematography combined with authentic locations immerses you in the world, enhanced by filming effects that blend old and new, enriching the tone and mood. Sabina Dana Plasse/Film Threat
A feel-good coming-of-age film that taps into the universal theme of finding your own path and the freedom that music can bring. Screen Zealots/Louisa Moore
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt34964187/
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/dj_ahmet
Marty Supreme
Monday Febuary 23, 7:15 p.m.
149 min
Season Sponsor: Rastins PharmaChoice Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Dorothy Richardson, Marion McQueen, Sandra Langton and Mabel Hickerson
Proceeds to Hamilton Out of the Cold
Nominated for 246 international awards including 9 Oscars. Won 27 awards to date.
Buy tickets at memorial arts.ca
Marty Supreme is a 2025 American sports comedy-drama film directed by Josh Safdie who co-wrote with Ronald Bronstein. Set in the 1950s, it follows fictional American table tennis player Marty Mauser (loosely based on Marty Reisman) in his quest to become world champion. Timothée Chalamet stars as Mauser, with Gwyneth Paltrow, Odessa A'zion, Kevin O'Leary and Fran Drescher in supporting roles.
Awards: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt32916440/awards/?ref_=tt_ov_at_op_awd
The movies can be a wonderfully amoral medium, and I found myself liking Marty Mauser -- and not just liking him, but actually rooting for him to succeed. It takes more than a good actor to pull that off. It takes one of the greats. Justin Chang/NPR
For all the trademark Safdie unease, Marty Supreme remains an enormously good time at the cinema. The 150 minutes speed by as we encounter an array of brilliantly cast cameos. Donal Clarke/Irish Times
Marty Supreme is a thrilling visual onslaught, a rattling cacophony of ideas and images so intense that for two and a half hours you barely have time to catch your breath. It’s utterly exhausting and I loved every jangling second. Wendy Ide/Observer (UK)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt32916440/
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/marty_supreme
The Choral
Monday March 30, 2:00 p.m.
113 min
Season Sponsor: Rastins PharmaChoice Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Patrick Orovan, Real Broker Ontario
Proceeds to Ancaster Community Services
Nominated for 19 international awards. Won 9 awards to date
Buy tickets at https://www.memorialarts.ca/films/aff-march-aft
As World War I rages on, Dr. Henry Guthrie (Ralph Fiennes) takes over a British choral society that's lost most of its men to the army. The community soon discovers that the best response to the chaos of war is to make beautiful music together.
The Brits do this kind of light and dark juggling act better than almost anybody, and the filmmakers and their cast deliver a movie that's perfect for viewing on a lazy Sunday afternoon at the movie theater. Odie Henderson/Boston Globe
The Choral is a beautifully made film with a great cast and impeccable credentials, a collaboration between writer Alan Bennett and director Nicholas Hytner, as were The History Boys and The Lady in the Van. Liz Braun/Original Cin
A sprawling First World War period comedy drama about a British choir reaching for normalcy through performance, The Choral boasts a humorous approach to a community’s inability to directly speak about the horrors of war. Robert Daniels/Screen International
The Secret Agent
Monday March 30, 7:15 p.m.
160 min
Season Sponsor: Rastins PharmaChoice Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Patrick Orovan, Real Broker Ontario
Proceeds to Ancaster Community Services
Nominated for 246 international awards including 9 Oscars. Won 27 awards to date.
Buy tickets at https://www.memorialarts.ca/films/aff-march-eve
The Secret Agent is a neo-noir political thriller set in 1977 Brazil during the military dictatorship. It follows Armando (Wagner Moura), a former professor and technology expert on the run, who returns to Recife to find peace but becomes entangled in the era's pervasive, paranoid atmosphere of fear, surveillance, and corruption.
Portuguese with English Subtitles
Won 76 International Awards and nominated for 149 others including 4 Oscar noms.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27847051/awards/?ref_=tt_ov_at_op_awd
The complexity of the storytelling here is considerable, and probably wouldn’t work without a strong, grounding central presence. It’s thus hard to say enough about the quality of Moura’s performance. Adam Nayman/Toronto Star
[Writer-director Kleber Mendonça Filho] crafts a tight story with startling freedom, leaping between characters in order to conjure their fateful interconnections, while giving them all, persecuted and persecutors alike, an identity and a voice. Richard Brody/The New Yorker
You won’t see a better political thriller this year than Filho’s ultra-chic genre entry, loosely in the spirit of a Costa-Gavras picture. Tomris Laffly/Elle
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27847051/
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_secret_agent_2025
The President's Cake
Monday April 20, 2:00 p.m.
Monday April 20, 2:00 p.m.
The President's Cake
105 min
Arabic with English Subtitles
Season Sponsor: Rastins Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Retired Teachers of Ontario-Hamilton Wentworth Branch
Proceeds to the Demazenod Door Outreach
Tickets: https://www.memorialarts.ca/films/aff-april-aft
Winner of Cannes Directors' Fortnight Audience Award and the Golden Camera Award
11 Award wins out of 23 nominations.
While people across 1990s Iraq struggle to survive the war and food shortages, the President requires each school in the country to prepare a cake to celebrate his birthday. Despite her efforts to avoid getting picked, 9-year-old Lamia is chosen among her classmates. The young girl must now use her wits and imagination to gather ingredients and prepare the mandatory cake.
A crowd-pleaser in the best sense, it overflows with empathy for its beleaguered people.
Peter Rainer/Christian Science Monitor.
This detail-rich and tremendously moving moral fable uncovers harsh realities in Iraqi society without departing from the earnest perspective of its knee-high protagonist, and without diminishing the dignity or value of her hopes and dreams. Isaac Feldberg/RogerEbert.com
It’s difficult to think of another debut that combines such crowd-pleasing sensibilities, political resonance, and cinematic sweep. Rory O'Connor/The Film Stage
Hadi tells an engaging story, brings complex and surprising characters to life, lends a locale an aesthetic iconography, and renders personal identity inextricable from the forces of history that shaped or deformed it. Richard Brody/The New Yorker
H Is For Hawk
Monday April 20, 7:15 p.m.
Monday April 20, 7:15 p.m.
H IS For Hawk
128 min
Season Sponsor: Rastins Pharmacy
Film Date Sponsor: Retired Teachers of Ontario-Hamilton Wentworth Branch
Proceeds to the Demazenod Door Outreach
Buy tickets at https://www.memorialarts.ca/films/aff-april-eve
H is for Hawk follows Helen (Claire Foy), who, after a family tragedy loses herself in the memories of her time birding and exploring the natural world with her father (Brendan Gleeson) and turns the ancient art of falconry—rooted in European tradition—training a wild goshawk named Mabel to navigate her profound sadness. But as she teaches Mabel to hunt and fly free, Helen discovers how deeply she has neglected her own emotions and life.
Foy is exceptional throughout in a project that frequently requires her to share the frame with a beady-eyed, sharp-clawed killer and, crucially, to convey a combination of awestruck admiration and stultifying terror. Kevin Maher/The Times(UK)
Finding ways to cope with any significant tragedy is hardly new, but in the hands of Foy and Lowthrope, it is. Brian Farvour/The Playlist
Foy is terrific in a film which balances bruising candour about mental health issues against arresting wildlife photography and a fervent appreciation of the natural world. Wendy Ide/Screen Daily
