The Torontonian: The People’s Festival

As a Toronto native, it’s always amazing to see the film world descend upon my hometown as if it were somehow important. Readers from another country may not understand the feeling, but growing up Canadian usually involves a national inferiority complex: Canada is the USA’s younger brother, the little cousin, the friendly bumpkin to the North. TIFF has played a major role in changing that. The city is energized. It’s prepped and swept; cleaned and preened. It’s ready to go.

The Hunt

Toronto’s film festival matters. It matters because the industry knows that Toronto’s audiences are savvy, enthusiastic, and passionate about their cinema. At its heart, Toronto is a festival for film fans—not film critics, buzz-chasers, or Oscar-prognosticators. Of course, while journalists like myself (and the rest of the talented MCN team) will cover a large chunk of the 2012 slate, the industry operates in a bubble. The real action happens in the theater, with thousands of Torontonians revving to engage the hundreds of movies. There are awards to be given away at the end of the event, but they’re not the main focus. Cannes is a horse race. Who will win the Palme d’Or? Toronto is a marathon. Who will see the most movies?

The one exception is Toronto’s People’s Choice Award, voted by TIFF audiences on ballots that are submitted at the end of a screening. In its 34-year tally, the People’s Choice Award has gone on to be known as an “Oscar-maker”—the winning film steadily gains steam until it wins the Academy’s love and golden respect. 1999’s American Beauty was the film that Toronto correctly identified as the year’s number one picture, reflected in mountains of trophies and eventually winning Best Picture. The People’s Choice Award is relevant now. It’s fitting, then, that Canuck director Jason Reitman would bring the film back to the city that launched its ride to greatness with a “live read.” Kept secret until a few days ago, Reitman will invite actors on stage to do a table-read of American Beauty in front of Toronto audiences. How cool is that?

The Artist won Best Picture in February, a crowd-pleaser, but one with a fluffy core narrative. I expected it to win the People’s Choice when it played Toronto, but it makes sense in hindsight why it didn’t: Toronto loves an important story, and most of the films that have won Toronto involve contemporary issues or themes that hit close to home. It’s why a film like Where Do We Go Now? won the audience nod at TIFF 2011. The warring conflict between religions plays very well to a city as multicultural as Toronto.

Stories We Tell.

I’ve lived here long enough to tune in to Toronto’s taste in film. As a result, I’ll make two guesses of the 2012 winner of the People’s Choice award—in essence, films that I expect to do well here: Thomas Vinterberg’s The Hunt, a dynamite drama exploring hysteria in a small town, and Sarah Polley’s Stories We Tell. Expect Polley’s name to skyrocket after this festival—she’s a fellow Torontonian who, according to accounts from Telluride and Venice, has crafted a documentary about her life and her family’s life that is mesmerizing in its storytelling. It’s hard to say that I am “excited” to see her latest film, given how intimate and personal it sounds, but as a fan of excellent work it’s the picture I most look forward to seeing this festival. Not The Master, not Argo, not Cloud Atlas, not anything else. If her film is as exquisite as I’ve read every day this past week, this city will somehow increase our adoration for Polley and bestow upon her the People’s Choice Award. We take care of our own.

Back to Vinterberg. If the Festen director doesn’t win Toronto, I’d bet good money on The Hunt winning Best Foreign Language Film this year, having seen the entire Cannes Competition slate and being quite familiar with contemporary world cinema. It’s got a textbook three-act structure that the Academy will eat up in spades. It deals with themes that are pertinent to life in a kneejerk world. The performances are powerful. It’s my favorite film of 2012 thus far, and I’m very keen to see how Toronto will react to it. I imagine—hope—it will be strong.

It’s an exciting time to be a film buff, and this year’s festival looks positively jam-packed with stories to tell, narratives to unearth, movies to review, and successes to hear of. The films await. The Toronto International Film Festival starts Thursday. For now, the city sleeps; its party clothes ready by the side of the bed.

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