When Sydney Film Festival rolls around every June, it's always a challenge to work out what looks good in the program. This year, with 244 feature films, documentaries and shorts from 60 countries, it's no different. Sure, there are some big-names in little-known films that could be worth the price of a ticket – Mel Gibson, Daniel Radcliffe, Cate Blanchett, Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, Kevin Spacey, Tom Hiddleston, Ethan Hawke and Viggo Mortensen among them.

And there are famous directors among the lesser-known names, including Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, Jim Jarmusch, Xavier Dolan and Pedro Almodóvar.

Some films arrive with buzz after winning awards or rave reviews at other festivals, which suggests they must be good. But you might prefer films from a particular country, documentaries on a certain topic or the cinematic adventurousness of the festival's competition for "courageous, audacious and cutting-edge" cinema.

Faith is a big part of festival-going. You throw yourself into the experience and hope for something memorable.

Writing about the festival is the same. You look forward to certain films but are invariably surprised by others you know nothing about and always miss something that people rave about for weeks.

To take some of the guesswork out of buying a ticket, we've studied the program, looked at the reception for films overseas – an imperfect system given the festival has 25 world premieres – and watched the occasional preview to pick the 20 hottest tickets.

But who knows? Even with a huge range of films – from the crazily idiosyncratic to family charmers, dramas, powerful documentaries, horror pics, classics and entertaining comedies – the best experiences might be completely unexpected.

Here's our guide ...

For insights into exotic worlds

Land of Mine ... in the festival competition.

Land of Mine: This tense drama about young German prisoners forced to defuse landmines along the coast of Denmark at the end of World War II has been winning awards at festivals around the world. During German occupation, the Nazis planted the mines in anticipation of an Allied invasion; now they have the dangerous job of removing them under the command of a stern Danish sergeant.
tate Theatre, June 12, 6.45pm; June 13, 11.45am; Cremorne Orpheum, June 19, 6.15pm.

Mustang: Winner of multiple awards and nominated for best foreign-language Oscar this year, this Turkish drama centres on five sisters who are lined up to be married after an innocent beachside frolic with their male classmates creates a scandal. Variety called it "a beautifully mounted story about the demonisation of young female sexuality in a remote Turkish village."
Cremorne Orpheum, June 9, 8.30pm; Event George Street, June 11, 1.30pm.

For fans of something different

A long way from Harry Potter ... Swiss Army Man.

Swiss Army Man: Daniel Radcliffe plays a corpse who joins a man (Paul Dano) stranded on a desert island in this subversive comedy. It screens after polarising audiences when it debuted at the Sundance Film Festival.
Event George Streetreet, June 9, 9pm; June 19, 6.15pm.

The Lure: How often do you see a film described as a Polish romance-horror-mermaid musical? That's the unlikely tag for this Sundance award winner that centres on two sisters who just happen to be vampire mermaids.
Event George Street, June 10, 8.30pm; Dendy Newtown, June 12, 6.15pm.

For experience seekers

High-Rise: Based on a novel by sci-fi writer J.G. Ballard, this blackly comic drama centres on residents of a luxury flat who descend into savagery. The cast includes Tom Hiddleston, Jeremy Irons and Sienna Miller.
Skyline Drive-in at Blacktown, June 10, 7.30pm; Event George Street, June 11, 5.45pm.

For fans of real-life stories

Weiner: Remember Anthony Weiner, the American congressman caught up in a sexting scandal in 2011? This documentary shows his comeback campaign for New York mayor coming gloriously unstuck via another sexting scandal.
State Theatre, June 11, 5pm; Dendy Opera Quays, June 14, 8pm; Event George Street, June 19, 5.45pm.

A Girl In The River: The Price of Forgiveness ... Oscar winner.

