Hollywood Reporter
Preview - Telefilm Canada's PITCH THIS!
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 15, 2009
Who says that film funding can't be exciting? Today six filmmaking crews who have six different movie ideas will have six minutes to pitch these ideas to a room packed with hundreds of industry professionals. One idea and one crew will be pronounced the best and will be awarded $10 000 to help get their idea off the ground.
This is Telefilm Canada's PITCH THIS!, which enters its 10th year at this year's festival. The event will take place at the Sutton Place Hotel, located at 955 Bay Street, on the 33rd floor, at noon. The pitch is open to all guest relations and sales & industry pass holders and will be judged by a panel of international experts from within the film industry.
Over the course of the past month, finalists have been coached by leading industry professionals on how to focus their ideas and how to make them sound scintillating to the jury. The event will be hosted by Canadian actor Ennis Esmer, known for his role in Young People F***ing and, more recently, on CBC's The Listener.
Preview - Master Class
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 15, 2009
Today at 3:00 pm film critic and academic Tom McSorley will interview Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan live on-stage. The Master Class event will take place at Varsity Cinemas at 55 Bloor Street West and will be followed by a cocktail hour to celebrate the release of McSorley's book about Egoyan, Atom Egoyan's The Adjuster.
The event will see Egoyan answer questions about his body of work, which includes acclaimed films like The Adjuster (1991), The Sweet Hereafter (1997), Adoration (2008) and Chloe, which screened at the festival this week as a gala presentation. Egoyan has a very distinct filmic style, leading many to term him a true Canadian auteur. His films in recent years have drifted away from his more experimental earlier works (such as 1993's Calendar), focusing on evermore complex character relationships and emotional entanglements. Always critically appreciated, his commercial success continues to grow.
Tom McSorley resides in Ottawa, where he teaches film studies at Carleton University and holds the post of executive director at the Canadian Film Institute. He has written several books on film, including a survey of the works of Phillip Hoffman and Frank Cole. His research for his latest book is sure to lend insight into the Q & A session. Fans of Egoyan and the role of the director in filmmaking will not be disappointed.
Preview - Crackie
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 15, 2009
This year's festival line-up is not short on great Canadian cinema. Certainly, the provinces of Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec are well represented. But it's nice to see that the voices of provinces less prolific in the country's film industry are being heard as well.
Crackie comes to the festival from Newfoundland and Labrador, and paints a grim but ultimately hopeful picture of life in the one of province's economically hard-hit coastal towns. The film tells the story of Mitsy (Meghan Greeley) who has lived with her overbearing grandmother (Canadian comedic icon Mary Walsh, honing her dramatic chops) since her mother, an alcoholic and a woman of slightly loose morals, abandoned her. Mitsy dreams of one thing and one thing only: of becoming a hairdresser and escaping her hum-drum life for a world with a touch more glamour.
But for the moment her life revolves around caring for Sparky, a dog as unwanted as she was, who her grandmother reluctantly allows her to keep.
Suddenly though, her life gets much more complicated. Mitsy's mother returns to her hometown from Alberta and the tensions that pull at three generations of familial relationships begin to rise.
Life in Newfoundland is sometimes hard, and the film doesn't dance around that. The characters are often ensnared in fog that's figurative as well as literal. But Mitsy is played with youthful optimism by newcomer Greeley, and even on the Rock the sun sometimes cuts through the mist. This is a film about hardship, but also about hope.
Preview - The Front Line
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 14, 2009
At a press conference earlier this summer announcing some of the films that would screen at this year's festival, Piers Handling, TIFF CEO and director, and Cameron Bailey, the festival's co-director, suggested that 2009 was the year that untold stories would finally surface.
This certainly seems to be the case in The Front Line, an Italian film directed by Renato De Maria. In the late '60s and early '70s simmering tensions on Italian university campuses led to the formation of extremist left-wing groups like the Red Brigades and the Prima Linea. These were intent upon overthrowing the state by whatever means necessary. Those means were radical, violent and more-often-than-not, deadly.
