I’m a bit out of pocket down south so a fleeting post is all I can offer the history-making moment that is ‘Precious’ winning Toronto’s audience prize. No other film has taken the audience award at both Sundance and Toronto, I believe, but this miraculous film’s Oscar trajectory has been written for months. Congrats to all involved, and onward…
Tag: TIFF
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TORONTO: Wrap up
And so it ends. The last of the press screenings have winded down, the final Gala is tonight, and the awards are on the way, ending this year;s Toronto International Film Festival.This year’s fest was terrific, one of the better festivals, though still not as strong as 2007, which for me was the greatest ever. Once again you can feel the Oscar buzz happening around several of the films and performances that have been screened here, just as you can hear and see the buzz around films without distribution. At the end of it all, it was a great time.
I sit here today exhausted, with aching legs, tired of coffee, and not really wanting to see a film for a few hours. There is nothing worse than attending a festival and struggling to find good films, but that has never happened to me in Toronto. Montreal is a different story…
The best film I saw at this year’s festival was the searing “Precious,” a stunning piece of cinema that is a work of art. Demanding, difficult, full of hate and rage, yet ultimately hope, “Precious” is extraordinary. Over the course of the festival I encountered many folks in the lines and on the streets asking me which film I thought stood out most, and each time I answered this one. Those who had seen it agreed wholeheartedly, and I met only one person who did not care for it.
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INTERVIEW: Steven Soderbergh
Toronto Film FestivalSteven Soderbergh freely admits how much luck has played into his career, beginning with winning the coveted Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1989, the victory that launched his career and his first major work, “sex, lies and videotape.”
“First of all the film was not supposed to be part of the competition but when another film was removed they bumped mine into that category,” he explains, “and then Francis Ford Coppola, who was supposed to be head of jury, couldn’t do it, so Wim Wenders took over. Without those two sets of circumstances would anything good have come out of Cannes for me? You have to ask yourself those things. Luck was with me, and I am fine with that. It’s knowing what to do with that luck.”
Soderbergh is a relaxed guy in this posh hotel suite. For some reason Warner Bros. chose the Royal York Hotel for their press days, away from festival village, and a cab (or subway) ride away from the action. I don’t mind the break, and frankly I admire Soderbergh very much, so I was looking forward to meeting him and speaking with him about his film “The Informant!” (opening today) and his career.
At this stage in his life, as he nears 50, Sodebrergh smiles and says he sees so much comedy in the world around him these days. “You have to see the humor in things don’t you,” he asks. “When I read ‘The Informant’ for the first time I saw it as a comedy, which many other people did not. But think about it, there have been films like this done as drama, Michael Mann’s ‘The Insider,’ which I like very much, so I chose not to go in that direction.
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TORONTO: ‘Whip It,’ ‘Valhalla Rising’
More from the fest…“Whip It” (***)
Skinny Milly Miller. I remember that name from the roller derby shows on Saturday afternoons in the 1970s. My grandfather loved sports of any kind and when there was nothing else, it was roller derby he would watch, and invite me to do so with him. I loved him so much I never had the heart to tell him how stupid a sport I though it was, so I sat down and watched it with him. His favorite skater was a tall, black woman named Skinny Milly Miller.
Anyway, I have always liked Drew Barrymore, that familiar manner in which she makes you feel like an old friend, even when meeting you for the first time. Though I never thought much of her as an actress until this year (in HBO’s “Grey Gardens”), I have always respected her as a fine movie star.
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TORONTO: Douglas tops in the tedious ‘Solitary Man’
People tend to forget that Michael Douglas won his first Academy Award not as an actor but as a producer, bringing the classic film “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” to the screen in 1975.His father Kirk had given him the project after years of trying to get the things going and Michael went outside the industry to find the money to make the picture, approaching music giant Saul Zaentz. The rest, as they say, is history, and Douglas became a major player in the business who has no doubt gone toe-to-toe with many a studio executive to get what he wants for his films.