A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness: Pakistani director Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy won her second Oscar this year for this confronting documentary about a teenage girl who miraculously survived an attempted honour killing by her father and uncle. Its power convinced Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to declare he would change the law affecting honour killings. It screens with Saving Face, about acid attacks on women, which won Obaid-Chinoy her first Oscar four years ago, followed by Q&A. "It's not an easy job, especially in a country like Pakistan where there is deep-seated misogyny," Obaid-Chinoy says. "Any prominent woman, not just me, who takes up these causes is harangued online and now with social media receives death threats."
Dendy Opera Quays, June 12, 6.30pm.

For comedy fans

Elvis & Nixon: A film that one American critic called "a hoot" takes a comic approach to the meeting between Elvis Presley (Michael Shannon) and President Richard Nixon (Kevin Spacey) at the White House in 1970. The King bizarrely wants to be made an FBI agent at large, with Nixon agreeing to a meeting so he can get an autograph for his daughter.
State Theatre, June 9, 8.40pm; Cremorne Orpheum, June 10, 8.40pm.

Everybody Wants Some!! After taking Boyhood all the way to the Oscars, Richard Linklater's 1980s college comedy – a follow-up to his 1970s high school comedy Dazed and Confused – has been getting rave reviews. It centres on a fresh-faced student arriving at a Texas  university for his first semester.
State Theatre, June 12, 9.15pm; Event George Street, June 18, 7pm.

For a thoughtful experience

Heart of a Dog: In a return to feature film-making 30 years after Home of the Brave, artist and musician Laurie Anderson reflects on love and loss in characteristically charming fashion. While she focuses on her beloved dog Lolabelle, she is also both mourning and celebrating the life of late husband Lou Reed.
State Theatre, June 13, 2.05pm; Event George Street, June 19, 3.15pm.

For a date

Sing Street: Irish director John Carney (Once, Begin Again) has drawn on his own teenage years for an infectious story about a Dublin teenager who starts a band to impress a girl in the 1980s, with music by Duran, Duran, Hall & Oates, the Jam and the Cure.

State Theatre, June 18, 6.20pm; Event George Street, June 19, 1pm.

For fans of movie stars

Festival guest ... Mel Gibson in Blood Father.

Blood Father: Mel Gibson plays a battered ex-con, living in a trailer and working as a tattooist, who has to protect his daughters from drug dealers in this ripping old-style thriller. Then you can head along to see the star In Conversation with this writer in a free session.
Blood Father is at the State Theatre, June 14, 8.25pm; Cremorne Orpheum, June 16, 8.30pm. In Conversation is at the Festival Hub, June 15, 5pm.

The big friendly giant in Steven Spielberg's The BFG. Photo: Disney

For families with children

The BFG: Steven Spielberg's adaptation of Roald Dahl's much-loved story stars Mark Rylance as the Big Friendly Giant. The festival has a family screening two weeks before the film opens in cinemas.
Event George Street, June 13, 6pm.

For older viewers

Aquarius: A retired music critic, elegantly played by Sonia Braga (Kiss of the Spiderwoman, Sex and the City), holds out against a development company that has bought her apartment building in this Brazilian drama. According to The Hollywood Reporter, it's "a portrait of one woman holding on to her dignity as others try to take away what's most dear to her".
State Theatre, June 10, 6.15pm; June 11, 11.30am.

For unique experiences

Notes on Blindness: What sounds like a moving documentary is based on the audio recordings of English theologian John Hull as he gradually became totally blind in the 1980s, with an accompanying Virtual Reality project.
State Theatre, June 18, 2.05pm; June 19, 9.30am. The VR project Notes on Blindness: Into Darkness is at the Festival Hub, in Sydney Town Hall, every day.

Tickled: Who knew there were such a thing as online tickling videos? When two New Zealand filmmakers investigate the empire that creates these bizarre videos for fetishists, they discover a strange and threatening world.
Dendy Newtown, June 9, 6.30pm; Event George Street, June 10, 6.30pm.