The Front Line is the story of a young man involved in this movement, Sergio Segio (Riccardo Scamarcio), and the young woman, equally devoted to the cause, who he falls in love with. Their youthful idealism and commitment to their beliefs allow them to commit reprehensible acts, but slowly Segio finds himself losing his conviction that they are necessary.
The Front Line brings to the screen a chapter of Italy's history that, while recent, has perhaps been forgotten or, in the case of North Americans, never explored at all. It takes larger-than-life political beliefs and idealism and focuses them on the story of two individuals caught up in them. The film isn't about passing judgment. It's about facing the consequences of our actions. It comments on political tensions today as back then. But ultimately, it's about people.
Preview - Chloe
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 13, 2009
In last year's Adoration, directed by Canadian auteur Atom Egoyan, a young boy becomes obsessed with a story that he writes for a drama class, beginning to believe that his work of fiction is in fact fact. In Chloe, which will screen as a gala presentation at Roy Thomson Hall this evening, Egoyan again explores themes of obsession and the blurring of imaginings and reality.
The story this time around is that Catherine (Julianne Moore), a doctor, has begun to suspect her husband David (Liam Neeson), a professor, of infidelity. And so she hires an escort, Chloe (played by relative newcomer Amanda Seyfried, who also stars in Jennifer's Body, also screening at the festival; it's definitely the 23-year-old's year), to attempt to seduce him and to report all indiscretions back to her, hoping to prove that he has a faltering heart.
Except that Catherine begins to shape Chloe's meetings with David, orchestrating their rendezvous and insisting that Chloe spare no details in her reports on them. Their own relationship deepens and suddenly everyone is caught up in the game of passion and deception.
Egoyan's work can sometimes be hard to connect with, his characters sometimes seem distant from the audience (as in Calendar, where the characters are often literally shot in the distance of some Armenian landscape, further removed by a camera's lens,) but this film hints at something more heated and personal, with desire and attraction on full display.
Preview - Doc Conference
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 13, 2009
Starting at 10:00 am today, at the University of Toronto's Victoria College on Charles Street West, guest relations, sales & industry and press pass holders are invited to attend the presentations and round-tables at the festival's Doc Conference.
The day-long event is a series of panels and discussions that will allow pass holders to engage in dialogue about the big issues, from financing to ethical issues, facing documentary filmmakers today. Topics of discussion include how to remain an independent voice in the documentary film industry, distribution of documentary films, financing documentary film in the current economic climate and a panel discussion on the various ethical issues that can arise from cinema verité filmmaking.
Speakers and panel-members come from all domains of the documentary industry. Among them are documentary directors, producers, professors of communication and employees of film consulting firms.
The event will continue until 5:00 pm. The full schedule of the conference's topics and events can be found at http://www.tiff.net/industry/programmes/.
Preview - Meet With...
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 12, 2009
The Meet With... program at TIFF is a chance for festival-goers to meet well-known and successful film industry professionals in an intimate and personal setting to discuss industry hot topics and to glean advice about the business and art of filmmaking. The sessions take place daily at the Match Club, located at the 5th Elementt Restaurant at 1033 Bay Street, until Sept. 17.
Today, from 11:00 am-12:00 pm, Sharon Swart, senior editor of features at Variety magazine, will discuss the publication's pick of 10 promising producers to watch out for. Swart, who is also in charge of flagging directors that the magazine suspects will have an impact on the industry, is especially interested and versed in the independent film industry. The event, like all Meet With... sessions, is open to anyone with a sales & industry or guest relations pass.
Topics of discussion later on in the festival will range from the use of new media to draw and immerse audiences in film, emerging trends in film distribution, the relation between video games and film and its business potential and feature comedy writing. More detailed information can be found on the festival's industry website, tiff.net/industry/programmes.
