Thursday the Toronto International Film Festival will kick off, and cinephiles, film critics and industry folks will be running amok all over downtown Toronto, rushing to get to screenings and holding court late nights on the patios of bars and restaurants near the Lightbox and Scotiabank, passionately dissecting the latest Malick or PT Anderson or Korine. By a couple days into the fest, the buzz will start swirling around this film or that one, for good or bad, and perfectly planned schedules will get tossed out the window, sometimes because a screening is full, sometimes because you’ve heard terrible things about this film but surprisingly good word on that one.

The first few days, everyone’s excited, high on being back in Toronto for another fest, heady with the allure of a slate of potentially great films to watch. It’s like Christmas for film geeks; you’re surrounded by all these pretty packages, but you don’t know what you’re going to get until you’re sitting in that dark theater and it comes down to the filmmaker’s vision, and how it filters through what you bring into it. Maybe you get something that thrills your soul or makes you laugh or cry, maybe you get something that makes you wonder, “What film didn’t get a slot in the fest because THAT one was chosen? Oy.”

By about day five or six the excited hum of energy surrounding the critics and bloggers and publicists and fest programmers starts to wane a bit as fest exhaustion sets in. You churn through it, you down more coffee or energy drinks, you get a second wind, and a third, and a fourth. But you don’t whine about how hard it all is (or at least, you shouldn’t) because if you’re in Toronto working at TIFF, hey, you’re lucky to be there. You have a job watching films and writing about them, or programming films for another fest, or publicizing films, or buying them, or making them. There are way worse jobs to have than one where you get to go to TIFF every year, to see movies like these, the films from the Gala Presentations slate that I’m most interested in putting on my dance card.

GALA PRESENTATIONS

Argo
Ben Affleck, USA

Academy Award® winner Ben Affleck directs and stars in this based-on-fact thriller about a CIA “exfiltration” expert who concocts an outlandish plan to get six stranded Americans out of Tehran after the 1979 invasion of the American embassy — by having them masquerade as a Hollywood film crew … This unique spin on the caper movie is both a riveting historical thriller and a witty satire on Hollywood excess. Although the great supporting cast — including Arkin, John Goodman and Breaking Bad’s Bryan Cranston — provides much buoyant humour, the tension never lets up. Affleck has already proven himself capable of helming gripping action set pieces in The Town (which screened at the Festival in 2010). With Argo, Affleck’s canvas is wider, and his directorial control even more graceful and assured.

Pedigree: Sneak screening at Telluride en route to TIFF.

Comments: Argo‘s been lauded with some of the most powerful buzz out of Telluride since its sneak screening, with bloggers tweeting visions of awards season sugarplums for Affleck’s third directorial effort. I wasn’t that keen on catching this film at TIFF (it has an October release date, so there will be other opportunities to catch it), but the Telluride chatter has me intrigued. Now I just have to find room on my schedule for it …

Free Angela and All Political Prisoners
Shola Lynch, USA / France


In this essential new feature documentary, legendary radical activist Angela Davis speaks for the first time about her 1970s imprisonment as a terrorist and conspirator, which became a flashpoint in the black liberation struggle and turned her into a revolutionary icon … A professor at UCLA, an open member of the Communist Party and an associate of the Black Panthers, Davis possessed an incendiary cocktail of attributes that made her the establishment’s worst nightmare: not only was she educated, fiercely intelligent and fearlessly outspoken, she was also a socialist, an African-American and a woman. It’s an understatement to say that not everyone in the U.S. was ready for Angela Davis — and some in fact did their utmost to put her behind bars forever. Free Angela & All Political Prisoners is the gripping story of how Davis became an international icon of social revolution and progressive politics.

Pedigree: TIFF World Premiere.

Comments: A feminist icon I’d like to know more about; I’ve been working my way through some of Davis’s writings lately and she is so intelligent and fierce. This doc looks to be a fascinating look at the woman behind the legend. Worth checking out.

Inescapable
Ruba Nadda, Canada / South Africa

Alexander Siddig, Joshua Jackson and Marisa Tomei star in this taut thriller about a man whose daughter disappears in Damascus, forcing him to return to the country he left behind more than three decades ago … Nadda spent four years as a teenager living in Damascus, which surely informs her convincing evocation of the climate of paranoia that is cultivated by totalitarian regimes. Along with its chillingly authentic atmosphere, Inescapable poses a series of vital, ethically charged questions. What happens if the past won’t stay in the past? What desperate lengths could someone go to if their former life threatens the new life they’ve spent decades painstakingly building? Expertly building the tension to a fever pitch, Nadda withholds her answers until the final, nail-biting minutes.

Pedigree: World Premiere at TIFF.

Comments: I wasn’t a huge fan of the fairly milquetoast Cairo Time, but Siddig’s performance in it was great. Can Nadda pull off a taut political thriller? The premise is certainly interesting and relevant, and it will be interesting to see what she’s done with it.

Jayne Mansfield’s Car
Billy Bob Thornton, USA / Russia

A top-notch cast — including Robert Duvall, Kevin Bacon and John Hurt — star alongside writer-director Billy Bob Thornton in this drama set in 1969 Alabama, about the culture clash between two families — one American, one British-brought together by the death of a loved one … Writer-director Thornton guides us through the travails of this troubled family with masterly assurance, effortlessly shifting from high comedy to moving pathos. With its sterling cast, Jayne Mansfield’s Car is a warm and richly funny exploration of familial dysfunction and reconciliation that is as truthful as it is hilarious.