For dog lovers

Baxter and Me: What shapes as a touching documentary from Sydney director Gillian Leahy (My Life Without Steve) centres on how dogs – most recently a brown labrador named Baxter – have helped her through illness and heartbreak. It has its world premiere in the festival's Australian documentary competition alongside films on such diverse subjects as Aboriginal initiation (Zach's Ceremony), body image (Embrace), traveller barmaids (Hotel Coolgardie), caring for a son with an intellectual disability (On Richard's Side), amateur bodybuilding (Destination Arnold) and refugees making a new life (The Baulkham Hills African Ladies Troupe and Constance on the Edge). Event George Street, June 14, 8.30pm.

For fans of Australian films

Goldstone: If you liked Ivan Sen's outback western Mystery Road, the world premiere on the festival's opening night film is one to catch. Aaron Pedersen is back as Indigenous detective Jay Swan, heading this time on a missing person's investigation to a remote mining town. "[He] begins to uncover a web of corruption in the establishment that controls the town, the local mine and the local Aboriginal land council," says Sen, who wrote, directed, shot, edited and composed the music.
State Theatre, June 8, 7.30pm and June 11, 2.30pm; Casula Powerhouse, June 10, 7.30pm; Cremorne Orpheum, June 12, 8.30pm.

World premiere ... Down Under. Photo: Dare Parker.

Down Under: Actor-director Abe Forsythe's black comedy, which is having its world premiere at the festival, takes place the night after the infamous Cronulla riots when three cars of hotheads head out for retaliation. "If you get to the base level of racism and look at it, you realise how ridiculous it is," Forsythe says. "That's where a lot of the humour has come out of."
State Theatre, June 15, 9.15pm; Dendy Newtown, June 17, 8.15pm.

For partygoers

Viva Cuba Party: After the screening of Cuban-drag-queen-drama Viva in the festival competition, the Festival Hub turns into Little Havana. The entertainment includes the high-energy Armandito & Trovason✓ Quartet and Merchants of Sound.
Festival Hub, June 17, 9pm.

For fans of classic films

Robert De Niro as Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull.

Raging Bull: The Essential Scorsese program, curated by David Stratton, includes this searing study of violence with Robert De Niro never less than magnetic as boxing champ Jake LaMotta. "Directors like Scorsese and Spielberg and Coppola grew up watching movies," Stratton says. "They got their love of movies the same way I did – by seeing movies and falling in love with them. He's probably the best of that group that started making films at that time and he's certainly endured."
Art Gallery of NSW, June 12, 2.25pm.

How to get the most out of the festival

* Rather than paying $19.90 for a ticket – $17 concession – it's smarter to buy a book of tickets and share them with a friend if you don't need them all. A Flexipass 10 costs $155, 20 costs $280 and 30 costs $375 – equivalent to just $12.50 a ticket. Bookings can be made at sff.org.au or on 1300 733 733. You can also get discount tickets at the Festival Hub.

* You can also buy tickets on the festival app then download them to your phone or tablet to show at the door. The app also lets you watch trailers, browse the program and vote in the audience awards.

* If you know teenagers who want to come to the festival, check the classification of films. For the first time, the festival is able to self-rate certain films MA 15+ rather than the mandatory R18+ (in lieu of an official classification), which opens up half the feature films to younger viewers.

* There are free events dotted around the festival, including talks, parties and virtual reality screenings at the Festival Hub, talks at the Apple Store and animation screenings in Pitt Street Mall.

* If you're desperate to see a film that's sold out, the box office sometimes has last-minute tickets.

Talks

The Sydney Morning Herald's Garry Maddox is hosting four talks during the festival:

In Conversation with Mel Gibson at the Festival Hub, June 15, 5pm.

Meet the Filmmakers: Ivan Sen and David Jowsey from Goldstone, Apple Store, June 11, 5pm

Meet the Filmmakers: Lee Tamahori, Temuera Morrison and Akuhata Keefe from Mahana, Apple Store, June 12, 4.30pm

Q&A with Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy after a screening of A Girl in the River and Saving Face, Dendy Opera Quays, June 12, 6.30pm

The Sydney Film Festival is on from June 8 to 19. More information: sff.org.au