I wonder, however, even with an acting Oscar eventually to his credit (for Oliver Stone’s “Wall Street”), has Douglas ever been given his proper due as an actor?
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TORONTO: Michael Caine, ‘Harry Brown’ and Oscar
Michael Caine has won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor twice, the first time for his performance in Woody Allen’s “Hannah and Her Sisters,”and the second for Lasse Hallström’s “The Cider House Rules.” Among others, he ousted Tom Cruises’s brilliant performance in “Magnolia” with the latter.Beloved within the business, Caine is considered an old war horse who has made as many bad movies as he has good ones (I think I’m being very fair), and it is my belief the Academy would like nothing more than to finally recognize his work as a leading man. He has been nominated in the past for “Alfie,” “Slueth,” “Educating Rita” and “The Quiet American,” but he’s never won in the category.
Let me be clear: SO WHAT?
The man has two Academy Awards on his mantle — two — while many other actors are still waiting for their first (and in some cases, many still await their first nod). Why is it that every time Caine makes a film that is reasonably good and he offers a typically fine performance, people start talking Oscar? Personally, if I were Caine, I would find it a tad demeaning.
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INTERVIEW: Clive Owen
Toronto Film Festival“I have two lives, mate,” Clive Owen says with clear-eyed certainty. “My work, and when I am done, my home life. There is no question to me which is more important. My wife and children are everything to me.”
Owen is as intense in person as he is in some of the roles he played on screen the last few years. Best known as a tough guy type in films such as “Sin City” and “Shoot ‘Em Up,” he is also brilliant without the edge, as evident in “Bent” and his Oscar-nominated turn in “Closer.” He sits close to me, his eyes never leave mine, and when I glance down to make a note he is still staring at me. But when he smiles his eyes smile as well. As Scott Hicks says, “Clive loves his life, he loves his family, his girls, his work, and his success…he loves his life.”
I wondered how much that love for family and life allowed Owen to tap into the mind of the character he portrays so very well in “The Boys are Back,” the new film from Aussie director Hicks, who first made an impact here back in 1996 with “Shine.” Owen has emerged as one of the great British actors in recent years, his scalding performance in “Closer” an extraordinary poiece of acting that seemed to blow everyone else in the film off the screen, no mean feat considering the quality of the acting in the movie. Julia Roberts and Natalie Portman gave career best work in the film, many of their scenes coming opposite the actor in front of me.
Owen’s road to this place began in television, with his first memorable film performance coming in the powerful drama “Bent,” based on the play by Martin Sherman about Hitler’s massacre of homosexuals during the Holocaust. It was “Gosford Park” that next earned him strong notices, followed by a role in “The Bourne Identity” with Matt Damon.
After the box office failure of “King Arthur,” Owen was back in theaters with “Closer,” which changed the course of his career. Brilliant work in “Children of Men,” “Inside Man” and, more recently, the under-appreciated “Duplicity,” have made him one of the top stars working in film today, and among the busiest. At one time he was among the leading contenders for the role of James Bond, a role that eventually went to Daniel Craig. He possesses a Bogart tough guy persona, but with a soft side buried within. There is certainly an edge to his work, but there is a heart there as well.
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INTERVIEW: Robert Duvall
Toronto Film FestivalSitting down with Robert Duvall is more than a little intimidating. The man does not suffer fools, nor does he have a lot of time for small talk or stupid questions. He likes to talk, but he also likes an informed conversation. As he nears 80, he is still a force of nature, with a powerful presence and voice that goes up and down depending on his excitement.
Duvall and I first met in 1997 when “The Apostle” exploded out of Toronto, landing the veteran actor a much-deserved Oscar nomination for Best Actor. The performance was a volcanic, furious portrait of a man trying to atone for his sins by building a church in the backwoods of Louisiana after killing a man in a fit of rage. For 13 years Duvall shopped the project around Hollywood, being turned down by the major and minor studios until his accountant suggested he finance the film himself. In a position to do so, he did just that, eventually selling the film at TIFF after a famed bidding war.
