Ten days, 18 programmes, 352 films, and over 500 international guests, all packed into one beautiful and diverse city. While the Toronto International Film Festival is now in its 31st year, navigating this burgeoning screen scene requires nerves of steel and a veritable battle plan. Between all the sold-out premieres and star-studded galas, how is the average moviegoer to approach this colossal cultural tastemaker?
Plan A “Get the Jump”: Last year’s TIFF featured early screenings of Crash, Brokeback Mountain, Capote, and Walk the Line-in fact, all with the exception of Brokeback had their world premieres right here in Toronto. In case you’ve been living under a rock for that last seven months, those four films all went on to receive top honours at the Oscars and Golden Globes. So it’s easy to see why certain Hollywood buzz-films become high-value targets for film scenesters seeking to pre-empt the hype and secure some Oscar-night bragging rights.
This year’s festival also boasts a number of films that seem to be contending for a gold statuette. There’s no doubt that people will be lined up to see the world premiere of All the King’s Men, a stirring political drama starring A-Listers Sean Penn, Jude Law, Kate Winslet, and James Gandolfini, and critics are already hailing director Todd Field’s latest suburban drama, Little Children as a serious awards-show threat, while director Anthony Minghella (who’s got a hardcore Oscar itch) hopes for a similar reaction to his new film, Breaking and Entering. Hey, life is sweet when you get to say you saw it first.
Plan B “Buried Treasure”: This approach is to catch the most obscure foreign and indie flicks screening at TIFF with the sound reasoning that each year some obscure cinematic genius quietly slips through the cracks never to see the inside of a Toronto theatre again. This option offers wide selection and viewing flexibility, since two third’s of the festival programming is made up of these films. Plus, you just might catch the big sleeper hit of 2007.
Plan C “Red Carpet Fever”: What? There are, like, movies in this film festival? This approach is for all the wannabe paparazzi who say “whatever” to all that arty film nonsense, and just want to stalk celebrities and party hard in ritzy clubs. In that sense this year’s festival is a blockbuster, starring the likes of Sacha Baron Cohen, Tom Hanks, Jennifer Lopez, The Flaming Lips, Russell Crowe, Michael Moore, and Brad Pitt. Who needs movies when the pages of Hello! are walking down our streets?
Hot stakeout spots include the Four Seasons and the Sutton Place hotels, pretty much all of Yorkville, and, of course, those famous red carpets.
We’ve found that the best approach to a well-rounded festival experience is to plan ahead and try to experience a little of each, just like we have here.
Exclusive Interview:
Cillian Murphy
Irish Actor Cillian Murphy (Batman Begins, 28 Days Later, Breakfast on Pluto) sat down to chat with The Varsity about his starring role in Ken Loach’s IRA drama, The Wind that Shakes the Barley, which has its North American premiere at this year’s fest.
Curled up on a couch and sporting a huge pair of shades-presumably to hide a massive hangover from a party the night before-he was nevertheless forthcoming about how he approaches subject matter that hits close to home.
The Varsity: What would you like foreign audiences, who might not be so familiar with Irish history, to take away from this film?
Cillian Murphy: Well I think the film works on two levels. It’s a political film, obviously, but also it’s a human story, and I think people anywhere can get that side of the human story. If they wish to go further and exercise their minds a little more, they can take some of the political meaning from it and maybe apply that to the world around them.
V: How would you respond to critics that dismiss the film as a one-sided take on events?
CM: Well I would like to see them point out any atrocity in the film that didn’t actually happen. It’s all fact. It all happened. The black and tans (British soldiers deployed in the occupation of Ireland) carried out these atrocities. And none of them are saying it didn’t happen. Also, we made a film about a group of young men. That’s our story. The story isn’t about a group of young black and tans. You can’t tell a film from every angle. You have to choose a number of protagonists and follow their story.
V: As an Irish actor, did you feel a responsibility to make films at or about home?
CM: I don’t feel any responsibility, because I don’t write them or direct them. But if a good script comes along, like for example Breakfast on Pluto two years ago, and then this, it’s more that they were good stories than that they were Irish films.
V: In this film there’s a scene where your character, Damien, a doctor, has to execute a young traitor, can you describe how he might have justified that?
CM: He’s a doctor. So how the hell do you reconcile being a doctor and taking life back? I think with Damien, he feels that once he gets involved with this cause, that he has to see it through till its ultimate conclusion. All democratic means have been closed off to them. Their Parliaments were banned. Their newspapers were banned. So violence was the only last thing they could resort to. It became a war, and in a war, traitors are shot. So I guess that’s probably the only justification I can think of.
Exclusive Interview:
Alejandro González Iñárritu
Later on, we caught up with the acclaimed Mexican Director Alejandro González Iñárritu to ask him about the North American premiere of his latest flick, Babel, which stars Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. Set in Morocco, Babel promises to complete Iñárritu’s “trilogy of death” which includes his two previous films Amores Perros and 21 Grams. Earlier this year Babel was nominated for the Palme d’Or, the top prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival.
The Varsity: Do the fractured timelines of your films portray your own sense of the world?
Alejandro González Iñárritu: I think first of all it portrays how the world happens. While we are talking now there are things that are happening that will affect us. It’s a way to observe things the way they are, to take advantage of what the film offers you. And I think at the same time, obviously there is a dramatic tension that you can create by putting this kind of hook around things, which is storytelling.
V: You’re trilogy has been referred to as a “trilogy of death”, and I didn’t really buy that. I was wondering what you think is the overriding theme among these three movies?
AGI: Well basically the main thing for me, and the reason I call them a trilogy, is because the three of them are about parents and children and the complex relation of it, the pain and vulnerability, and fragility we feel as one and the other. The other thing is that all of them are interconnected by one event. In Amores Perros there are just three stories that happen to cross in one single moment. In 21 Grams, basically there’s one story told in three different points of view and the stories are physically connected. And in Babel there is no physical connection. They never see each other. It’s just an emotional connection. That’s why I call them a trilogy. But I think it’s more about life than death. The thing is in Western cultures we try to avoid death. We don’t want to see it. We want to dismiss it. That’s why we have surgery and Botox and all of those things. We don’t want to recognize that it is part of life. So there is death, but I think it is more about life. I hope that is more about life.
V: There are rumours that you had a falling out with writer Guillermo Arriaga. Are you planning to work with him again?
AGI: I think he wants to direct, which I think is great for him. I think we are very satisfied with this trilogy. That’s the end of this concept. Let’s see what happens later.
V: You dedicated this movie to your children. Are you anxious about their future in this world?
AGI: Yeah, I worry. The way the world is heading now is super wrong. When you have more power than culture, as the President of the United States does or even Tony Blair, it’s a very dangerous moment for history. The world is now in the hands of people who are not very smart. And what is happening is, it seems that you are guilty for being different. So this theory that the ones who are not with us are against us is really fucking things around in the world. And now look how the world is going. It’s terrible. How many kids are dying every year? How many Iraqi kids, or Afghanistan kids, or Palestinian kids, or Jewish kids are dying? I have two kids and I’m obviously worried by these things.
V: Do you think you could organize a screening of Babel at the White House?
AGI: I don’t think that [George W. Bush] would like to see this kind of film.
