Best Canadian First Feature Film at Toronto International Film Festival 2012

“ …consistently opts for grisly dark comedy over horror-thriller tension, a strategy that does pay off with a certain gruesome logic in the film’s nightmarish final image.” — Variety

Syd March works for a firm that harvests diseases from sick stars and injects them into obsessed fans for a premium. Deciding to capitalize on this mania for biological communion, Syd secretly injects himself with viruses, then sells his blood to the highest bidder. But when he gives himself the virus that killed superstar Hannah Geist, he becomes a target for rabid fans and crime syndicates—and must unravel the mystery surrounding her death to save his own life.

With the highly anticipated Antiviral, Brandon Cronenberg (son of David) picks up where his father left off in the late 80s—in so doing, filling a lingering void in both Canadian film and genre cinema (hooray!). Sick and contagious, it goes more than skin-deep to play on transgressive sexuality and celebrity obsession at a time of widespread paranoia and fear of epidemics. A bold debut of great originality, Antiviral caused a sensation at this year’s Cannes, where it was clearly the film to see. Preceded by Ana, a performance by Ouananiche.