Pedigree: Premiered at Berlin, North American premiere at TIFF.

Comments: Mixed reviews out of the Berlinale, with slams from The Hollywood Reporter and Variety, but some positive word-of-mouth as well, have me intrigued to maybe catch this at TIFF. Worth seeing for being Thornton’s return to writing/directing, as well as for the ensemble cast, who, one has to hope, are capable of pulling off the quirkiness of the premise.

Looper
Rian Johnson, USA

A mob hitman (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is assigned to kill his own future self (Bruce Willis) in this mind-bending futuristic thriller … Gordon-Levitt, who demonstrated his deftness with Johnson’s distinctive banter in Brick, does so again here, proving his leading-man chops as he stands toe to toe with the always impressive Willis. Recalling such genre classics as Blade Runner, The Terminator and 12 Monkeys, Looper delivers futuristic eye-candy and nail-biting chase sequences without sacrificing its sharp intelligence or the philosophical implications of its mind-bending premise.

Pedigree: World premiere at TIFF.

Comments. Yes, please.

Midnight’s Children
Deepa Mehta, Canada / UK


Spanning decades and generations, celebrated Canadian filmmaker Deepa Mehta’s highly anticipated adaptation of Salman Rushdie’s Booker Prize®–winning novel is an engrossing allegorical fantasy in which children born on the cusp of India’s independence from Britain are endowed with strange, magical abilities … Rushdie’s inspired adaptation of his own Booker Prize–winning magical realist novel follows the destinies of a pair of children born at the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, the very moment that India claimed its independence from Great Britain — a coinci-dence of profound consequence for both. “Handcuffed to history,” and switched at birth by a nurse in a Bombay hospital, Saleem Sinai (Satya Bhabha), the son of a poor single mother, and Shiva (Siddharth), scion of a wealthy family, are condemned to live out the fate intended for the other. Imbued with mysterious telepathic powers, their lives become strangely intertwined and inextricably linked to their country’s careening journey through the tumultuous twentieth century.

Pedigree: Playing Telluride en route to TIFF.

Comments: I know, I know. These kind of epic adaptations can be a real mess; it’s not easy to condense a multi-generational story into a cinematic form without ending up with plot holes, endless exposition, and undercooked plotlines. But … this script was written by Salman Rushdie, adapting from his own Booker Prize-winning novel. And I’m a fan of Mehta’s films Fire and Water. Telluride buzz isn’t quite good or quite bad, but will probably go sharply one way or the other at TIFF. Curious to see this one, if just to see on which side I’ll fall.

The Reluctant Fundamentalist
Mira Nair, India / Pakistan / USA

Kiefer Sutherland, Liev Schreiber and Kate Hudson co-star in this adaptation of Mohsin Hamid’s international best-selling novel, about a young Pakistani man (Riz Ahmed) whose pursuit of corporate success on Wall Street leads him on a strange path back to the world he had left behind … A boldly dramatic adaptation of a remarkable, timely novel, Mira Nair’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist promises to be one of the most talked about films of the year. Mixing romance and tragedy with the classic arc of ambition thwarted, Nair brings Mohsin Hamid’s award-winning 2007 book to the screen with both passion and insight. She also delivers a cracking thriller.

Pedigree: Venice opener before heading to TIFF.

Comments: I’ve been looking forward to this one for a while now. Reviews out of Venice have been solid; look for this one to pop at Toronto.

Silver Linings Playbook
David O. Russell, USA

Bradley Cooper, Robert De Niro, Julia Stiles and Jennifer Lawrence star in this acerbic comedy-drama from David O. Russell (Three Kings, The Fighter), about a former high-school teacher who returns to his family home after eight months in a mental institution and begins to slowly rebuild his life … Quirky yet utterly accessible, Silver Linings Playbook is a wonderful showcase for Cooper, who gives an uncommonly mature, nuanced performance that is miles away from The Hangover. Cooper’s co-stars shine as well: De Niro is in top comic form as a superstitious über-fan, Lawrence is nothing short of dazzling in her endearing yet darkly kooky role, and Chris Tucker pops up as the object of a hilarious running gag. One of the greatest pleasures of Silver Linings Playbook is Russell’s palpable affection for awkwardness. In Russell’s world, idiosyncrasies are not be conquered; they’re to be embraced.

Pedigree: Toronto debutante.

Comments: It’s David O. Russell. Odds are, I’m going to like it, and so are you.

What Maisie Knew
Scott McGehee, David Siegel, USA

Julianne Moore and Steve Coogan star in this modern-day version of the classic Henry James novel from directors Scott McGehee and David Siegel (The Deep End, Bee Season) … The genius of Henry James’ novel lay in its uncanny ability to capture its young protagonist’s developing consciousness over time … In Aprile, they have found a truly remarkable child star, with a gaze that arrests us with its sincerity and knowingness. Hers is an unforgettable performance, beautifully matched by her adult co-stars Moore (feisty, compelling, and often clad in leopard-print outfits) and Coogan, who is by turns frustrating and endearing in an atypical dramatic role. A grown-up film about childhood and a scathing look at two childish grown-ups, What Maisie Knew is, above all, wickedly amusing and cuttingly insightful.

Pedigree: Toronto debutante.

Comments: Julianne Moore, Steve Coogan, and a kid in the lead role who can act? This one has so much potential to be really good.

*(All film descriptions are from the TIFF catalog.)

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