THE 2007 TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

Attending the Toronto International FilmFestival (TIFF) requires preparation. The largest film festival in the Western Hemisphere, it shows more than 350 films over a ten day period. From 8:45 in the morning until after 2:00 am, as many as 32 venues are showing films simultaneously. In addition, there are at least ten social events going on as well as meetings for industry people. Any reasonable day means that for those who are in the industry see at least four films, attend three social events and have three or four meetings. In order to prepare for this, one needs to anticipate on getting by on no more than 5 hours sleep, and to prepare to do more alcohol consumption that one normally does. After all, in the vicinity of the Festival, the bars stay open til 4am. It's like training for the Olympics.

This was the 32nd year of the Festival, formerly known as the Festival of Festivals, and it was my l8th consecutive year. Things have changed. Because press and industry people come from all over the world, those of us who have such passes go to special screenings, but, when I first went there, we got into public screenings, where the makers of the films would be present for question and answer periods. And, while it's great to mingle with colleagues at such trade screenings, I miss standing in line with the natives of Toronto sharing opinions about the films they've seen. It's become more comparmentalized. Also, the 10 day festival is more frontloaded. Most of the celecrities come at the start, and even those in the "industry" ten to leave after 5 or 6 days. And, even though the number of films exhibited has remained the same, more feature films already have distribution. TIFF is now regarded as the launching pad for the Fall awards candidates. As I write this, over 20 films that were at Toronto have already premiered in Boston. MICHAEL CLAYTON, INTO THE WILD, ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES, ELIZABETH, THE BRAVE ONE (what was that doing in the festival in the first place?), EASTERN PROMISES, SLEUTH, ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, LUST, CAUTION) Yet the joy of discovery of a new and rare talent has somewhat diminished.

Nevertheless, it is still the festival to go to. No matter whare you are in the film world, there one can find a niche, whether it be seeing the it films for Fall releases or unorthodox experimental films, one can find a home, and the people to share that with. There was even a screening of a 1917 John Ford film, BUCKING BROADWAY that was introduced by Peter Bogdanovich. There are still small film distributors and film festival programmers that use Toronto has a shopping mall. And, members of the Coolidge Corner Theatre Foundation even organize a trip. The only element that has been consistently missing has been animation, but that can be saved for the animation festival in Ottawa.

Although I did see the new Woody Allen film, CASSANDRA DREAMS, with Ewan McGregor, Colin Farrell and tthe excellent Tom Wilkenson, a film that seems to betray Allen's own sense of guilt about crimes and misdemeanors past, I rather preferred two experimental films. The first was Winnepeg director Guy Maddin's, MY WINNEPEG. Maddin is one of the greatest filmmakers in the world, and this meditation on his life in Winnepeg is so much the culmination of his own work in film, is truly haunting, and occasionaly hilarious. Unfortunately, the film is so stylised and subjective, that I'm afraid that it might not be seen anywhere else. On the other hand, Boston filmmaker John Gianvito's PROFIT MOTIVE AND THE WHISPERING WIND, inspired by Howard Zinn's book on the people's history of America, is a wonderfully elagiac piece in which the filmmaker visits the gravesites of those who have been part of the activist history of America. It has a strong culumative power. Interestingly enough, it is getting into more prominant European film festivals than American. I hear that Karen Cooper at Film Forum likes it and also The Boston MFA will give it a run after Thanksgiving. Other films I found worthwhile were also political, BATTLE IN SEATTLE, with Ray Liotta, Woody Harrelson, and a wonderfully de-glammed Charlize Theron (as she is in IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH, also in Toronto) about the protests against the World Trade Organization in Seattle in l999, and the film version of the one-man stage play about the blacklisted writer Dalton Trumbo, simply called TRUMBO, a powerful piece and complex porttrait of the blacklisted screenwriter SPARTACUS), who was also a major freedom of speech advocate. Also, on the humanistic/political side, I got to see the new John Sayles film HONEYDRIPPER,a film set in a rural black music bar run by Danny Glover, in the Alabama of 1950. What is nice about Toronto is that one can run into filmmakers in a casual setting (unlike Sundance, where VIP passes are everything_. Having a conversation with my Beanywood associate with Sayles at a party led to HONEYDRIPPER getting its New England premiere at the upcoming Northampton FIndependent Film Festival in early November.

But Toronto wouldn.t be complete without its demented component.,There's a section of Toronto called Midnight Madness, curated by a friend of mine Colin Geddes, and, one of the better films I saw this year was STUCK, staring Mina Suvari and Stephen Rea, and directed by Stuard Gordan (REANIMATOR, EDMUND) It's a fascinating, almost Pinter-esque story of a hospital worker who hits a newly homeless man who gets stuck in her car windshield. It's a film worth waiting for.

For, as I've said, Toronto does have something for everyone, but you have to prepare, whether you're in the business or not. And it is a marathon. Be prepared!