April 18, 2025

WIFF’S WEEKEND WATCH LIST — 4/18

Check out our recommendations of what to watch this weekend.

in case you gave up chocolate for lent

chocolat

Vincent Georgie: For those indulging in Mini Eggs, drugstore chocolate bunnies, and even the finest of chocolates, please enjoy a magical, sumptuous romance set around the many pleasures of chocolate. Nominated for 5 Oscars, including Best Picture, this film is an appealing and most enjoyable delight. A total charmer.

Synopsis: When mysterious Vianne and her child arrive in a tranquil French town in the winter of 1959, no one could have imagined the impact that she and her spirited daughter would have on the community stubbornly rooted in tradition. Within days, she opens an unusual chocolate shop across the square from the church. Her ability to perceive her customers’ desires and satisfy them with just the right confection coaxes the villagers to abandon themselves to temptation—just as Lent begins.

Available on Apple TV and Amazon Prime.

if you want a biblical journey

the passion of the christ

Vincent Georgie: Most fittingly for this Easter weekend, take a look at Mel Gibson’s incredibly popular and powerful religious drama. Jim Caviezel is excellent as Jesus.

Synopsis: In this version of Christ’s crucifixion, based on the New Testament, Judas expedites the downfall of Jesus (Jim Caviezel) by handing him over to the Roman Empire’s handpicked officials. To the horror of his mother, Mary (Maia Morgenstern), Magdalen (Monica Bellucci), whom he saved from damnation, and his disciples, Jesus is condemned to death. He is tortured as he drags a crucifix to nearby Calvary, where he is nailed to the cross. He dies, but not before a last act of grace.

Available on Apple TV, Netflix, and Amazon Prime.

if you want a thriller

cairo conspiracy

Vincent Georgie: Originally titled Boy From Heaven when it appeared at WIFF 2022, this interesting and intelligent political thriller won the Best Screenplay prize at Cannes that same year during its World Premiere. Egyptian filmmaker Tarik Saleh will be returning to Cannes this year with his newest film entitled Eagles of the Republic.

Synopsis: Adam, a fisherman’s son, is offered the ultimate privilege to study at the Al-Azhar University in Cairo. When the Grand Imam suddenly dies, Adam becomes a pawn in a ruthless power struggle between Egypt’s religious and political elites.

Available on Apple TV, PLEX, YouTube, and Amazon Prime.

DOUBLE FEATURE

david cronenberg

Vincent Georgie: As Canada’s most celebrated filmmaker’s latest work, The Shrouds hits theaters, take a look at two films that epitomize the many strengths (and obsessions) of the Cronenberg universe: carnal pleasures, fractured identities, and an attraction to the unusual. Outstanding, risky performances from both casts make both of these very memorable.

CRASh

Crash is about the strange lure of the auto collision, provoking as it does the human fascination with death and the tendency to eroticize danger. Most motorists will slow down to stare at the scene of a collision; they may feel their pulses quickening and become aware of the fragility of their own bodies. The characters of Crash carry this awareness a step further, cherishing and nurturing it. For them, a car collision is a sexual turn-on and a jolting life force they come to crave.

Available on Apple TV, YouTube, and Amazon Prime.

spider

Released after decades in a sanitarium, schizophrenic Dennis Spider Cleg (Ralph Fiennes) moves into Mrs. Wilkinson’s (Lynn Redgrave) halfway house and befriends a fellow resident, Terrence (John Neville), before retreating into personal writing and the darkness of his own haunted mind. Spider struggles to decipher murky memories of a childhood trauma involving his abusive father (Gabriel Byrne), his murdered mother (Miranda Richardson), and a prostitute who may have replaced her.