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Prize guys make Oscars run that little bit clearer Lav Diaz with his Golden Lion
Stone, Diaz, Ford win big at Venice BY JEREMY KAY
Emma Stone’s awards season prospects earned a timely fillip last night with the Coppa Volpi best actress award at the 73rd Venice Film Festival, while Lav Diaz’s The Woman Who Left from the Philippines claimed the Golden Lion for best film. Toronto attendees will have a chance to see Stone’s allsinging, all-dancing turn at the Canadian premiere on Monday. Tom Ford’s Nocturnal Animals claimed the Silver Lion grand jury prize and has its North American premiere here tonight, as does Jackie, which figured in the ceremony when Noah Oppenheim claimed screenplay honours. Ana Lily Amirpour took the special jury prize for The Bad Batch. Oscar Martinez won the Coppa Volpi best actor award for The Distinguished Citizen. The Silver Lion best director was a tie between Russia’s Andrei Konchalovsky for Paradise and Mexico’s Amat Escalante for The Untamed. Paula Beer won the Marcello Mastroianni award for best young actress for her role in Frantz.
BY FINN HALLIGAN
With Venice and Telluride spun out and Toronto through its first weekend, the 2016 awards race is coming into focus with some films already making strong plays — reinforced by yesterday’s win at Venice for Emma Stone (best actress for La La Land) and Tom Ford (Silver Lion grand jury prize for Nocturnal Animals). Still in clear contention for best picture — and, by extension, best director — is Kenneth Lonergan’s Sundance title Manchester By The Sea. It seems likely to be joined by
Manchester By The Sea, first seen in Sundance, should carry him through to a best actor nomination a year later. He could be joined by Tom Hanks for Sully, Michael Keaton for The Founder, Joseph Gordon-Levitt for Snowden, Ryan Gosling for La La Land and Andrew Garfield for Hacksaw Ridge. Best actress front runners must now include Natalie Portman’s titular Jackie, Sonia Braga in Aquarius, Isabelle Huppert, never better in Elle, Ruth Negga for Loving and Amy Adams for Arrival, with Rachel Weisz yet to be seen in Denial.
Hubert Boesl
Rooney Mara and Nicole Kidman here at TIFF for the world premiere of Garth Davis’s debut feature, Lion
Keener drama goes to IFT International Film Trust (IFT) has picked up international sales rights to Toronto selection Unless, as the Special Presentations entry receives its world premiere tonight. Catherine Keener plays an author who finds out her daughter has dropped out of college and is begging on the street. Newcomer Hannah Gross also stars. Alan Gilsenan directed from his screenplay, adapted from Carol
Pablo Larrain’s Jackie and Damien Chazelle’s lustrous La La Land. Jostling the pack are Ford’s dark drama and Denis Villeneuve’s Arrival. Outside contenders — but in with a chance — are Moonlight, Loving and Mel Gibson’s directorial comeback Hacksaw Ridge. Still to be seen are Ang Lee’s Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, Martin Scorsese’s Silence and Denzel Washington’s Fences. The future of The Birth Of A Nation is still in play following an enthusiastic response at Toronto. Casey Affleck’s performance in
Shields’ Pulitzer-winning novel. Gersh handles US rights and IFT’s Todd Olsson has been touting the drama to buyers here. “Keener is at her all-time best,” said Olsson. IFT’s sales roster features Isabel Coixet’s Light On Broken Glass and Werner Herzog’s Salt And Fire, which sold to XLrator Media for the US and gets its North American premiere here on September 15. Jeremy Kay
MK2 draws heat on A Woman’s Life BY MELANIE GOODFELLOW
MK2 Films has secured a slew of sales on French director Stéphane Brizé’s period drama A Woman’s Life following its world premiere in Venice competition last week. The film has gone down particularly well with Asian distributors, selling to China (iQIYI), South Korea (Green Narae Media) and Taiwan ( Joint Entertainment International). First European deals include Portugal (Alambique), Switzerland and Liechtenstein
(Xenix) and Greece (Ama). The film has also sold to Latin America (CDI Films), Brazil (Mares Filmes), Tunisia (Hakka Distribution) and Turkey (Fabula Films). Set in 19th-century Normandy, A Woman’s Life stars Judith Chemla as an aristocrat whose life takes a turn when she marries a philandering baron. The film marks a shift for Brizé after his contemporary social drama The Measure Of A Man, for which Vincent Lindon won the best actor prize at Cannes in 2015.
TODAY
Lumiere!
NEWS Thierry in town Cannes topper Thierry Frémaux arrives to present Lumiere! » Page 5
REVIEW A Monster Calls JA Bayona’s fantasy film mixes a visual deluge with raw emotion » Page 8
INTERVIEW Pablo Larrain The Chilean film-maker on TIFF double Neruda and Jackie » Page 14
Galitzine joins Radiant’s Changeover BY JEREMY KAY Screen 2015 Star of Tomorrow Nicholas Galitzine, who will be seen in tonight’s world premiere of Contemporary World Cinema selection Handsome Devil, has joined The Changeover, which Radiant Films International is selling here. Previously announced Timothy Spall, Melanie Lynskey, Lucy Lawless and Erana James also star in the supernatural thriller, which is scheduled to begin shooting on September 19. Co-directors Stuart McKenzie and Miranda Harcourt will shoot in New Zealand. McKenzie adapted the screenplay from New Zealand author Margaret Mahy’s YA novel The Changeover: A Supernatural Romance. The story centres on a 16-yearold girl who discovers her true identity and the supernatural powers within her after an ancient spirit attacks her infant brother. Emma Slade of Firefly Films produces with investment from New Zealand Film Commission, private backers and the New Zealand Screen Production Grant. The film is being financed in association with Fulcrum Media Finance. Production partners include Park Road Post Production, Pukeko Pictures and Christchurch City Council. Radiant president and CEO Mimi Steinbauer and her team represent worldwide excluding Australia and New Zealand.
NEWS
Jamaica makes TIFF bid to become global player
TIFF BRIEFS Nu Image gets Stoic Nu Image chief Jeffrey Greenstein and his team have introduced buyers here to the revenge thriller Stoic with Antonio Banderas in the lead. The Spanish star will play a fast-talking lawyer who sets out on a mission after his wife and daughter are murdered.
Bleecker, Participant find room to Breathe Bleecker Street and Participant Media have jointly acquired North American rights from Embankment to Andy Serkis’s feature directorial debut Breathe. Andrew Garfield stars in the true story of Robin Cavendish, who refused to bow to polio and travelled the world to inspire fellow sufferers. Embankment handles international rights.
BY WENDY MITCHELL
Spitfire
Spitfire soars for British Film Co BY TOM GRATER
UK production and finance outfit British Film Company, headed up by Moon co-producer Steve Milne, is in the works on feature documentary Spitfire, about the iconic British aircraft. The film will chart the history of the Second World War fighter plane, including first-hand accounts from veteran pilots. Aviation photographer John Dibbs is
4 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
filming footage with surviving Spitfires, while Ant Palmer and David Fairhead are directing. The company also revealed it has come on board as a partner, with Munich-based Lieblingsfilm and London-based Zephyr Films, on Trautmann, an English-language soccer feature about the legendary German goalkeeper Bert Trautmann,
who will be played by David Kross (The Reader). The $11m biographical drama was launched at Cannes in 2015. Marcus H Rosenmüller is directing; producers are Chris Curling and Robert Marciniak. Beta Cinema is the international sales agent and Square One has German distribution rights. Principal photography is scheduled to get underway in spring 2017.
Renee Robinson, former TIFF industry programmer, is back at the festival in her role as film commissioner of Jamaica. JAMPRO, Jamaica’s national investment and export agency, is spearheading a 20-strong delegation of Jamaican film professionals coming to Toronto. There is also a Jamaica stand at the industry centre in the Hyatt Regency for the first time. Robinson said the size of this first Toronto delegation is notable. “It’s an indication that Jamaica is ready to be a global film player,” she told Screen International. The delegation includes the film-makers selected for the Propella! short film development initiative, plus other experts including
Kamal Bankay of Creative Marketing Associates, Paul Bucknor of Firefly Films, Ca r l e e n e Sa m u e l s o f Creative Source Productions, Damien Baddy of LookYah and Delano Forbes of Phase 3. Nick Cannon’s US Jamaica co-production King Of The Dancehall premieres at TIFF tonight, with actress Kimberly Patterson taking part in the festival’s new International Actors Programme. Robinson said the island nation is ready to move beyond production services for international shoots. “We want to also shift that to content development and exporting talent, making sure talent is developed in a certain way to play in the global market,” she said.
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Hubert Boesl
Sigourney Weaver arrives for the premiere of JA Bayona’s A Monster Calls at Roy Thomson Hall. The actress co-stars as the 12-year-old lead character’s grandmother in the Spanish filmmaker’s fantasy drama, which Screen International describes as “well acted and technically flawless”. See review, page 8.
Dubai gives backing to Indian film-makers BY LIZ SHACKLETON
Dubai International Film Festival (DIFF) is partnering with the PJLF Three Rivers Residency, designed to support Indian filmmakers in developing their scripts. The residency provides six writer-directors one year with a distractionfree space to write their scripts, the help of a mentor and the opportunity to pre-
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sent their projects at DIFF. The six film-makers selected this year include Kanu Behl, whose debut Titli screened in Un Certain Regard at Cannes in 2014, Arun Karthick, who debuted with Rotterdam title The Strange Case Of Shiva, Raj Rishi More, who served as AD on The Lunchbox, Miransha Naik, Sonal Jain and Pushan Kripalani. Naik
recently completed postproduction on Juze, which has been picked up by Films Boutique and secured a French release through Sophie Dulac Distribution. This year’s advisers include Molly Stensgaard, Franz Rodenkirchen, Marten Rabarts, Gyula Gazdag and Olivia Stewart, who has developed and launched the residency programme.
Frémaux sheds light on Lumieres’ legacy BY MELANIE GOODFELLOW
Cannes Film Festival chief Thierry Frémaux is a guest of Toronto this weekend although his visit is not connected to his role as head of the French festival. Instead, double-hatted Frémaux is in town as managing director of France’s Institut Lumiere in Lyon, devoted to the work of cinema pioneers Auguste and Louis Lumiere and film heritage in general, which he oversees when not preparing Cannes. He has flown in to take part in a live narration today of his film Lumiere!, which pulls together some 100 short films shot by the Lumiere brothers from
Thierry Frémaux
1895 to 1905, which are rarely shown on the big screen today. “Louis Lumiere and his operators shot nearly 1,500 films of 50 seconds. Apart from in the first five years, they have never been shown in theatres. The aim with Lumiere! was to make one single film out of all the films, so that audiences could rediscover them,”
Frémaux told Screen International. He reveals his favourite Lumiere film is their famous Workers Leaving The Lumiere Factory – which is generally regarded as one of the first cinematographic works ever shot, and shows workers pouring out of the gates of the Lumieres’ factory, which has since been incorporated into the site of the Institut Lumiere. Lumiere! reveals the brothers shot three versions of the film over a course of several months in 1895. “Their first film is my favourite. I like the fact the first character in the history of cinema is the people,” says Frémaux.
