INDEPTH: TORONTO FILM FESTIVAL
Film Festival Reports - Main Page
CBC News Online | September 3, 2003
Dan Brown will be attending the Toronto International Film Festival for its entirety, from Sept. 4 to 13. Throughout the 9-day festival he will bring you reports on the latest Canadian films. Read his dispatches and follow his comments by clicking on the menu links.
Yes, it's that time of year again: the Toronto International Film Festival is set to roll. This is the auspicious moment when many of Hollywood's stars descend on Canada's largest city.
Once here, they go to parties, grant interviews and make obscure in-jokes at press conferences. And they walk among us, much like ordinary mortals.
Of course, it isn't just Hollywood sending its best and brightest to the Big Smoke. Actors, writers, directors and producers come from every corner of the planet, bringing with them their assorted hangers-on.
And wherever there are fabulous people and hangers-on, there are journalists. This will be the fourth time I cover the festival, the first time I do it for CBC.ca.
There are so many famous faces, so many films, and so much hype, it's easy to get distracted at the festival. As a journalist, it helps if you have a clear sense of what you want to write about.
This year my mandate is simple: to write about all things Canadian. If it has any connection to the True North, it's fodder for these special reports.
Before the festival begins, it's hard to tell which films will be worth seeing. (Which films will be successful is another story.) We journalists often have only sketchy information to go on. But not having preconceptions can be a good thing.
When I went to see the Ben Kingsley heist flick Sexy Beast in 2000, for instance, I didn't know much beyond the film's title but it turned out to be a small gem, just the kind of treasure that's a joy to unearth at a festival.
That said, this does look like a strong year for homegrown productions. There's A Problem With Fear, the latest from Calgary's Gary Burns (he of Kitchen Party and waydowntown fame).
There's Deepa Mehta's adaptation of the Carol Shields novel The Republic of Love. Also on my radar is Guy Maddin's The Saddest Music in the World.
One film near the top of my must-see list is Peter O'Brian's Hollywood North. Festival literature bills it as a comedy about Canadian tax-shelter films of the 1970s. That, dear reader, is what's known as a deep comedic vein. This picture has no excuse to be unfunny.
Even better, it stars Matthew Modine. And I'm told that Modine does, indeed, sport '70s hair.
There's even a film inspired by Neil Young's latest album, Greendale. Knowing Young's dislike for the predictable, it could be fun.
There's an especially strong contingent of films coming from Quebec this year, including Les invasions barbares and Mambo Italiano, which some are calling this year's answer to My Big Fat Greek Wedding. We'll see if that description fits.
For those who love documentaries, there's a lot of buzz about The Corporation, a look at big companies as the dominant institutions of our age. It has interviews with Noam Chomsky and Michael Moore, so don't expect any libertarian diatribes.
There are so many promising films, it feels like the festival has arrived at a turning point. At one time, the only way to see a Canadian film was to take in Perspective Canada, the program reserved specifically for this country's filmmakers.
But now there are Canadian productions in several different programs. Ron Mann's Go Further (the documentary about Woody Harrelson) is in the Special Presentations lineup, for example.
In fact, the festival has got to the point where some movie buffs are complaining the Canadiana is spread too thin.
The complaint is an odd one, considering that these may be the same people who used to lament that Perspective Canada was a kind of filmic ghetto, that its presence was an indication Canadian film wasn't strong enough to stand on its own.
Some might argue what's missing this fall are the heavyweights – there are no entries from David Cronenberg and Atom Egoyan, for instance. But I still have a good feeling about the schedule that festival director Piers Handling and his team of programmers have put together.
And if there's no film from Cronenberg, at least there's one from his nephew, Aaron Woodley, who directed Rhinocerous Eyes.
Which, when you think about it, is a gutsy move. If 2003 turns out to be a good festival, people will remember it as the year young Mr. Woodley's career was launched. If it turns out to be a bad year, however, it will go down in history as the year that was so bad, they even showed a film by David Cronenberg's nephew.
My money is on the former.
Dan Brown will be attending the Toronto International Film Festival for its entirety, from Sept. 4 to 13. Throughout the 9-day festival he will bring you reports on the latest Canadian films. Read his dispatches and follow his comments by clicking on the links.
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| ABOUT DAN BROWN: |
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Dan Brown is the site's senior arts editor/reporter. Before joining us he was a lineup editor and senior writer for Newsworld International. Dan helped to launch the National Post's Arts & Life section, where he was a columnist and reporter. A former editorial writer, copy editor and journalism instructor, Dan has degrees from three universities.
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