Preview - Get Low
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 12, 2009
In 1938 Felix "Bush" Breazeale, alive and kicking, hosted his funeral, figuring that it would be his only chance to actually enjoy it. The event drew thousands to his small Tennessee town and was covered by national newspapers; the stunt became something of an American legend.
Get Low, which will screen as a gala presentation at Roy Thomson Hall tonight, is based on Bush's story. The film sees Bush (Robert Duvall), a crotchety, hardened, bearded woodsman, emerge from his cabin, where he has been living in isolation from the nearby town. He invites friends and enemies alike to learn the truth about him, about why he lives so lonely a life, and to dispel myths of madness and murder. There's more to this action than the fun of watching one's own funeral: behind it is a desire for confession, honesty and redemption.
Fittingly, the film, directed by first-time feature director Aaron Schneider, tells Bush's story in a style that is quintessentially American. Get Low has a distinctly Western-feel, although not due to gun-slinging cowboys or showdowns at sunset.
Rather, it's a film about the characters - from the sly undertaker (Bill Murray) to his earnest sidekick (Lucas Black) to the sweet ex-lover (Sissy Spacek) to Bush himself - of a small, 1930s town in the western United States.
The film promises to recreate that time and place beautifully and evoke the feel of a classic Hollywood film with light-heartedness and depth.
Preview - Suck
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 11, 2009
Suck may very well be the solution to Hollywood's current obsession with the romantic, teen-friendly vampire flick.
The Canadian film, directed by actor Rob Stefaniuk (Phil the Alien), is a smart blend between a classic band film (unsuccessful band of longtime friends unexpectedly makes it big) and a rollicking vampire movie.
But if you're expecting Rob Pattinson, Twilight star and teen dream, you'll be sorely disappointed. Suck's vampires look as though they've raided the Halloween make-up section at the local Wal-Mart. They're white-faced, red-eyed and fake-fanged. They scream camp, and when vampires are the in-thing, a throw-back to kitsch, fun films like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Vamp isn't a bad thing.
The basic premise of the film is this: the Winners, a mediocre bar band, are going nowhere and getting there fast. That is, until attractive band-member Jennifer (Jessica Pare) spends the night with the baddest-looking goth ever to grace the silver screen. She returns to band practice the next day looking fairer-skinned than usual. Stranger still is that Jennifer's musical skills have inexplicably gone from mediocre to über overnight.
One by one, the band's members and those around them begin to make the same transformation. Then come the moral quandaries, as band leader Joey (played by Stefaniuk) is forced the ponder the question: whether to suck at music or suck...well, you get the idea.
Stylistically, the film looks a little bit like sleeper cult hit Repo! The Genetic Opera (2008), set in seedy bars and decaying alleyways, with a harsh, almost digital cinematographic feel. Some might consider the film a musical as well, for the vampires are prone to breaking out in the occasional song and movement number, but it reads more like a music video. Songs are sometimes psychedelic, sometimes gritty and rock-themed.
Suck certainly doesn't lack in rock-star clout. Alice Cooper co-stars as a bartender turned bad-ass bloodsucker and Iggy Pop as a manic producer.
"Suck is cool, it’s different, it’s stylized, doesn’t take itself seriously, and it doesn’t suck," promises Stefaniuk.
In addition to screenings of the film, which start today, the cast of the film will make a live appearance at 6:30 pm at Yonge-Dundas Square as part of the festival's free programming.
Preview - Match Club
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 11, 2009
As of yesterday, as the Toronto International Film Festival kicked off, sales & industry pass-holders and representatives from the festival's guest relations office can head over to 5th Elementt Restaurant at 1033 Bay St., dubbed the "Match Club" for the duration of the festival, to meet with international experts in film festival organization, industry sales and production. Consultants will be on-site at the lounge, which is open daily from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm until Sept. 17, to set up meetings with pass-holders and offer their advice.