September 11, 2016 Screen International at Toronto 5
TRIBUTE DON RANVAUD
A friend of film The late Don Ranvaud, producer-sales agent-academic, helped bring the likes of City Of God and Central Station to the big screen. Geoffrey Macnab reports
Don Ranvaud
D
on Ranvaud was one of the most colourful figures on the film circuit, a globe-trotting producer-sales agent-journalist-academic whose methods were sometimes chaotic but who inspired enormous affection and loyalty. Following his death last weekend, figures from across the industry have paid him tribute. “Don was a passionate, inspiring friend, and all of us who had the privilege to collaborate with him in Brazil are
shocked and saddened,” director Walter Salles tells Screen International. “Don’s whole life revolved around cinema, and it is telling that he passed away at a film festival [Ranvaud died suddenly at Montreal World Film Festival on September 5]. Don was vital for Central Station coming to life, as well as City Of God. He spotted Pablo Trapero’s wonderful work early on, and spent years developing film labs in Bolivia and other Latin America countries. He was guided by ideals in a world where this is becoming rarer and rarer, unfortunately.” In the course of his career, Ranvaud was associated as a producer with many fine films, among them Chen Kaige’s Life On A String (1991), Salles’ Central Station (1998), Fernando Meirelles’ City Of God (2002), Karim Aïnouz’s Madame Sata
‘He was guided by ideals in a world where this is becoming rarer’ Walter Salles, film-maker
(2002) and Meirelles’ The Constant Gardener (2005). He did not always receive the credit he deserved, however, putting the interests of the film-makers he worked with above his own. Ranvaud was a university professor, lecturing in film studies at the UK’s University of East Anglia; he was a founder of the independent film magazine Framework, helped launch the European Script Fund and, a decade ago, tried to shake up the world of international film sales by
organising an International Filmmakers’ Collective that would give producers greater control over how their movies were handled in the marketplace. “Don was a friend. He brought us City Of God, which put Wild Bunch on the map,” says Wild Bunch co-founder Vincent Maraval. “There was no better character who can represent what Wild Bunch was at the beginning. He is one of the last true independent figures of cinema.” “He has been a member of the international film appreciation society that travels the world excitedly, producing and helping people produce films,” says Oscar-winning producer Jeremy Thomas, who last saw Ranvaud two weeks ago. “He was a wonderful colleague. He was a figure who hardly exists very much anys more, just in love with films.” ■
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REVIEWS Reviews edited by Fionnuala Halligan finn.halligan@screendaily.com
Trespass Against Us Reviewed by Allan Hunter
A Monster Calls Reviewed by Graham Fuller The sophisticated tween-fiction fantasy A Monster Calls is blessed by a harrowing supporting turn by Felicity Jones as a cancer-stricken single mother but, sadly, her haunting performance can be occluded by the movie’s visual excess. JA Bayona, the gifted Spanish director of The Impossible, deluges his story — albeit well acted and technically flawless — with emotionally coded representational imagery and hectors the viewer with stylistic shifts, mood swings and frantic pacing. Feistily portrayed by pint-sized Scottish actor Lewis MacDougall, 12-year-old English northerner Conor O’Malley bears a heavy cross. He is repeatedly beaten by a school bully (James Melville) and drearily admonished by his understandably tense maternal grandma (Sigourney Weaver), who reluctantly installs him in her fastidiously appointed house when Mum (Jones) stays in hospital. Repressing the spectre of his mother’s death, Conor starts having nightmares, triggered by his viewing of 1933’s King Kong. The ape colossus seeds in Conor’s unconscious mind his nightly visitor — a bark-skinned giant sprung from the roots of a yew tree. Liam Neeson provides the booming voice and performance capture for the barnstorming woody monster, which initially menaces the unfazed Conor but predictably becomes his guardian and moral instructor. He insists on telling three illogical fables to the boy to teach him that assumptions people make about others are often wrong, and that good and evil co-exist in most of us. A fourth tale — that he orders Conor to tell him — is not a tale at all, but a kind of self-discovery. The film has become such a pictorial maelstrom by the time Conor verbalises a home truth crucial to his coming of age that the moment is underwhelming. The abutting of Conor’s conscious and unconscious states justifies the swarming images, but the film’s overwrought tone can grate. A Monster Calls is at its best in its raw emotional scenes. Conor is charged by Grandma to touch nothing in her house, but his inability to save his mother unleashes a pent-up rage and he smashes everything within reach. It effects a change in Grandma that leads to a rapprochement and prompts a reconsideration of Weaver’s hitherto unsympathetic presence.
8 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
GALA US-Sp. 2016. 108mins Director JA Bayona Production companies Participant Media, River Road Entertainment, Apaches Entertainment, Telecinco Cinema, Pelicula la Trini, Lionsgate International sales Lionsgate International, internationalsales@ lionsgate.com North American distribution Focus Features, www. AMonsterCallsFilm.com Producer Belén Atienza Screenplay Patrick Ness, based on his novel Cinematography Oscar Faura Production design Eugenio Caballero Editors Bernat Vilaplana, Jaume Marti Music Fernando Velazquez Main cast Lewis MacDougall, Sigourney Weaver, Felicity Jones, Liam Neeson, Toby Kebbell, James Melville, Geraldine Chaplin
Blood ties are impossible to defy in Trespass Against Us, an impressive first feature from TV and music-video director Adam Smith. Dynamic storytelling and powerful performances bring out the pathos in a tale of conflicting loyalties set on the criminal edges of a travelling community. One of the film’s most striking elements is the way in which Smith manages to evoke sympathy for characters that initially seem beyond the scope of our compassion. Outsider Chad Cutler (Michael Fassbender) is a man who displays nothing but contempt for anything that stands in the way of him living life on his own terms. He does show respect to his father Colby (Brendan Gleeson) and is a devoted father to his own children, including six-year-old Tyson (Georgie Smith). Chad wants his son to live a settled life, and it is that longing for something better that sets him at odds with his father. Alastair Siddons’ screenplay is uncompromising in its depiction of a close-knit community where Colby has the authority of a king. It is initially difficult to tune your ear to the vernacular, which could be an issue for some audiences and make the film a tough sell. It also takes time to warm to the characters and look beyond their criminal actions to see the human beings beneath. All of that may make the film a challenge, but ensures it earns its impact. Smith’s immersion in this world echoes the work of Andrea Arnold or Shane Meadows but he adds his own muscular signature in the staging of car chases and robberies and uses Edu Grau’s images of landscape to add a layer of lyricism to the events. There are also welcome touches of black humour and the surreal that come as welcome relief to the darker mood that prevails. Smith’s other skill lies in bringing out the best in his performers. Smith is a scene-stealing natural as the tearaway Tyson. Lyndsey Marshal brings a fiery spark to the role of Chad’s wife Kelly. A charismatic Fassbender captures the feckless, bad-boy charm of Chad and his feelings of inadequacy. Gleeson balances the gormless with the ruthless as a figure who seems a dim-witted, lumbering oaf but can snap in an instant if anyone dares to question his authority. Watching these two heavyweights go head to head as a father and son is one of the film’s great pleasures.
SPECIAL PRESENTATION UK. 2016. 94mins Director Adam Smith Production companies Potboiler Productions, Albert Granville International sales Protagonist Pictures, info@protagonistpictures. com Producers Andrea Calderwood, Gail Egan, Alastair Siddons Screenplay Alastair Siddons Cinematography Edu Grau Editors Kristina Hetherington, Jake Roberts Production design Nick Palmer Music Tom Rowlands (The Chemical Brothers) Main cast Michael Fassbender, Brendan Gleeson, Lyndsey Marshal, Killian Scott, Rory Kinnear, Georgie Smith
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» A Monster Calls p8 » Trespass Against Us p8 » American Pastoral p9
» Before The Flood p9 » Queen Of Katwe p10 » I Called Him Morgan p10
» Layla M p10 » Amanda Knox p10 » The Bad Batch p11
Before The Flood Reviewed by Allan Hunter
American Pastoral Reviewed by Tim Grierson Bob Dylan’s musical warning to the parents of the counterculture — “Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command” — haunts the protagonist of American Pastoral, a wildly uneven adaptation that cannot hope to capture the breadth of Philip Roth’s majestic 1997 novel. And yet, Ewan McGregor’s directorial debut finds its own emotional core, zeroing in on the tragedy that befalls when a man’s wilful daughter torpedoes his seemingly perfect life. This Lionsgate release opens in North America on October 21, boasting a cast that includes McGregor, Jennifer Connelly and Dakota Fanning. Mixed reviews may stall awards talk, but the material’s pedigree and its family-drama trappings should attract upscale viewers. Spanning roughly 20 years, American Pastoral stars McGregor as Seymour ‘Swede’ Levov, a high-school athlete who goes on to become a successful businessman and husband to the ravishing Dawn (Connelly). His enviable life hits its first snag, though, when his rebellious teen daughter Merry (Fanning) begins acting out in protest of the Vietnam War, her exploits turning deadly when she kills a man during the bombing of a post office, forcing her to go underground. Among other themes, Roth’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel examines how the promise of a stable, post-war US came to clash with the next generation’s desire for social upheaval. McGregor and screenwriter John Romano can only scratch the book’s ambitious surface, the adaptation condensing and simplifying its grand trajectory. Equally troublesome, McGregor (despite his still-boyish handsomeness) cannot conjure up Swede’s almost preternatural, golden-god-like vitality, a failing that makes the character’s later fall from grace not as steep a collapse as it should be. Nonetheless, American Pastoral is sufficiently moving when it digs into Swede’s troubled relationship with his beloved only child. The movie short changes the depth of that relationship, which diminishes the tragedy somewhat, but as Fanning begins to emerge as the central character, the story’s poignancy takes hold. It is a testament to her performance that she honours this intentionally irrational character’s militancy with such steeliness that our heart breaks for Swede.