I got to know him when he invited me to spend some time with him on the set of “John Q” while it was shooting here in Toronto, the invitation coming during the 2000 Film Festival when I interviewed him a few times for his soccer picture, “A Shot at Glory,” in which he co-starred with soccer star Ally McCoist. In the years since, Duvall has kept himself busy with great roles and performances in films such as “Broken Trail,” for which he won the Emmy Award for Best Actor, and “Kicking and Screaming,” a soccer comedy with Will Farrell that seemed like an odd choice for the actor.
Recognized as one of America’s greatest thespians, Duvall has given an array of brilliant performances over the years, from his breakthrough, shy Boo, in “To Kill a Mockingbird” through to his mafia lawyer Tom Hagen in “The Godfather” and “The Godfather Part II” and perhaps most memorable of all, Kilgore in “Apocalypse Now.” He came into his own in the 1970s, at a time when other major talents such as Jack Nicholson, Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino, Robert De Niro and Gene Hackman were also turning in brilliant performances, changing the face of American acting.
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TORONTO: More on ‘The Road’
There were some complaints in yesterday’s Toronto thread that I wasn’t specific enough as to why I enjoyed John Hillcoat’s “The Road,” so let me make it clear.The film captures, miraculously, in its performances and its images, a profound sense of loss, both for what was and for what will never be. Trees fall around the actors, nothing left to replace them. There are no flowers, no bushes, no sense of life. The land — the earth — is slowly dying and with that humanity will die as well.
Yet The Man is dedicated to surviving and sees his son as the future, as any parent would. “To me he’s a god.” One day we will die but our children will live on, and that is a motivating factor carried across precisely in the film. The Man hopes he is teaching his boy how to survive because he knows he is dying. The constant pain is etched onto Viggo Mortenson’s face throughout the film, all joy is gone, and memory has become his foe, taking him back to happier times that simply torture him.
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TORONTO: ‘The Road,’ ‘Bad Lieutenant,’ ‘Chloe’
(Please note, as opposed to Kris and Guy, I tend to grade films on a 5-star scale.)Loads to catch up on today and some interviews still to write up. First off, I have to confess that I disagree with Kris’s review of “The Road,” respectfully of course, and I think I have a reason why I might have viewed and appreciated the film in a very different light than he. I also saw Werner Herzog’s “The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans,” which features a hugely entertaining performance from Nicolas Cage, and the latest from Atom Egoyan, “Chloe,” which features a splendid performance from Amanda Seyfreid.
Let’s dig in…
“The Road” (****)
This was a dark and unsettling film based on the brilliant book by Cormac McCarthy about a father (Viggo Mortensen) and son (Kodi Smit-McPhee) journeying to the south after the world has essentially seen its end of days. We are never really given a clear explanation as to what happened, but the vague description we do get sounds like nuclear war finally came, and the planet is dying a slow death. Trees are dead, there is nothing alive or growing anymore, the world is a gray and dreary place, as though hell had suddenly burst forth from the bowels of the earth. The south brings warmer weather, which is what the man and his son need, he believes, to survive, and survivial is what the film is about.
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TORONTO: Duvall the talk of the fest — shades of 1997
You know a film is hot when it is the subject of conversation in the screening, in the press room, and in the hallways of the hotels where the press junkets and meetings are being held. In 1997, “The Apostle,” the exquisite film directed, written by and starring Robert Duvall, was the talk of the Toronto film fest after its world premiere the night before, but in fact, the buzz started partway through the film when October Films and Miramax began a bidding battle that has become the stuff of legend.Duvall left the festival with his career reborn, the film, which he financed, was sold (to October), and the multi-hyphenate began winning critics awards for the film at year’s end. The Los Angeles Film Critics Association named him Best Actor that year and a few weeks later the National Society of Film Critics did the same. Though snubbed for a Golden Globe nomination, he was nominated by both the Screen Actors Guild and the Academy, but he eventually lost to Jack Nicholson in “As Good as It Get.”
