BRAD Pitt will drop in, as will Bryan Brown. Hollywood veteran
Jonathan Demme has a new film to show, the family drama Rachel Getting
Married; so does Melbourne actor Matthew Newton, who will present his
second feature behind the camera, Three Blind Mice.
If it’s early September, it must be the Toronto International Film
Festival, one of the largest, most respected and tightly run movie
bazaars in a world suddenly full of such events. The numbers are
startling: 312 films from 64 countries; 249 features, with three-
quarters of those billed world, international or North American
premieres (this is an important distinction in the world of film
festival bragging rights). Sixty-one are films from first-time
directors, and Australia will be represented by six features.
In all, the festival is promising more than 500 filmmakers, writers
and actors from across the world, on hand to present their work,
answer audience questions, participate in gruelling press interview
sessions and hobnob at exclusive parties.
Polling colleagues from across the world, one Toronto-based film
journalist has concluded the five must-see movies, based on buzz, are
Steven Soderbergh’s two-part revolutionary epic Che; Joel and Ethan
Coen’s CIA satire with Pitt, Burn After Reading; Canadian Bruce
McDonald’s zombie romp Pontypool; and Religulous, the documentary from
Borat director Larry Charles, in which comedian-commentator Bill Maher
traverses America in search of definitions of piety and faith.
Screenings run from 9am to well past midnight. Distributors and film
critics will jostle for seats with the Canadian public.
It’s a daunting 10 days. Depending on what business one has at TIFF,
it’s possible to see five films a day, or three times that number if
one is simply sampling the vibe by hopping from one cinema to the
next. At the other extreme, many festival-goers never set foot in a
cinema. Toronto has become a crucial stop for movie buyers and
sellers, with deals done in the members-only industry centre and on
napkins in upscale restaurants.
Programmers from festivals across the world — including Sydney Film
Festival executive director Clare Stewart — come to Toronto to pre-
screen movies for their events.
The festival, in its 33rd year, has had a torrid love affair with
Hollywood for the past decade. After Sam Mendes’s American Beauty
surfed its overwhelmingly positive 1999 festival buzz to a best-
picture Oscar win, studios in subsequent years have scrambled to get
their end-of-the-year award hopefuls into the Toronto schedule before
commercial release.
Studios are pruning their lavish budgets for travel, lodgings and
splashy parties to promote these films. As a result, Toronto is locked
in competition with the overlapping Venice film festival for high-
profile pictures and A-list stars. Sometimes films play at both
festivals, such as Burn After Reading. Often, films given a big push
in one city are conspicuously absent from the other.
In fact, as comprehensive as TIFF is, the list of films not showing is
also noteworthy. Oliver Stone’s W., with Josh Brolin as the incumbent
US president, apparently wasn’t finished in time, even though it’s
scheduled to open in the US scarcely a month after the festival
closes. Word has it films from prominent directors Darren Aronofsky
(The Wrestler, with Mickey Rourke) and Jim Sheridan (Brothers, with
Jake Gyllenhaal and Tobey Maguire) weren’t even submitted. (Unlike the
Cannes festival, where anyone with enough money can rent a screen and
show their film in the market section, Toronto screens only what
Toronto invites.)
Laurent Cantet’s high school drama The Class, which won the Palme d’Or
at Cannes last May, was scheduled to play Toronto but was pulled when
the film was selected as the opening-night gala by the New York
festival, which opens later this month. Toronto also apparently lost
Clint Eastwood’s Cannes favourite Changeling, starring Angelina Jolie,
to New York’s demand for exclusivity.
Director Steve Jacobs’s new Australian film Disgrace, adapted from the
novel by J.M. Coetzee and starring John Malkovich, will open near the
festival’s halfway point. Baz Luhrmann’s anticipated Australia is not
finished. Other Australian films in various sections of the festival
include the stop-motion animated $9.99, a co-production with Israel
and featuring the voices of Geoffrey Rush, Anthony LaPaglia, Joel
Edgerton and Ben Mendelsohn; the documentary Yes Madam, Sir, with
narration by Helen Mirren; and two films in the cult Midnight Madness
program, the horror thriller Acolytes and the Ozploitation documentary
Not Quite Hollywood. Brown co-stars with Sam Neill and Peter O’Toole
in writer-director Toa Fraser’s British-New Zealand co-production Dean
Spanley, from the novel by Lord Dunsany.
But in the end and beyond the hype, attending Toronto or any film
festival isn’t so different from checking session times on a Friday
afternoon: all anyone’s really looking for is a good movie.
From here you can use the Social Web links to save Toronto’s casts of
thousands to a social bookmarking site.
Information provided on this page will not be used for any other
purpose than to notify the recipient of the article you have chosen.
Staff writers THE Australian competition watchdog said today it would
not oppose BHP Billiton’s proposed takeover of rival mining giant Rio
Tinto.
Andrew Colley IT took a few days but Hutchison 3 Mobile customers
finally have access to popular websites such as BigPond and Hotmail.
FAST food chain McDonald’s has consolidated its $65 million
advertising account with DDB, dumping rival agency Leo Burnett.
Bernard Lane THE University of New England may move to elect a new
chancellor as early as next month in the long-running leadership
crisis.
Michael Bloomberg will seek to overturn a term limits law so he can
run New York for another four years.
Mark Dodd AN Australian delegation visiting Croatia will today meet
its leaders to press for help in resolving the fate of Britt
Lapthorne.
Paul Kelly, Editor-at-large ROSS Garnaut’s report will be anathema to
the environmental lobby but it focuses on the achievable.
Avril Groom in Milan WITH couture taking a clobbering, shoes and
accessories are now at the pointy end of fashion
Search Engine News 