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SPECIAL PRESENTATION US. 2016. 108mins Director Ewan McGregor Production companies Lionsgate, Lakeshore Entertainment International sales Lakeshore Entertainment, sales@lakeshore entertainment.com US distributor Lionsgate, www.lionsgate.com/ movies Producers Tom Rosenberg, Gary Lucchesi, Andre Lamal Screenplay John Romano, based on the novel by Philip Roth Cinematography Martin Ruhe Production design Daniel B Clancy Editor Melissa Kent Music Alexandre Desplat Main cast Ewan McGregor, Jennifer Connelly, Dakota Fanning, Peter Riegert, Rupert Evans, Uzo Aduba, Molly Parker, Valorie Curry, Hannah Nordberg, Julia Silverman, Mark Hildreth, Samantha Mathis, David Strathairn
TIFF DOCS
Over the past 20 years, Leonardo DiCaprio has spent the currency of his celebrity on becoming an informed, committed environmental activist. Any notion that he lacks the credentials for the role as a United Nations Ambassador of Peace, or is being indulged in a vanity project, are decisively put to bed by Before The Flood, a sober, thoughtful documentary that combines a lament for a lost Eden with a rousing call to action. Inevitably, it will be accused of preaching to the converted but DiCaprio’s name, the wide-ranging subject matter and beautiful imagery from around the globe should be sufficient to attract attention and a robust theatrical life for an accessible documentary very much in the tradition of Oscar winner An Inconvenient Truth (2006). Director Fisher Stevens takes an intelligent approach to the use of DiCaprio and the importance of his subject matter. He knows the audience may be initially drawn into the film by DiCaprio’s commitment to the cause, and the actor obliges by talking of visiting Los Angeles’ Natural History Museum as a child and being fascinated by the species that are now extinct, from the dodo to the Tasmanian tiger. He also admits to being pessimistic about what can be achieved in an America where a whole swathe of politicians are in the pay of vast corporations with vested interests in maintaining an economy based on the consumption of fossil fuels. And, as he journeys from the Canadian tar sands in Alberta to the smog-shrouded streets of Beijing, he asks the questions that anyone with a curious mind might demand. How much damage has been done? What can we do to change things? The film might be considered a little dry in places, as we learn about the consequences of climate change and projections of what might happen in the coming decades. But just when you think Before The Flood is intent on spreading doom and gloom, DiCaprio attempts to find signs of hope in the climate-change conference in Paris last December and in the small differences that individuals could make that might have a profound effect, including a simple change of diet to eat much less beef. Ultimately, Before The Flood is a thought-provoking contribution to the debate and DiCaprio’s presence should ensure a bigger audience is drawn to its message.
US. 2016. 96mins Director Fisher Stevens Production companies Appian Way, Insurgent Docs, RatPac Documentary Films International sales Cinetic Media, info@ cineticmedia.com Producers Trevor Davidoski, Jennifer Davisson, Leonardo DiCaprio, James Packer, Brett Ratner, Fisher Stevens Screenplay Mark Monroe Cinematography Antonio Rossi Editors Geoff Richman, Ben Sozanski, Brett Banks, Abhay Sofsky Music Mogwai, Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross, Gustavo Santaolalla
September 11, 2016 Screen International at Toronto 9
REVIEWS
Queen Of Katwe Reviewed by Tim Grierson Queen Of Katwe tells a potentially touching story in the stodgiest of ways, its recounting of a young Ugandan chess prodigy sensitively rendered but far too formulaic. Director Mira Nair has fashioned a good-looking but Disneyfied version of actual events, the studio’s uplifting-at-all-costs blandness methodically draining the material of its richness. Premiering here in Toronto, Queen Of Katwe is set to arrive in US theatres on September 23. The presence of David Oyelowo and Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o will spark interest, as will the story’s sports framework. But outside of the family-film crowd, Disney may have a tough time wrangling audiences to this true-life tale. Set in the impoverished Ugandan community of Katwe, the film introduces us to Phiona (Madina Nalwanga), a vivacious girl who lives with her siblings and widowed mother Harriet (Nyong’o) in the mid-2000s. She meets Robert (Oyelowo), who has a passion for chess that he wants to pass along to the local kids. Discovering Phiona seems gifted at the game, he encourages her to enter competitions — in large part because he wants her to escape a world in which she cannot even afford schooling. Based on a 2011 ESPN The Magazine profile, Nair’s first feature since The Reluctant Fundamentalist is a tasteful, sympathetic look at peo-
GALA Ug-S Afr. 2016. 124mins Director Mira Nair Production companies ESPN Films, John B Carls Productions, Cine Mosaic, Mirabai Films Worldwide distribution The Walt Disney Company Producers Lydia Dean Pilcher, John Carls Screenplay William Wheeler Cinematography Sean Bobbitt Production design Stephanie Carroll Editor Barry Alexander Brown Music Alex Heffes Main cast David Oyelowo, Lupita Nyong’o, Madina Nalwanga
ple learning to cope in difficult circumstances. But these precise cultural observations start to feel like mere grist for what is ultimately a familiar underdog story. With Robert serving as Phiona’s mentor and her mother playing the unsupportive parent, Queen Of Katwe is too dramatically tidy, each step of her remarkable path neutered of drama until it seems preordained. Oyelowo’s kind-hearted performance stands out. Strict but silly, Robert is like a goofy older brother to Phiona, and the characters’ interactions outside of the de rigueur scenes of preparing for tournaments are among the film’s best moments. And yet Robert is quick to use every aspect of the game as a metaphor for life, an on-
the-nose narrative device that is overdone no matter how much the actor invests in his speeches. Newcomer Nalwanga is very likeable, holding her own alongside her co-stars. Oscar winner Nyong’o fills in Harriet’s blanks, showing how her stubbornness is born from a fear of not raising her little girl’s expectations too much in a society with few opportunities. Revealingly, the film’s most moving sequence occurs during the end credits when the actual individuals come and stand by the actors who portray them. Only then do we get a piercing sense of real-life hardship and struggle that the film too often soft-pedals for feelgood comfort.
that ensues feels standard. Imbued with suspense, even with the outcome already known, biographies of Lee and Helen spring from their own accounts, as well as recent discussions with those who knew them. The former were recorded in separate candid chats before their individual deaths while the latter, spanning jazz greats such as Albert Heath, Billy Harper and Wayne Shorter, brim with affection and sorrow. Fresh footage weaved between the recollections helps explain much of the documentary’s entrancing air. I Called Him Morgan starts with
the sound of wind and, just as the introductory radio patter that comes next gives way to a moody tune, the black screen fades into brightness, with hazy images of a blizzard similar to the weather conditions on the night of Lee’s death. The hypnotic sight is just one of the evocative sections shot on 16mm by Selma cinematographer Bradford Young. With his assistance, Collin attempts to do more than recount facts; if he can’t always wholly capture the figures at the film’s centre, he can convey a sense of the time and place inhabited by Lee and Helen.
I Called Him Morgan Reviewed by Sarah Ward A film’s title can be revealing; in I Called Him Morgan, it offers Helen Morgan’s preferred name for her jazz trumpeter husband, Lee. While their story is seemingly straightforward, this tale is one of infamy that Swedish filmmaker Kasper Collin attempts to rescue from the annals of history — and, with the attention his documentary should receive at festivals and in specialised play, he succeeds in that aim. Its journey from Venice to Telluride to Toronto to New York will help spread the Morgans’ fascinating story and appreciation for Collin’s poignant portrait of their tumultuous existence. He spreads his focus between the prodigious talent and the woman who saved him from drug addiction — and then, in 1972, shot and killed him during a show. It is with a trumpet-heavy soundtrack of Lee’s music, plus a remarkable array of archival snaps, that I Called Him Morgan steps through this timeline, then intertwines Helen’s progression from teen mother to becoming Lee’s lover and caretaker. Working with fellow co-editors Hanna Lejonqvist, Eva Hillstrom and Dino Jonsater, Collin assembles all the usual elements from talking heads to newspaper headlines — yet little
10 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
TIFF DOCS Swe-US. 2016. 91mins Director/screenplay/ producer Kasper Collin Production companies Kasper Collin Produktion AB, Sveriges Television AB, Film Väst International sales Submarine, dan@ submarine.com Cinematographer Bradford Young, Erik Vallsten Editors Hanna Lejonqvist, Eva Hillstrom, Dino Jonsater, Kasper Collin
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Layla M Reviewed by Allan Hunter In Layla M, a disillusioned Muslim woman grows to feel there is no longer a place for her in an increasingly intolerant Europe. The decision to start a new life in the Middle East is fraught with challenges to her naïve notion of finding a place and a faith in which she feels she belongs. Mijke de Jong’s exploration of the issues surrounding radicalisation and identity is one of a number of current films on the theme, distinguished by its intelligent approach to complex matters, the polished visuals of cinematographer Danny Elsen and a knockout central performance from newcomer Nora el Koussour. That combination and the timeliness of the topic should make Layla M a regular festival fixture and guarantee some theatrical interest. Koussour’s Dutch-Moroccan teenager Layla Mourabit is a fantastically compelling character, someone whose voice is not heard in her home, her school or her city of Amsterdam. She embraces eagerly her status as an outsider, becoming more devout in her prayers, attending demonstrations and never giving an inch in the defence of her position. She also tends towards the insufferable in her righteousness, which makes her all the more interesting. The process of Layla becoming open to radicalisation is convincingly depicted as she aban-
PLATFORM Neth-Bel-Ger-Jor. 2016. 98mins Director Mijke de Jong Production companies Topkapi Films, NTR, Chromosom Film, Menuet, The Imaginarium Films, Schiwago Film International sales Beta Cinema, beta@ betacinema.com Producers Frans van Gestel, Arnold Heslenfeld, Laurette Schillings Screenplay Jan Eilander, Mijke de Jong Cinematography Danny Elsen Editor Dorith Vinken Production designer Jorien Sont Music Can Erdogan Main cast Nora el Koussour, Ilias Addab
dons friends who mock her decision to wear the full hijab and finds it intolerable that so few people seem to care about what is happening in Syria. Even though you fear where this is heading, the viewer can appreciate fully what she is feeling. Layla is drawn to the charismatic jihadist Abdel (Ilias Addab). Skype chats and supportive words fuel her starry-eyed romantic notions, and she is more than willing to become Abdel’s bride and follow him to the Middle East — a new life in which her role as a docile wife leaves her with similar feelings of being denied a voice. One of the admirable qualities of Layla M is
the way it strives to find the good and bad in each character. There is a genuine affection in the relationship between Layla and Abdel, especially in the moments when they are alone together. The fact Abdel will come to see Layla as someone who fails to fulfil her duties does not diminish his earlier fondness. There is a fatalistic arc to Layla M. We know this is unlikely to end well but there are still unexpected details that emerge and Nora el Koussour’s performance carries the narrative. Her big, yearning eyes, the hot flashes of her anger and the tears of disappointment all convey the emotional turmoil of an incredible journey.