The film eventually nailed down a solid $24 million at the box office and Duvall’s performance is considered by and large one of his best. He came back to a couple of years later with his new film “Assassination Tango,” a failure, and he is here again with two films — John Hillcoat’s “The Road,” which I will write about later today, and “Get Low,” a film recalling shades of the 1997 fest as it has captured the conversation here.
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TORONTO: ‘The Informant!,’ ‘Jennifer’s Body,’ ‘Up in the Air,’ ‘Hugh Hefner’
(Please note, as opposed to Kris and Guy, I tend to grade films on a 5-star scale.)Day two of the festival is always among the busiest because the major studios are here and they want you to see their films. Movies with buzz coming out of Toronto quite often end up in the Oscar race.
“Slumdog Millionaire” exploded out of this festival last year and went all the way to eight Academy Awards. Who would have thought coming in to Toronto that Danny Boyle’s film would rock the fest? So which film will it be this year?
If Venice and Telluride can tell us anything it is that Jason Reitman’s “Up in the Air” is winning critics over and should land George Clooney in the Oscar race once again for Best Actor. Kris certainly loved the film when he saw it, and frankly, so did I.
But Clooney will not be alone here in the race for Best Actor. One of his good friends will be right there with him: Matt Damon for his amazing work in “The Informant!.” Today was one of those good days when I bounced from good film to great film back to good film, to great documentary. I may have seen the best of the fest on Friday.
Let’s get into some reactions…
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TORONTO: Settling in, ‘Antichrist’
I left home at 6:30am yesterday to make an early check-in to my hotel at 8:30. One bummer, my youngest daughter, Ariana, has a flu bug and I hate leaving Sherri with her on her own. She assured me it was cool, so I managed to get out the door without being overwhelmed with guilt. Kissed the girls goodbye, loaded the van with my luggage and laptop and was Toronto-bound.Just over 90 minutes later (good traffic day) I pulled into the parking garage of the Delta, checked in and set my room up. I am very fussy about what the room looks like, where my stuff goes, my laptop, books and such, though within 10 minutes of the girls arriving Saturday, it all goes to hell.
From here I head to the press office to get my pass. Navigating the Sutton Place is hellish, as it is crawling with television crews already preparing for the day’s press conferences. Luckily the press office is away from the nightmare on the second floor.
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THE LISTS: Top 10 memories from TIFF
One of the joys of my life is the 10 days in September I spend at the Toronto International Film Festival, bringing the film world to our city, the world press, and enough stars to take over Hollywood. The little festival that could, as it was known in the 1970s and early-1980s, The Festival of Festivals has become a world cultural event, perhaps the most important film festival in the world, and certainly rivaling Cannes for prestige.Created by William Marshall, Dusty Cohl and Henk den Henk in the mid-1970s, the festival struggled in its early days to get product, finally landing a major film with “Midnight Express” in 1978. A few years later “Chariots of Fire” would leave the fest on its march toward the Academy Award, while “The Big Chill” would make a huge impression when premiered here in 1983.
More importantly, the actors and directors were turning their attentions to Toronto. In the early days, the organizers hosted tributes: Warren Beatty and Robert Duvall were there with many friends, further putting the festival on the map. Through the 1980s the festival continued to grow in prestige, expanding its Canadian program to showcase homegrown cinema, but never losing touch with Hollywood and world product.
In the 1990s, Piers Handling took over as Director of the festival and changed the name to the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) and took the proceedings into the international realm. Handling, one of the greatest cinematic minds I have ever encountered, has been an extraordinary leader for TIFF, taking it into the next level of success worldwide while maintaining the roots that make it a people’s festival.
I love it, and I maintain it is the finest festival on the planet. Having covered it for the better part of a decade, close to 15 years, I think, here are my top ten memories of the festival, the films, the performances, the events, the goings-on.