The consultants are successful producers from around the world: Nancy Collet recently founded Cinema Collet, which offers services to a wide array of clients, from festivals to filmmakers, and served as director of programming at the American Film Institute; Peter Belsito of New York City has been involved in the production of groundbreaking documentaries, founding both LA Newsreel and and the Independent Feature Project in the 1980s and producing Valley of Tears, a documentary about Mexican-American labourers, in 2003; Matt Toner and Jessica Leigh Clark-Bojin are both involved, as president and creative director, respectively, in Zeros2Heroes Media, which works to give film and television fans the power to break into the industry, to find digital solutions in film and television and to simplify new media concepts for use by the industry in production and advertising.
Preview - Year of the Carnivore
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 10, 2009
Sook-Yin Lee has come a long way since her MuchMusic VJ days. After starring in John Cameron Mitchell’s Hedwig and the Angry Inch and, more recently, Shortbus, the latter film labelled the most sexually explicit movie ever made outside of the porn industry by Variety magazine, Lee proved she was more than a cookie-cutter hipster.
Her feature-directing debut promises to be just as controversial. But Year of the Carnivore, starring Cristin Milioti and Mark Rendall, looks beyond mere carnal nature, just as Shortbus did, to comment on deeper truths about human nature and yearning.
True, it's the story of a woman, Sammy Smalls (Milioti), who works as a security guard at a supermarket and who bribes customers caught shoplifting into giving her lessons to boost her sexual prowess, but Carnivore is a love story at heart, however unconventional. Sammy is in love with Eugene (Rendall), a busker whose rock band is on the verge of making it big. It's only to overcome a first, disastrous sexual encounter with him that Sammy resorts to abusing her power, as insignificant as it is.
Like Shortbus, like last year's Toronto Stories (one-fourth of which Lee directed,) this film is a study of characters. Of quirky, neurotic, unhappy, completely messed-up characters. Characters who want more, who want someone, who feel trapped in their time and place. All of this treated with a sympathy and light-heartedness (Lee scripted the story herself) certain to at once charm, amuse and devastate.
Preview - CFTPA Awards Reception
By Michelle Anne Olsen
September 10, 2009
As the Toronto International Film Festival kicks off today, the Canadian Film and Television Production Association, which represents and advocates for English-language production companies and producers within Canada, will present an independent Canadian producer with the CFTPA Producers Award at a reception held at the 5th Elementt Restaurant at 1033 Bay Street, at 4:00 pm.
The $10,000 annual award is intended to promote the production of Canadian cinema and recognize the country's industry talent. In order to be eligible, a producer must be screening a feature film at that year's festival. Of the more than 25 producers screening eligible films at this year's festival, five finalists are vying for the prize.
They include Robin Cass, one of the founders of Toronto's Triptych Media and the man behind 2007's Emotional Arithmetic and this year's dark comedy/heist film High Life; David Hamilton, whose credentials include the production of Water (2005) and Cooking with Stella, an issue-driven comedy screening at this year's festival; Jennifer Jonas, who worked on last year's Toronto Stories and dark films Leslie, My Name is Evil and George Ryga's Hungry Hills, both premiering at this year's festival; Peter Raymont, award-winning director of Shake Hands with the Devil: The Journey of Romeo Dallaire (2005), who also produced this year's Genius Within: The Inner Life of Glenn Gould, a documentary about the late, great pianist; and Kevin Tierney, behind Canadian hits such as Bon Cop/Bad Cop, and Memoirs: Pierre Elliot Trudeau, as well as offbeat festival selection The Trotsky.
The jury that selects the award recipient consists of executives from top Canadian production companies.
About Michelle Anne Olsen
Michelle is a fourth-year journalism student at Carleton University's School of Journalism and Communication. She has been taking to the streets of Ottawa's arts community with her notepad and pencil for three years, most notably reporting on the struggles of Ottawa's historic Mayfair theatre to avoid closure, for Carleton's independent newspaper, the Charlatan. She also interned in 2008 at the National Post, writing for their Arts & Life section, and will help organize this year's Ottawa International Animation Festival.