They begin on November 2, 2007, with a call to the Perugia police department and concerns over the fate of Kercher. Voices reaching out from the past send a chill down the spine. The subsequent discovery of Kercher’s body and the way suspicion falls on her flatmate Knox and boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito is quickly established; Sollecito is also among those interviewed for the film. What becomes apparent is the pressure on the police to swiftly solve the case and prove their competence, and the insatiable hunger of the international media as they
started to feast on a murder case brimming with sex, scandal, death and depravity. The film is very good at raising reasonable doubts, planting seeds of confusion and demanding a more sensible examination of the facts. Painting Knox as a “witch of deception”, a sex maniac, femme fatale who did not show any sign of grief at the loss of a friend seemed to be what the world wanted to read and accept. The filmmakers seem to side with those who believe drug dealer Rudy Guede was the guilty party, and certainly provide the viewer with food for thought.
Amanda Knox Reviewed by Allan Hunter It is a tall order to find a fresh perspective on the story of Amanda Knox, whose life has been exhaustively scrutinised in the nine years since she was accused of murdering UK student Meredith Kercher. Brian McGinn and Rod Blackhurst’s fascinating documentary attempts a cooler understanding of who Knox was and what she has endured through two convictions and two acquittals. It offers a sharp-eyed sense of the bigger picture and should attract healthy figures when it is launched globally on Netflix at the end of September. The lingering question mark over Knox’s guilt or innocence is what makes her such a troubling figure. She has rarely seemed a sympathetic figure, and that has played a huge part in public perceptions of her character. A substantial new interview with her and the decision to diligently focus on the facts means that, at the very least, McGinn and Blackhurst are prepared to give her a fair hearing. Tellingly, Kercher’s family are only seen in press conference footage. McGinn and Blackhurst have been given incredible access to everything from police videos of the crime scene to audio recordings of prison visits Knox received from her parents.
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TIFF DOCS US-Den. 2016. 92mins Directors Brian McGinn, Rod Blackhurst Production company Plus Pictures ApS Distributor Netflix Producers Mette Heide, Stephen Morse Screenplay Brian McGinn, Matthew Hamachek Cinematography Rod Blackhurst Editor Matthew Hamachek Music Saunder Jurriaans, Danny Bensi
September 11, 2016 Screen International at Toronto 11
REVIEWS
The Bad Batch Reviewed by Lee Marshall
VANGUARD
Cool production design, cool soundtrack, cool tattoos; shame about the script. Iranian-American director Ana Lily Amirpour’s follow-up to her edgy arthouse genre trip A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night does nothing to disprove the old ‘difficult second album’ adage. With its pop-culture attitude and horrorwestern genre sheen, not to mention a smart casting mix, The Bad Batch is unlikely to completely crash and burn at the box office, but equally unlikely to do well. Amirpour conjures up a Mad Max-ish outcast reserve of cannibals and grifters somewhere in the Texas badlands, a reserve that is populated by everything except an engaging story. The story presents the idea that if the US goes on demonising and persecuting asylum seekers and outcasts — well, this might happen. We are told roughly what ‘this’ is by an opening-credit montage of walkie-talkie voiceovers in which US customs officials are told to avoid eye contact with ‘bad batch’ inmates. They are not, as we suspect initially, zombievirus sufferers but simply undesirables such as Arlen (Suki Waterhouse), who is dumped
US. 2016. 118 mins Director/screenplay Ana Lily Amirpour Production companies Annapurna Pictures, Vice International sales Annapurna International, samantha@ annapurnapics.com Producers Sina Sayyah, Danny Gabai Cinematography Lyle Vincent Editor Alex O’Flinn Production designer Brandon Tonner-Connolly Main cast Suki Waterhouse, Jason Momoa, Giovanni Ribisi, Yolonda Ross, Cory Roberts, Louie Lopez, Keanu Reeves, Jim Carrey
inside a fenced enclosure in what we immediately recognise to be lawless spaghetti western territory. What follows, as Arlen sets off to walk the badlands clad in little more than a pair of watermelon-print hotpants, will pan out between three locations — a cannibal camp, a shanty town that comes on like an Ibiza hippy market gone sour, and the desert no-man’s land that separates them. It is to the first that Arlen is dragged, gagged and bound, to make a meal for the inhabitants. For all its grisly shock tactics, this opening 20-minute sequence is a tense ride, up to Arlen’s escape from the cannibals. It is when she is picked up by a mute shopping-trolleypushing tramp called The Hermit (Jim Carrey), and taken to the sub-Blade Runner shanty town of Comfort, that the story runs out of steam — with a full 90 minutes still to go. After the tense opening, coherent drama goes by the board — one example among many being the way that, months after her cannibal camp ordeal, Arlen sets out to wreak revenge on her tormentors as if the idea has only just occurred to her. Whenever she feels that cool production
design and cod philosophy may not be enough to sustain us, the director puts another song on the soundtrack. With tracks by Die Antwoord, Ace of Base and Darkside, as well as a counterpoint stunt straight out of the Tarantino rulebook (a grisly cannibalism scene set to Culture Club’s ‘Karma Chameleon’), The Bad Batch feels, at times, like an extended music video.
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INTERVIEW PABLO LARRAIN
Gael Garcia Bernal in Neruda
Poetry in motion Chilean film-maker Pablo Larrain dwells on the mysteries of storytelling as he contemplates fall festival slots for his two latest films, Neruda and Jackie. Jeremy Kay reports
P
ablo Larrain sounds almost giddy with anticipation when Screen International reaches him by phone in Santiago, where he is entrenched in post-production on Jackie a few weeks before the film will earn glowing reviews following its world premiere in Venice. “I’m so proud of the movie,” says the Chilean auteur. “I’m looking at the effects we’re starting to do. I think it’s beautiful.” Beyond that Larrain declines to elaborate. It is not an arrogance thing: one gets the sense the director wants the audience to share in his journey of discovery and come to his films armed only with curiosity and an open mind. And so cinephiles picked at morsels before the Lido feast: a foreboding first-look image of Natalie Portman as Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy and a well-worn logline about how the film chronicles through her eyes the days immediately before and after the 1963 assassination of President John F Kennedy. Cameron Bailey, artistic director at TIFF, where Larrain’s seventh film has its international premiere here today, notes how the film-maker has unearthed a new perspective on events in the film and is “not telling us a story we already know”. The critics were in agreement. This will come as little surprise to those who caught the Cannes world premiere in Directors’ Fortnight of Neruda, which also travels to Toronto for its international premiere tomor-
row. Rather than serve up a by-the-numbers portrait, that film challenges biopic orthodoxy with a structurally transgressive focus on an episode in the life of Chile’s celebrated poet Pablo Neruda. Larrain takes Neruda’s postwar flight during an anti-communist crackdown as his cue to present a bold sketch of the artist within an intimate snapshot of mid-20th-century Chilean society. “It’s strange what cinema does in terms of the memory,” says Larrain. “It takes a while to understand what you’re grabbing from anything. Neruda is this kind of medicine that takes effect right away and on the other hand there is also a slow digestion. I’ve done seven movies and five of them are period movies. You try to think the way [the protagonists] thought. That’s the first problem — seeing the world through the eyes they had back then. And then you have to build the imagination and it’s very absurd.” While Neruda is a complex, important film for Latin America, absurdity courses through it. Nowhere is this more evident than in the notion of Oscar Peluchonneau, a fictional police inspector played by Larrain’s No star Gael Garcia Bernal, whose pursuit of his quarry shows him to be a buffoon. Yet
14 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
‘It’s strange what cinema does in terms of the memory. It takes a while to understand what you’re grabbing from anything’ Pablo Larrain, director
away from the procedural plod, Peluchonneau’s existential quest for himself within the meta-narrative of the film is touching and betrays a rough-hewn poetry of its own. “I love the way [Pablo] plays with the narrative within the narrative; it’s such a multilayered film,” says Paul Davidson, executive vice-president of the film’s US distributor The Orchard. Davidson describes Neruda as “an anti-biopic, the Inception of biopics” and will open the film in limited release on December 16 before expanding in the first few months of 2017.
