Skip to main content
Sharp Corner film image; man looking into a car at the driver

Sharp Corner

Showcase

This event has passed

Jason Buxton’s thriller stars Ben Foster as Josh, a husband and father who comes unmoored from the safety of middle-class life. When he, his wife Rachel (Cobie Smulders), and their young son Max (William Kosovic) move into a home on the outskirts of town, they discover something the realtor hadn’t flagged: the road in front of their property contains the sharp corner of the title. A deadly car accident happens on their first night of occupancy, and things get worse from there…

Less a film about physical danger than one about emotional pathology, Sharp Corner gains in power as Josh becomes increasingly obsessed with car crashes—not out of fear, as a more conventional film might portray, but rather out of a perverse attraction. Foster plays the role with just enough understatement to match the film’s mode of escalating menace, and Buxton directs with a terrific feel for social tension, escalating derangement, and the small but decisive shifts with which we can go over the edge.

 

Sept 27: Q&A with director Jason Buxton and producer Paul Barkin

Sept 28: Q&A with director Jason Buxton

Director
Cast

Ben Foster, Cobie Smulders, Gavin Drea, William Kosovic

Credits
Country of Origin

Canada/Ireland

Year

2024

Language

English

Film Contact
18+

At International Village

19+

At Fifth Avenue

110 min
Drama Q&As at VIFF
Alcina Pictures, Shut Up & Colour Pictures, Kobalt Films, Workhorse Pictures

Book Tickets

This event has passed.

Credits & Director

Executive Producer

Cameron MacLaren, Kristen Figeroid, Marc Schaberg, Noah Segal, Adrian Love, Laurie May, Peter Graham, Stephen Hays, Donald Johnston, Sheila Johnston, Robert Munroe

Producer

Paul Barkin, Marc Tetreault, Jason Levangie, Jason Buxton, Susan Mullen

Screenwriter

Jason Buxton

Cinematography

Guy Godfree

Editor

Jorge Weisz

Production Design

Jennifer Stewart

Original Music

Stephen McKeon

Jason Buxton headshot; Sharp Corner director

Jason Buxton

Jason Buxton was born in England and raised in Nova Scotia. He studied film at Simon Fraser University, and holds a BFA from Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. His debut feature Blackbird (2012) won Best Canadian First Feature at TIFF.

Filmography: Blackbird (2012)

Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre

Trust

Dir. Hal Hartley
107 min

Trust is an earnestly deadpan farce; a terse, furious, funny picture about family, class, and consumerism written to within an inch of its life by indie auteur Hal Hartley.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

The Company of Strangers

Dir. Cynthia Scott
106 min

In this Canadian gem, seven elderly women find themselves stranded when their bus breaks down in the wilderness. With only their wits, memories and some roasted frogs' legs to sustain them, this remarkable group of strangers share their life stories.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Madonna: Truth or Dare

Dir. Alek Kershishian
115 min

A year in the life of Madonna at the height of her fame, touring Blonde Ambition through 1990. There's concert footage, but the movie is also daringly truthful about life behind the scenes — not that Madonna is every really off-stage.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

The Leopard

Dir. Luchino Visconti
185 min

Lampedusa's elegiac account of a 19th century Sicilian aristocrat, Prince Salina, fading into history is one of the pinnacles of Italian cinema, an epic which influenced the tempo and gravitas of The Godfather, Age of Innocence and The Deer Hunter.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

One Woman One Bra

Dir. Vincho Nchogu
80 min

Kenyan filmmaker Vincho Nchogu impresses with her humorous account of one woman's fight to keep her ancestral land. Winner: Best First Feature, London Film Festival

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Jacob's Ladder

Dir. Adrian Lyne
113 min

Ever feel you're losing your mind? Jacob Singer (Tim Robbins) comes back from the Vietnam War with a firefight in his head. Sanity is a losing battle in Adrian Lyne's terrifying psychological thriller.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema