Guest of Honour
2019 | 105 minutes | Canada
Director: Atom Egoyan
Writer: Atom Egoyan
Language: English
Toronto International Film Festival 2019, Special Presentations
Berlin International Film Festival 2019, Competition
Internationally acclaimed veteran Canadian auteur filmmaker Atom Egoyan (Exotica, The Sweet Hereafter, Adoration, Remember) returns with a complex, absorbing family drama about a father-daughter relationship wrestling with past traumas that inform present circumstances.
Jim Davis (played brilliantly by renowned British actor David Thewlis, famous for his role in Mike Leigh’s Naked and his work in the Harry Potter cycle of films) is a health inspector in Hamilton, making sure restaurants are up to health code standards. His daughter, Veronica (Laysla De Oliveira), a high school music teacher, has been recently incarcerated for inappropriate behaviour with students. Jim is convinced that she innocent, but his efforts to reduce her sentence are blocked by Veronica’s own mysterious refusal to cooperate.
In the midst of trying to understand his daughter’s attitude, Jim channels his energy and frustration into his work, with deeply unsettling results and, as always in Egoyan, startling revelations. Making its world premiere in the Official Competition section at the Venice Film Festival in September 2019, Guest of Honour has also played at festivals in Toronto, London, and Busan, and was selected to open the 2020 Canada Now showcase series in New York City in February.
- Tom McSorley
Screenings
SUNDAY, MARCH 29
7:30PM
Stay after the screening for a director Q&A and reception.
Reception sponsored by
Preceded by the short film
Please Speak Continuously and Describe Your Experiences as They Come to You
A psychiatric patient with a brain implant that allows her to relive her dreams believes her reality is being distorted.
Closing the inaugural IFFO, Guest of Honour and Please Speak Continuously… will end the week with a fine tip-o-the-hat from one of Canada’s most established filmmakers and the latest short from an exciting representative of the next directorial generation.
Director in attendance
Atom Egoyan