Metaphysical approach There is talk of an awards campaign, which seems like a fitting reward. Juan de Dios Larrain, the director’s brother and producing partner, with whom he co-founded production company Fabula 12 years ago, says unlike Jackie, Neruda was a long road for the Larrains. “I brought the idea to Pablo about eight years ago,” he says. “It took us four years to understand which part of Neruda’s life Pablo would want to focus on. Then we brought on Guillermo [Calderon, screenwriter on Larrain’s 2015 Berlin Silver Bear winner The Club] and we started discussing the point of view and the idea of this policeman came up.” Calderon initially Pablo Larrain on the set of Neruda delivered a 160-page
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script that eventually expanded to 190. The director was enamoured with it. “I told my brother I would rather shoot fast and include everything,” says Larrain. “I couldn’t get rid of anything. It was so precious. “It’s entirely Guillermo’s writing; I can’t take credit for it,” he continues. “The main challenge when you deal with somebody like Neruda is how he talks. He would have handled our language in a way that very few people have. He ends up creating a cop in this metaphysical sense who’s been written by Neruda, so Guillermo had to write something that Neruda would have done and you go, ‘Woah!’ It’s like making a movie about the Beatles and you’re going to write a new song.” Juan de Dios Larrain enlisted the support of Argentina’s AZ Films, France’s Funny Balloons and Spain’s Setembro Cine. Participant Media was also on board via its Participant PanAmerica initiative, which had previously backed Larrain’s 2013 foreign-language Oscar nominee No. The 56-day shoot kicked off in early summer 2015 and spanned Santiago, Lampa and Valparaiso in Chile, as well as Buenos Aires and Paris. Larrain filmed multiple takes of scenes in different locales to create options in the editing room, while a panoply of filming techniques included rearprojection in all its dated glory for chase sequences. “It shows we’re using cinematic tools of the time that don’t pretend to be realistic,” says the film-maker. History lessons Fact and fiction dance together in Neruda. In one chilling example of the former, the dictator Augusto Pinochet is seen presiding over an internment camp, many years before the 1973 coup that would sweep him to power in Chile. This aspect of Pinochet’s past was news to Larrain, who grew up under the dictator’s regime in the 1970s and 1980s, and earned global acclaim with his trilogy of films set during his 17-year rule, comprising Tony Manero, Post Mortem and No. “It was an accident — I never knew that,” he says. “When we did the research, someone from our team said, ‘Did you know Pinochet was in charge of this camp?’ We put it in. He used that same camp 30 years later.” Larrain’s familiar subject of state repression is writ large in Neruda. “The war was ending and communism was in good shape in those days and fascism was defeated, but in [Chile] there was a strong connection to it. Our president outlawed communism because of [US president Harry S] Truman. Again, the US was sticking its nose in the history of Latin America. Later, the US would support the Pinochet coup and eventually ousted him. All these earthquakes were far from us but created a big wave that slowly got here.” Larrain warms to his theme: “In Latin America, there are a lot of things we don’t share, but there are a lot of things we do and it’s not just connected with our language. How do you preserve your own culture? That’s the
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Natalie Portman in Jackie
challenge. It’s there in this movie. It’s a fiction about not just your language but your ideas, your food — how do you preserve that instead of being so globalised and American?” It will be intriguing for audiences to see how the brothers bring their Latin American sensibility to Jackie, which they produced in association with Darren Aronofsky and Scott Franklin’s Protozoa Pictures and French powerhouse Wild Bunch’s Los Angeles offshoot Insiders, now IMR International. For his part, Juan de Dios Larrain, who through Fabula has produced The 33, Gloria and Nasty Baby, and often agonises over how to get more Latin American films seen by neighbouring countries in the continent, knows his brother’s English-language debut marks the next big step for Fabula. “We’ve worked with different types of directors — Pablo, Sebastian Lelio, Sebastian Silva — very different directors with different styles and diverse subjects,” says the producer. “At some point we became a company that supported directors and we also take our own scripts and make our own stories.” Tony Manero in 2008 was the film that put the company on the map. “That was a big jump for us, and especially Pablo,” says Juan. “After that we did two seasons of Profugos on HBO for Latin America. It was an action series and a big production. We learned a lot — it was like doing 10 or 15 movies in a row.” Joining Jackie It was after The Club won the Berlin grand jury prize in February 2015 that Pablo Larrain met jury president Aronofsky at the closing ceremony party. He flew home to prepare Neruda and a week later the US film-maker sent him a
‘We became a company that supported directors and we also take our own scripts and make our own stories’ Juan de Dios Larrain, producer
Luis Gnecco as Pablo Neruda
script Larrain had read and liked in an earlier iteration some five years prior. Protozoa Pictures held the rights to Jackie and invited Larrain to Brooklyn to talk things over during the making of Neruda. “It was incredible,” Larrain says. “This came out of the blue. I asked if Natalie could do this and Darren said he would set a meeting. Everything came together when I was cutting Neruda. I had never done anything like that — two movies back-to-back. I’m 39 years old and you don’t say no to a thing like that.” Protozoa’s Franklin tells Screen that Larrain asked the pair why they wanted to hire a Chilean director for a story that felt quintessentially American. “We wanted someone who didn’t have too many preconceived ideas about the Kennedys, the assassination and Jackie,” says Franklin. “We wanted to have someone come in with a fresh and openminded take on this story and this woman’s life. We don’t play much with the politics in Jackie — it’s an emotional and personal journey, and very different stylistically from any biopic you’ve ever seen. Pablo possesses incredible talent.” Jackie was financed by LD Entertainment and Bliss Media, with IMR International handling pre-sales. A firm believer in the need to let directors pursue their vision when producing other people’s films, Pablo and Juan de Dios Larrain are currently working on Lelio’s The Fantastic Woman, which stars Neruda’s Luis Gnecco. The Chilean cannot say enough nice things about Protozoa Pictures and Wild Bunch: “Somehow we just found each other and they have been super supportive.” As for his own long-term partnership with his brother at Fabula, Larrain describes it as “a big pleasure.” And as a fan of the mystery behind a process, he admits readily: “I have no idea about most of what Juan s does.” ■
Screen International at Toronto 15
SCREENINGS Edited by Jamie McLeish
PUBLIC
106mins. Kinology (int’l and US). Dir: Rebecca Zlotowski. Cast: Natalie Portman, Lily-Rose Depp, Emmanuel Salinger. In 1930s France, two sisters who perform as supernatural mediums cross paths with a visionary film producer.
SCREENINGS
8:30AM THE JOURNEY See box, right
8:45AM OFF FRAME AKA REVOLUTION UNTIL VICTORY (followed by ‘Breaking Occupation’)
Gala Presentations Ryerson Theatre
12:00PM
74mins. Dir: Mohanad Yaqubi Exploration of the tumultuous history of Palestine and Palestinian film-making.
QUEEN OF KATWE
(Uganda/South Africa) 124mins. Walt Disney Studios Pictures (US). Dir: Mira Nair. Cast: David Oyelowo, Lupita Nyong’o, Madina Nalwanga. The true story of a girl from rural Uganda who discovers a passion for chess, and sets out to become an international champion.
TIFF Docs Jackman Hall (AGO)
WEIRDOS
(Canada) 89mins. Dir: Bruce McDonald. Cast: Dylan Authors, Julia Sarah Stone, Molly Parker. Offbeat coming-of-age comedy-drama about two Nova Scotian teens who hit the road in July 1976 accompanied by the laconic ghost of the — still living — Andy Warhol. Special Presentations Isabel Bader Theatre
9:00AM
PUBLIC SCREENING 8:30AM THE JOURNEY
(UK) 94mins. IM Global (int’l). Dir: Nick Hamm. Cast: Timothy Spall, Colm Meaney, John Hurt. Timothy Spall and Colm Meaney star in this dramatisation of
the events preceding the historic 2006 St Andrews Agreement, which brought peace to Northern Ireland after years of violent strife between Unionist and Republican factions. Special Presentations TIFF Bell Lightbox 3
MOONLIGHT
(US) 111mins. Dir: Barry Jenkins. Cast: Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris, Trevante Rhodes. Follows its protagonist from childhood to adulthood as he navigates the dangers of drugs and violence in his depressed Florida neighbourhood. Platform, Next Wave TIFF Bell Lightbox 1
THE WOMEN’S BALCONY
(Israel) 96mins. Dir: Emil Ben Shimon. Cast: Evelin Hagoel, Igal Naor. An accident during a bar mitzvah celebration leads to a gendered rift in a devout Orthodox community in Jerusalem, in this good-hearted tale about women speaking truth to patriarchal power. Contemporary World Cinema TIFF Bell Lightbox 4
9:15AM THINGS TO COME
(France/Germany)
100mins. Les Films du Losange (int’l). Dir: Mia Hansen-Love. Cast: Isabelle Huppert, André Marcon, Roman Kolinka. A delicate and affecting tale about a middle-aged professor whose carefully structured life is thrown into disarray when her husband leaves her for another woman. Special Presentations TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
10:00AM A MONSTER CALLS
(US/Spain) 108mins. Lionsgate International (int’l). Dir: JA Bayona. Cast: Sigourney Weaver, Felicity Jones, Toby Kebbell. A lonely young boy, struggling with the imminent death of his terminally ill mother, is befriended by a friendly, shambling monster that arrives in his room nightly
16 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
documentary about the rise of Podemos, the insurgent Spanish political party founded on the basis of a nationwide antiausterity movement that dramatically upended the country’s traditional, hidebound two-party system. TIFF Docs Jackman Hall (AGO)
ZACMA: BLINDNESS
to tell him stories. Gala Presentations Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema
10:30AM THE LIMEHOUSE GOLEM
(UK) 105mins. HanWay Films (int’l). HanWay Films, William Morris Endeavor Entertainment (US). Dir: Juan Carlos Medina. Cast: Bill Nighy, Olivia Cooke, Douglas Booth. In Victorian-era London, an intrepid police inspector investigates a series of brutal killings that seem to be linked to a fearsome creature of Jewish legend. Special Presentations Winter Garden Theatre
11:00AM POLITICS, INSTRUCTIONS MANUAL
(Spain) 115mins. Dir: Fernando Leon de Aranoa. A behind-the-scenes
(Poland) 110mins. The Society for Arts/Society Films (US). Dir: Ryszard Bugajski. Cast: Maria Mamona, Malgorzata Zajaczkowska, Janusz Gajos. Haunted by her ruthless past, a former high-ranking security officer in Poland’s communist government seeks an audience with the Primate of the Polish Catholic Church. Contemporary World Cinema, Contemporary World Speakers TIFF Bell Lightbox 3
11:15AM BARRY
(US) 104mins. Cinetic Media, Black Bear Pictures (US). Dir: Vikram Gandhi. Cast: Devon Terrell, Anya Taylor-Joy, Jason Mitchell. Biopic about the young Barack Obama’s college
days in New York City. Special Presentations Isabel Bader Theatre
11:30AM DAUGHTERS OF THE DUST
(US) 112mins. Cohen Media Group (int’l and (US). Dir: Julie Dash. Cast: Adisa Anderson, Barbara-O, Cheryl Lynn Bruce. The first US feature directed by an African American woman to receive a general theatrical release tells the story of three generations of women. TIFF Cinematheque TIFF Bell Lightbox 4
LION
(Australia) 129mins. The Weinstein Company (int’l). Dir: Garth Davis. Cast: Nicole Kidman, Dev Patel, Rooney Mara. The true story of Saroo Brierley, who was adopted by an Australian couple after being separated from his family in India at the age of five, and then located his original home using Google Earth 25 years later. Special Presentations VISA Screening Room (Elgin Theatre)
11:45AM PLANETARIUM
(France/Belgium)
Gala Presentations Princess of Wales Theatre
THE BIRTH OF A NATION
(US) 120mins. Dir: Nate Parker. Cast: Nate Parker, Armie Hammer, Mark Boone Jr. Epic chronicle of the life of Nat Turner, who led a slave rebellion against white plantation owners in 1831 Virginia. Special Presentations Roy Thomson Hall
THE WAR SHOW
(Denmark/Finland/Syria) 100mins. DR Sales (int’l and US). Dir: Andreas Dalsgaard. Cast: Obaidah Zytoon, Amr Kheito, Hisham Issa. A Syrian radio DJ documents the experiences of herself and her friends as their dreams of hope and liberation in the wake of the 2011 Arab Spring give way to the grim realities of repression, forced emigration and extremism. TIFF Docs TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
12:15PM CERTAIN WOMEN
(US) 107mins. United Talent Agency (UTA) (US). Dir: Kelly Reichardt. Cast: Laura Dern, Kristen Stewart, Michelle Williams. www.screendaily.com
ISRAELI CINEMA IN TORONTO 2016
FURTHER COVERAGE, SEE SCREENDAILY.COM » Screening times and venues are correct at the time of going to press but subject to alteration
Tripartite portrait of striving, independent women whose lives intersect in suggestive and powerful ways. Masters TIFF Bell Lightbox 1
12:45PM MISS IMPOSSIBLE
(France) 90mins. Doc & Film International (int’l and US). Dir: Emilie Deleuze. Cast: Léna Magnien, Patricia Mazuy, Philippe Duquesne. Stuck in the middle between a beautiful older sister and a brainiac younger sister, 13-year-old Aurore struggles to find her place — which arrives in an unlikely way when she is invited to be the only girl in an all-male band. TIFF Kids Scotiabank 10
1:00PM 93 DAYS
(Nigeria) 124mins. FilmOne Distribution (int’l). Dir: Steve Gukas. Cast: Danny Glover, Bimbo Akintola, Somkele Idhalama. Riveting real-life thriller about courageous healthcare workers in Lagos battling the ebola outbreak of 2014. City to City Scotiabank 11
CHASING TRANE: THE JOHN COLTRANE DOCUMENTARY
(US) 99mins. Concord Music Group (US). Dir: John Scheinfeld. Cast: Antonia Andrews, Bill Clinton, Michelle Coltrane. The life and work of jazz legend John Coltrane, with commentary and appreciations from diverse Trane devotees.
demons stirred by his arrival.
finds freedom in his fantasies.
Discovery Scotiabank 13
Discovery Jackman Hall (AGO)
1:15PM A DEATH IN THE GUNJ
(India) 110mins. Dir: Konkona Sensharma. Cast: Vikrant Massey, Ranvir Shorey, Kalki Koechlin. Coming-of-age story about a shy young Indian student who quietly and fatefully unravels during a family road trip. Special Presentations Scotiabank 14
1:30PM THE BLEEDER
(US) 101mins. Millennium Films (int’l). United Talent Agency (US). Dir: Philippe Falardeau. Cast: Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber, Elisabeth Moss. Biopic of boxer Chuck Wepner, whose legendary ability to take punishment in the ring made him the inspiration for Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky. Special Presentations Winter Garden Theatre
1:45PM THE FIXER
(Romania/France) 98mins. MPM Film (int’l). Dir: Adrian Sitaru. Cast: Tudor Aaron Istodor, Mehdi Nebbou, Nicolas Wanczycki. A headline-grabbing sex scandal gives a Romanian trainee at a French news network an opportunity for his big break. Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 8
2:00PM LUMIERE!
TIFF Docs Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema
(France) 90mins. Wild Bunch (int’l). Dir: Louis Lumiere. Restored prints of the work of the Lumiere brothers.
IN THE RADIANT CITY
TIFF Cinematheque TIFF Bell Lightbox 3
(US) 95mins. ICM Partners (US). Dir: Rachel Lambert. Cast: Michael Abbott Jr., Marin Ireland, Paul Sparks. Enigmatic family drama about a prodigal son’s return to his family and hometown, and the
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THE GIANT
(Sweden/Denmark) 90mins. Indie Sales (int’l). Dir: Johannes Nyholm. Cast: Johan Kylén. A young man born with a deformity that impedes his ability to communicate
NORMAN – THE MODERATE RISE AND TRAGIC FALL OF A NEW YORK FIXER
Director: Josesph Cedar Producers: Gideon Tadmor, Oren Moverman, Eyal Rimmon, David Mandil, Lawrence Inglee, Miranda Bailey Production Companies: TA0DMOR Entertainment, MoviePlus Productions, Blackbird, Cold Iron Pictures World Sales: The Solution Entertainment Group Web: thesolutioent.com Mon Sep 12 18:30 Roy Thomson Hall Tue Sep 13 14:45 Scotiabank 2 Press & Industry: Mon Sep 12 12:15 Scotiabank 1 Wed Sep 14 14:30 Scotiabank 2
WINDOW HORSES (THE POETIC PERSIAN EPIPHANY OF ROSIE MING)
(Canada) 88mins. National Film Board of Canada (int’l and US). Dir: Ann Marie Fleming. Cast: Sandra Oh, Ellen Page, Shohreh Aghdashloo. A warm and witty animated feature about a young Canadian poet who undergoes a life-changing experience when she attends a poetry festival in Iran. Special Presentations, Next Wave Isabel Bader Theatre
Contemporary World Cinema BAR BAHAR / IN BETWEEN
Director: Maysaloun Hamud Producer: Shlomi Elkabetz Production Company: Deux Beaux Garcons Films World Sales: Alma Cinema (FR) E-mail: sara@almacinema.com Sun Sep 11 18:30 Tiff Bell Lightbox Cinema 2 Mon Sep 12 10:30 Tiff Bell Lightbox Cinema 3 Sun Sep 18 17:45 Scotiabank 10 PRESS & INDUSTRY: Mon Sep 12 18:30 Scotiabank 7 Thu Sep 15 09:00 Scotiabank 10
PAST LIFE
Director: Avi Nesher Producers: Dr. David M. Milch, David Silber, Avi Nesher, Moshe Edery, Leon Edery, Ruth Cats Co-Producers: Ellamilch SheriFf, Elad Naggar Production Companies: Metro Communications, Artomas Communicaitons, Ars Veritas Productions, Sunshine Productions WORLD SALES: Beliberg Entertainment E-mail: SALES@bleibergent.com web: www. bleibergent.com Mon Sep 12 15:00 Tiff Bell Lightbox Cinema 2 Wed Sep 14 11:45 Tiff Bell Lightbox Cinema 3 Sun Sep 18 09:15 Tiff Bell Lightbox Cinema 3 PRESS & INDUSTRY: Mon Sep 12 09:00 Scotiabank 9 Fri Sep 16 12:45 Scotiabank 10
THE WOMEN'S BALCONY
Director: Emil Ben Shimon Producers: Osnat Handelsman Keren, Talia Kleinhendler, Moahe Edery, Leon Edery Production Companies: Pie Films, United King Films contact: pie films e-mail: osnat@piefilms.co.il
2:45PM AQUARIUS
(Brazil/France) 145mins. SBS International (int’l). Dir: Kleber Mendonca Filho. Cast: Sonia Braga, Maeve Jinkings, Irhandir Santos. A retired music critic battles a corrupt real-estate firm as she struggles to hold on to her apartment. Contemporary World Cinema TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
MASCOTS
(US) 89mins. Dir: Christopher Guest. Cast: Jennifer Coolidge, Sarah Baker, Bob Balaban. Enter the high-stakes world of professional sports mascots, in which rivals who are engaged in a cutthroat competition for the Gold Fluffy Award. Special Presentations Scotiabank 2
Sat Sun Sun
Sep 10 Sep 11 Sep 17
16:30 Scotiabank 13 09:00 Tiff Bell Lightbox Cinema 4 18:15 Scotiabank 4
PRESS & INDUSTRY: Sun Sep 11 09:00 Scotiabank 8 Wed Sep 14 09:00 Scotiabank 9
discovery SANDSTORM
Director: Elite Zexer Producers: Haim Mecklberg, Estee Yacov-Mecklberg Executive Producers: Rami Yehoshua, Moshe Edery, Leon Edery, Ygal Mograbi Production Company: 2Team Productions World Sales: Beta Cinema E-mail: beta@betacinema.com Web: www.betacinema.com Tue Sep 13 18:45 Wed Sep 14 09:15 Sat Sep 17 16:00 Press & Industry: Thu Sep 8 15:15
Scotiabank 13 TIFF Bell Lightbox Cinema 3 TIFF Bell Lightbox Cinema 4 Scotiabank 8
TIFF Docs FOREVER PURE
Director: Maya Zinshtein Producers: Geoff Arbourne, Maya Zinshtein Co-Producers: Alan Maher, Torstein Grude Production Companies: Duckin' Divin' Films, Maya Films, Passion Pictures, Roads Entertainment, Piraya Films AS International & US Sales: DOGWOOF e-mail: anna@dogwoof.com web: www.dogwoof.com Sat Sep 10 19:15 Scotiabank 13 Mon Sep 12 15:45 Scotiabank 10 Sun Sep 18 21:15 Scotiabank 13 Press & Industry: Mon Sep 12 09:00 Scotiabank 10
Short Cuts ANNA
MY ENTIRE HIGH SCHOOL SINKING INTO THE SEA
(US) 72mins. Cinetic Media (US). Dir: Dash Shaw. Cast: John Cameron Mitchell, Reggie Watts, Jason Schwartzman. The title tells the tale in this inventive and bizarre animated feature voiced by Jason Schwartzman, Lena Dunham, Maya Rudolph, Susan Sarandon and Reggie Watts. Vanguard, Next Wave Ryerson Theatre
Gala Presentations
Director: Or Sinai Producer: Lea Tonic Production: The Jerusalem Sam Spiegel Film School Co-Production: Cinephil Distribution and Co-Productions World Sales: Cinephil – Distribution & Co Productions E-mail: info@cinephil.com Web: www.cinephil.com Mon Sep 12 18:45 Scotiabank 14 Sat Sep 17 18:30 Scotiabank 11 Press & Industry: Tue Sep 13 12:15 Scotiabank 6 ISRAEL FILM FUND / TEL: 972 3 562 8180, FAX: 972 3 562 5992 INFO@FILMFUND.CO.IL / WWW.FILMFUND.ORG.IL THE YEHOSHUA RABINOVICH FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS / CINEMA PROJECT INFO@CINEMAPROJECT.ORG.IL TEL: +972-3-5255020, +972-3-5254920 / FAX: +972-3-5255130 WWW.CINEMAPROJECT.ORG.IL Ministry of Culture and Sport
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September 11, 2016 Screen International at Toronto 17
SCREENINGS
Portrait) returns with this intimate portrait of avantgarde cinema legend Jonas Mekas.
3:00PM KEKSZAKALLU
(Argentina) 72mins. Dir: Gaston Solnicki. Cast: Laila Maltz, Katia Szechtman, Lara Tarlowski. The beguiling third feature from Argentine writer-director Gaston Solnicki takes inspiration from Béla Bartok’s opera Bluebeard’s Castle for this charming tale about several young women attempting to make their way into adulthood.
Wavelengths Jackman Hall (AGO)
THE ROAD TO MANDALAY
(Taiwan/Myanmar/ France/Germany) 108mins. UDI — Urban Distribution International (int’l). Dir: Midi Z. Cast: Ko Kai, Wu Ke-Xi. Two illegal Burmese migrants fleeing their country’s civil war find love with each other while struggling to survive in the bustling cities of Thailand.
Wavelengths TIFF Bell Lightbox 4
TRANSPARENT SEASON 3
(US) 88mins. Dir: Jill Soloway. Cast: Anjelica Huston, Jeffrey Tambor, Gaby Hoffmann. Premiere of the first three episodes from the new season of Jill Soloway’s Emmy-winning comedydrama, starring Jeffrey Tambor as transgender retiree Maura Pfefferman. Primetime VISA Screening Room (Elgin Theatre)
3:15PM IN THE BLOOD
(Denmark) 104mins. LevelK ApS (int’l). Dir: Rasmus Heisterberg. Cast: Kristoffer Bech, Elliott Crosset Hove, Victoria Carmen Sonne. A brilliant but entitled Danish medical student to allow his possessive feelings for his best friend throw his decadent social circle into chaos. Discovery Scotiabank 10
PUBLIC SCREENING
Reese Witherspoon, Seth MacFarlane. A showbiz impresario who happens to be a koala attracts a menagerie of musical hopefuls when he holds a singing contest to save his theatre. Special Presentations Princess of Wales Theatre
THEIR FINEST
(UK) 110mins. HanWay Films (int’l). HanWay Films, Creative Artists Agency (US). Dir: Lone Scherfig. Cast: Gemma Arterton, Sam Claflin, Bill Nighy. Period comedy-drama about a group of filmmakers struggling to make an inspirational film to boost morale during the Blitz of London in the Second World War. Gala Presentations Roy Thomson Hall
VAYA
(US) 87mins. Celluloid Dreams (int’l). Dir: Otto Bell. Cast: Aisholpan, Nurgaiv, Almagul, Dalaikhan. Visually stunning documentary about Aisholpan, a 13-year-old girl who becomes the first female in 12 generations of her Kazakh family to become an eagle hunter.
(South Africa) 110mins. Dir: Akin Omotoso. Cast: Mncedisi Shabangu, Zimkhitha Nyoka, Nomonde Mbusi. Three separate stories create a gripping yet compassionate portrait of small-town characters immersed in the intimidating, alluring, and dangerous world of Johannesburg and Soweto.
TIFF Kids TIFF Bell Lightbox 1
Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 9
THE EAGLE HUNTRESS
3:30PM
Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 8
3:45PM
SING
CLAIR OBSCUR
(US/France) 110mins. Dir: Garth Jennings. Cast: Matthew McConaughey,
(Turkey/Germany/ Poland/France) 105mins. Beta Cinema (int’l). Dir:
18 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
Yesim Ustaoglu. Cast: Funda Eryigit, Ecem Uzun, Mehmet Kurtulus. A parallel study of two women — a psychiatrist with a long-time live-in partner and a wife in a conservative, nearly tyrannical household — shows the possibilities and limitations that exist for women in Turkey today. Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 13
4:00PM ABACUS: SMALL ENOUGH TO JAIL
(US) 90mins. Motto Pictures (int’l and US). Dir: Steve James. Chronicles the legal struggles of Abacus, a small, family-run Manhattan bank that was the only financial institution to be criminally indicted in the wake of the 2008 mortgage crisis. TIFF Docs Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema
4:15PM GIRL UNBOUND
(Pakistan/Canada/Hong Kong/South Korea) 80mins. United Talent Agency (US). Dir: Erin Heidenreich. Cast: Maria Toorpakai Wazir, Shamsul Qayyum Wazir, Ayesha Gulalai Wazir. An intimate portrait of Maria Toorpakai, who defies threats from Islamic fundamentalists in order to represent Pakistan as an internationally competitive squash player. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 3
5:30PM LE CIEL FLAMAND
(Belgium) 112mins. UDI — Urban Distribution International (int’l and US). Dir: Peter Monsaert. Cast: Sara Vertongen, Wim Willaert, Esra Vandenbussche.
LAND OF THE GODS
(India/Serbia) 92mins. Nova Film (int’l). Dir: Goran Paskaljevic. A visually stunning fable set in a remote Himalayan village, where the return of a native who has been wandering for 40 years stirs dark memories and old grudges. Masters Scotiabank 14
ZOOLOGY
(Russia/France/ Germany) 87mins. New Europe Film Sales (int’l and US). Dir: Ivan I Tverdovsky. Cast: Natalia Pavlenkova, Dmitry Groshev, Irina Chipizhenko. A lonely and seemingly unremarkable middleaged zoo worker redefines her life after discovering she has grown a tail, in a film that is part comedy of errors, part social satire, and part tender love story. Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 11
4:30PM AFTER THE STORM
(Japan) 117mins. Wild Bunch (int’l). Dir:
A brothel keeper tries to keep her six-yearold daughter from discovering the details of the family business, in this powerful film that asks us how far we would go to keep our kids safe. Discovery Scotiabank 4
Hirokazu Kore-eda. Cast: Hiroshi Abe, Yoko Maki, Taiyo Yoshizawa. A divorced man struggles to regain his estranged family’s trust while sheltering with them during a typhoon. Masters Isabel Bader Theatre
DAGUERROTYPE
(France/Japan/Belgium) 131mins. Celluloid Dreams (int’l). Dir: Kiyoshi Kurosawa. Cast: Tahar Rahim, Constance Rousseau, Olivier Gourmet. French-language fantasy about an ageing photographer whose obsession with an archaic technique draws his young assistant and beautiful daughter into a dark and mysterious world. Platform Winter Garden Theatre
I HAD NOWHERE TO GO
(Germany) 100mins. Dir: Douglas Gordon. Cast: Jonas Mekas. Internationally acclaimed multimedia artist Douglas Gordon (24 Hour Psycho, Zidane: A 21st Century
WATER AND SUGAR: CARLO DI PALMA, THE COLOURS OF LIFE
(Italy) 90mins. Adriana Chiesa Enterprises. Dir: Fariborz Kamkari. A galaxy of cinema luminaries — from Ken Loach and Ettore Scola to Wim Wenders and Bernardo Bertolucci — pay tribute to the great Italian DoP Carlo di Palma. TIFF Docs TIFF Bell Lightbox 3
5:15PM AMERICAN HONEY
(UK/US) 158mins. Protagonist Pictures (int’l). Dir: Andrea Arnold. Cast: Shia LaBeouf, Sasha Lane, Riley Keough. A crew of hard-partying teenagers criss-crosses the Midwest while working as travelling magazine salesmen. Special Presentations Ryerson Theatre
5:30PM LE CIEL FLAMAND See box, above
5:45PM NIRVANNA THE BAND THE SHOW
(Canada) 75mins. Vice Media Distribution (int’l and US). Dir: Matt Johnson. Cast: Matt Johnson, Jay McCarrol. Bad boy Matt Johnson (The Dirties, Operation Avalanche) and co-conspirator Jay McCarrol revive their cult-hit web series about a hapless two-piece
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Toronto band who will do anything to play a show at The Rivoli — apart from actually writing and rehearsing any songs.
mogul to yogi, Kurtz-like jungle recluse to potential murderer, and most recently a prospective presidential candidate.
Primetime Scotiabank 12
TIFF Docs Scotiabank 1
THE BELKO EXPERIMENT
GUILTY MEN
(US) 88mins. The Safran Company (int’l). Dir: Greg McLean. Cast: John Gallagher Jr, Tony Goldwyn, Adria Arjona. Office politics turn into a real-life survival of the fittest when a group of co-workers are forced into a sick game of kill or be killed by sinister forces who lock down their building.
(Colombia) 115mins. Films Boutique (int’l). Dir: Ivan D Gaona. Cast: Willington Gordillo, Heriberto Palacio Santamaria, Rene Diaz. A town leader in rural Colombia plays a risky game with the local rightwing paramilitaries with a cache of cash at stake.
Midnight Madness Scotiabank 2
6:00PM GRINGO: THE DANGEROUS LIFE OF JOHN MCAFEE
(US) 100mins. Dir: Nanette Burstein. The strange story of John McAfee, who went from millionaire software
KATIE SAYS GOODBYE
Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 9
(US) 123mins. Dir: Jeff Nichols. Cast: Joel Edgerton, Ruth Negga, Marton Csokas. The true story of Richard and Mildred Loving, who waged a decade-long legal battle that led to the overturning of the state of Virginia’s law prohibiting interracial marriage.
IN BETWEEN
Gala Presentations Roy Thomson Hall
(US) 88mins. Creative Artists Agency (US). Dir: Wayne Roberts. A truck-stop waitress believes she has found a way out of her dead end when she falls in love with a handsome mechanic.
Discovery Scotiabank 10
Discovery TIFF Bell Lightbox 1
JULIETA
WAVELENGTHS 3: POSTPERFORMANCE
(Spain) 99mins. FilmNation Entertainment (int’l). Dir: Pedro Almodovar. Cast: Dario Grandinetti, Daniel Grao, Inma Cuesta. Spanish maestro Pedro Almodovar adapts three
2016_UKF_TIFF_Screenad_HP_218x150_Art_11th.indd 2
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Masters VISA Screening Room (Elgin Theatre)
Argentina) 100mins. FiGa Films (int’l and US). Dir: Lukas Valenta Rinner. Cast: Martin Shanly, Iride Mockert, Andrea Strenitz. A Buenos Aires cleaning woman enters the strange world of upper-class nudism.
stories from Canadian Nobel Prize winner Alice Munro for this timetripping tale about the relationship and eventual rupture between a Madrid teacher and her daughter.
80mins. Wavelengths TIFF Bell Lightbox 4
6:30PM A DECENT WOMAN
(Austria/South Korea/
(Israel/France) 96mins. Alma Cinema (int’l). Dir: Maysaloun Hamoud. Cast: Mouna Hawa, Sana Jammelieh, Shaden Kanboura. Three Palestinian women sharing an apartment in the vibrant heart of Tel Aviv find themselves balancing tradition and modernity, citizenship and culture, fealty and freedom. Contemporary World Cinema, Contemporary World Speakers TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
LOVING
UNLESS
(Canada/Ireland) 93mins. Subotica Limited (US). Dir: Alan Gilsenan. Cast: Catherine Keener, Matt Craven, Hannah Gross. Adaptation of the final novel by the late, great Canadian novelist Carol Shields, about a writer who discovers her runaway daughter panhandling on the street and seemingly deprived of speech.
6:45PM AN INSIGNIFICANT MAN
(India) 95mins. Dir: Khushboo Ranka. Cast: Arvind Kejriwal, Yogendra Yadav, Santosh Koli. Film-makers Khushboo Ranka and Vinay Shukla follow Arvind Kejriwal — “the Bernie Sanders of India” — as he shakes up the corrupt status quo of Indian politics as the head of the Common Man’s Party. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 14
Special Presentations Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema
7:00PM AFTERIMAGE
(Poland) 98mins. Films Boutique (int’l). Dir: Andrzej Wajda. Cast: Boguslaw Linda, Bronislawa Zamachowska, Zofia Wichlacz. Passionate biopic about avant-garde artist Wladyslaw Strzeminski who battled Stalinist orthodoxy and his own physical impairments to »
05/09/2016 16:06
September 11, 2016 Screen International at Toronto 19
SCREENINGS
advance his progressive ideas about art. Masters Scotiabank 11
DENIAL
(US/UK) 110mins. Cornerstone Films (int’l). Dir: Mick Jackson. Cast: Rachel Weisz, Tom Wilkinson, Timothy Spall. Riveting true-life drama about the courtroom showdown between historian Deborah Lipstadt and notorious Holocaust denier David Irving. Special Presentations Princess of Wales Theatre
I CALLED HIM MORGAN
(Sweden/US) 91mins. Submarine (int’l and US). Dir: Kasper Collin. Cast: Lee Morgan, Helen Morgan, Wayne Shorter. Part jazz history, part true-crime tale, Kasper Collin’s new documentary employs extensive archival footage and new interviews to tell the tragic story of the talented trumpeter Lee Morgan and his commonlaw wife Helen, who murdered him in a New York bar in 1972.