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Previewing the 34th annual Toronto fest
In less than a week I will kiss my wife and kids goodbye and head into Toronto, about 50 miles away, for this year’s Toronto International Film Festival. Twelve years ago my wife and I found it makes no sense for me to attend the festival for 16 to 18 hours and then try to drive home; beyond the danger of driving exhausted, arriving home at three in the morning tends to wake them up because our stupid, stupid dog begins barking the moment anyone pulls into the driveway. So for 10 days I live in the Delta Chelsea Hotel on Gerrard Street.This year I am finding leaving for the festival easier. Last year my wife Sherri was diagnosed with brain cancer and dealt with the removal of part of a considerable brain tumor. We went through radiation last summer, the loss of her beautiful, lush red hair, and the constant exhaustion she had to deal with. Cancer, sadly, is a family affair, and not something anyone should go through alone. But this year we are in a good place. The monster seems to be at bay, for now.
So what I am looking forward to seeing? Well first let me state that I’m shocked “Where the Wild Things Are,” “Amelia” and a handful of other films are not here. They seemed like good fits for the festival, their filmmakers have been here before, etc. That said, it looks like one of the best festivals in recent memory, though I am not sure anything will ever beat out 2007, which presented a bounty of great pictures. I was leaving screening room after screening room giddy.
This year looks like a challenge for even the toughest film fester. Choosing the films to see is the toughest part because there is no chance you’ll see everything you want to see. There are generally three of four press/industry screenings at the Varsity, Cumberland or new AMC Theatres, as well as the public screenings which the press have limited access to. Our press pass allows us access to six (I think) Gala performances in the evening, but they sell out quickly. There is also a DVD library where you can watch the films in the rooms provided on your own, but films are meant to be seen on the big screen.
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‘The Road’ and others set for TIFF
Right now, all is right with the world.The Toronto International Film Festival has confirmed that John Hillcoat’s “The Road,” the film I am looking forward to most this year, is going to be here in the Special Presentation Program.
Yes!! I have been waiting for this film since reading that amazing book in three days a year ago.
Along with the Viggo Mortenson, Charlize Theron and Robert Duvall starrer will be new films featuring Natalie Portman, George Clooney, Annette Bening, Naomi Watts, Demi Moore, David Duchovny, Colin Firth, Omar Sharif, Jeff Bridges and countless others, making for another star-studded Toronto line-up.
Among the films announced today in addition to The Road are, “Mother and Child” from director Rodrigo Garcia, a study of three women and the unbreakable bonds between mothers and daughters. Annette Bening, Naomi Watts and Kerry Washington star in the film.
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‘Young Victoria’ to close TIFF, Egoyan’s ‘Chloe’ added
Toronto is obviously digging the corsets this year. Weeks after Jon Amiel’s Charles Darwin biopic “Creation” was announced as the opening film of this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, fest organizers have revealed that Jean-Marc Vallée’s “The Young Victoria” will close proceedings.This choice of bookends gives an odd symmetry to the festival schedule: both films are (or appear to be, since I haven’t seen “Creation” yet) old-fashioned Anglocentric period biopics with minimal buzz.
The choice of “Victoria” is an unsurprising one, given that Vallée is a hometown boy whose last, considerably more interesting, effort “C.R.A.Z.Y.” won the Best Canadian Feature award at the 2005 festival. But it’s a disappointingly stiff choice for such a prime spot.
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Herzog, Moore, Coens plan a stop at TIFF
Some exciting announcements out of Toronto today (still no “Road”). The festival is shaping up to be very, very cool this year.The film I am most excited about, announced today, is Werner Herzog’s remake “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” with Nicolas Cage in the role that Harvey Keitel made legendary. No in between with this one; they either nailed it or blew it.
Drew Barrymore will bring her directorial debut here, the roller derby flick “Whip It,” with Ellen Page. That brings back memories of Saturday afternoons with my grandparents watching roller derby. Barrymore made a startling impact in “Grey Gardens” on HBO earlier this year and hopes are high for this one.
The Coen brothers are back with “A Serious Man,” as is Michael Moore with “Capitalism: A Love Story,” his latest documentary that will take viewers into the financial brain centers of America.