PUBLIC SCREENING
TIFF Docs Scotiabank 3
Cast: Ahmad Thaher, Maher Khammash, Odai Hijazi. Imprisoned on an unfair charge of fraud, a mildmannered Jordanian contractor discovers that prison has its own rhythms, rules, and economies — and he soon begins to carve out a position for himself in this place where fraud isn’t a crime so much as a way of life.
NELLY
Discovery Scotiabank 8
gripping drama set against the backdrop of the attempted 1976 military coup against the government of General Murtala Mohammed.
HERMIA & HELENA
City to City Isabel Bader Theatre
(Canada) 101mins. Seville International (int’l). Dir: Anne Emond. Cast: Mylene Mackay, Mylia Corbeil-Gavreau, Mickael Gouin. Award-winning filmmaker Anne Emond returns to TIFF with this creatively imagined biopic of controversial Quebec writer Nelly Arcan, who scandalised the French literary world with her semi-autobiographical novel based on her experiences as a sex worker. Vanguard TIFF Bell Lightbox 3
SHORT CUTS PROGRAMME 05
(US/Argentina) 86mins. Dir: Matias Pineiro. Cast: Agustina Munoz, Maria Villar, Mati Diop. The prolific, cinephilic, and endlessly imaginative Matias Pineiro (Viola, The Princess Of France) continues his multifilm meditation on Shakespeare’s comedies with this marvellous riff on A Midsummer Night’s Dream centred on an Argentine theatre director’s sojourn in New York City. Wavelengths Jackman Hall (AGO)
7:30PM
92mins.
76
Short Cuts Scotiabank 13
(Nigeria) 118mins. Princewill Trust (int’l). Dir: Izu Ojukwu. Cast: Ramsey Nouah, Rita Dominic, Chidi Mokeme. Nollywood superstars Ramsey Nouah, Rita Dominic and Chidi Mokeme headline this
7:15PM BLESSED BENEFIT
(Jordan/Germany/ Netherlands) 83mins. Beta Cinema (int’l). Dir: Mahmoud al Massad.
20 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
8:45PM HANDSOME DEVIL
(Ireland) 95mins. Radiant Films International (int’l). ICM Partners (US). Dir: John Butler. Cast:
8:15PM
Fionn O’Shea, Nicholas Galitzine, Andrew Scott. A music-mad 16-year-old outcast at a rugby-mad boarding school forms an unlikely friendship with his dashing new
roommate, in this funny and observant comingof-age tale from John Butler.
(Tony Manero, No) depicts the events leading up to and following the assassination of JFK through the eyes of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy.
Martinez, George Abreu. A dissident homosexual Cuban novelist strikes up an unlikely rapport with the government watcher assigned to keep him from speaking during an upcoming political rally.
Platform Winter Garden Theatre
THE DUELIST
THE HANDMAIDEN
(Russia) 110mins. Sony Pictures International Productions (US). Dir: Alexey Mizgirev. Cast: Petr Fedorov, Vladimir Mashkov, Martin Wuttke. A professional duellist in 19th-century Russia has second thoughts about his profession when he meets the beautiful sister of a future opponent, in this handsome historical epic shot spectacularly in Imax.
(South Korea) 145mins. CJ Entertainment (int’l). Dir: Park Chan-wook. Cast: Kim Min-hee, Kim Tae-ri, Ha Jung-woo. A crook-turned-servant falls for the vulnerable heiress she had originally schemed to swindle, in this audacious, visually sumptuous and highly erotic period piece from acclaimed writer-director Park Chan-wook.
Special Presentations Scotiabank 12
Special Presentations Scotiabank 2
8:30PM
8:45PM
JACKIE
HANDSOME DEVIL
(UK) 91mins. IMR (int’l). Creative Artists Agency (US). Dir: Pablo Larrain. Cast: Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, Greta Gerwig. Provocative Chilean director Pablo Larrain
See box, above
SANTA & ANDRES
(Cuba/Colombia/ France) 105mins. Habanero (int’l). Dir: Carlos Lechuga. Cast: Lola Amores, Eduardo
Contemporary World Cinema, Next Wave Scotiabank 4
Contemporary World Cinema TIFF Bell Lightbox 4
9:00PM FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF
(US) 103mins. Dir: John Hughes. Cast: Matthew Broderick, Alan Ruck, Mia Sara. Matthew Broderick became a teen icon as the smooth-talking, classskipping high school operator in John Hughes’ comedy classic. Festival Street Slaight Music Stage
KING OF THE DANCEHALL
(US/Jamaica) 100mins. ICM Partners (int’l and US). Dir: Nick Cannon. Cast: Nick Cannon, Whoopi Goldberg, Busta Rhymes. Nick Cannon directs and stars in this high-energy musical about a young man from Brooklyn who is caught up in the vibrant
Kingston music scene during a visit to Jamaica. Special Presentations Ryerson Theatre
SOUL ON A STRING
(China) 142mins. Asian Shadows (int’l). Dir: Zhang Yang. Cast: Kimba, Quni Ciren, Siano Dudiom Zahi. Zhang Yang (Shower, Quitting) adapts two novels by Tibetan writer Tashi Dawa for this stunning mystical epic about a killer on the run who is entrusted with a sacred mission. Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 10
9:15PM INDIA IN A DAY
(India/UK) 86mins. Scott Free Films Limited (int’l and US). Dir: Richie Mehta. Directed by Richie Mehta, executive produced by Ridley Scott and powered by Google, India in a Day is a form of non-fiction film-making that uses footage shot by millions of people in India on one single day to assemble a lyrical portrait of modern India. TIFF Docs, Next Wave Scotiabank 1
IT’S ONLY THE END OF THE WORLD
(Canada/France) 95mins. Seville International (int’l). Creative Artists Agency (US). Dir: Xavier
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Dolan. Cast: Gaspard Ulliel, Nathalie Baye, Léa Seydoux. Winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes, the new film from Quebecois wunderkind Xavier Dolan (Mommy) ropes in an all-star French cast for its tempestuous tale about the fraught reunion of a fractured family. Special Presentations TIFF Bell Lightbox 1
JUST NOT MARRIED
(Nigeria) 102mins. Dir: Uduak-Obong Patrick. Cast: Judith Audu, Stan Nze, Rotimi Salami. In this charming caper comedy, a bright but broke undergrad striving to escape the slums gets in over his head when his modest criminal enterprise goes a bit too far. City to City Scotiabank 9
SHORT CUTS PROGRAMME 06
90mins. Short Cuts Scotiabank 14
THE OATH
(Iceland) 110mins. XYZ Films (int’l). XYZ Films (US). Dir: Baltasar Kormakur. Cast: Baltasar Kormakur, Hera Hilmar, Gisli Orn Gardarsson. Icelandic auteur Baltasar Kormakur (Contraband, 2 Guns, Everest) directs and stars in this psychological thriller about a father who tries to pull his daughter out of her world of drugs and petty crime, only to find that danger can be found in unexpected places. Special Presentations Scotiabank 3
THE PROMISE THE UNKNOWN GIRL
(Belgium/France) 106mins. Wild Bunch (int’l). Dir: Luc and JeanPierre Dardenne. Cast: Adele Haenel, Olivier Bonnaud, Jérémie Renier. After refusing to answer a late-night knock on her clinic door, a doctor seeks to uncover the truth behind the mysterious death of her unidentified caller, in this social-realist procedural from Belgian auteurs Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne.
(US/Spain) 130mins. William Morris Endeavor Entertainment (US). Dir: Terry George. Cast: Oscar
Isaac, Charlotte Le Bon, Christian Bale. An Armenian medical student (Oscar Isaac), an artist (Charlotte Le Bon), and a worldly American journalist (Christian Bale) form a love triangle amid the chaos of the First World War, in this epic romance from director Terry George (Hotel Rwanda). Gala Presentations Roy Thomson Hall
9:45PM GAZA SURF CLUB
(Germany) 87mins. XYZ Films (US). Dir: Philip Gnadt. Cast: Sabah Abu Ghanem, Mohammed Abu Jayab, Ibrahim Arafat. This handsome and heartfelt documentary takes us into the world of the Gaza Strip’s surfing enthusiasts, and reveals a formidable resilience pulsing within a beleaguered population. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 13
PUBLIC SCREENING 9:30PM BUSTER’S MAL HEART
(US) 96mins. The Film Sales Company (int’l and US). Dir: Sarah Adina Smith. Cast: Rami Malek, Kate Lyn Sheil, DJ Qualls. A troubled man on the run (Rami Malek from
JESUS
(France/Chile/Germany/ Greece/Colombia) 86mins. Premium Films (int’l). Dir: Fernando Guzzoni. Cast: Nicolas Duran, Alejandro Goic. The volatile relationship between a wayward teen and his disapproving father (Alejandro Goic, star of Pablo Larrain’s The Club) comes to a head when the boy seeks shelter from the police, in the new feature from Chilean writer-director Fernando Guzzoni (Dog Flesh). Discovery Scotiabank 11
THE CINEMA TRAVELLERS
(India) 96mins. Submarine (int’l and US). Dir: Shirley Abraham. This lyrical documentary chronicles the vanishing tradition of the mobile ‘tent cinemas’ that bring films to far-flung towns and villages across India. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 8
THE HUMAN SURGE
Mr. Robot) recalls the mysterious events that brought him to his present fugitive state, in the enigmatic and moving feature from Sarah Adina Smith (Midnight Swim). Vanguard Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema
(Argentina/Brazil/ Portugal) 97mins. Dir: Eduardo Williams. Cast: Sergio Morosini, Shine Marx, Domingos Marengula. An ingeniously shapeshifting debut from director Eduardo Williams, which follows
the lives of mostly young men in disparate parts of the world who are bored by (or released from) their jobs and seeking fulfilment elsewhere.
woman who is forced to confront the demons of her past as she is drawn into the world of a thriller novel written by her ex-husband.
Wavelengths Jackman Hall (AGO)
Special Presentations Princess of Wales Theatre
10:00PM IT’S ONLY THE END OF THE WORLD
(Canada/France) 95mins. Seville International (int’l). Creative Artists Agency (US). Dir: Xavier Dolan. Cast: Gaspard Ulliel, Nathalie Baye, Léa Seydoux. Winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes, the new film from Quebecois wunderkind Xavier Dolan (Mommy) ropes in an allstar French cast (including Marion Cotillard, Vincent Cassel, Léa Seydoux and Nathalie Baye) for its tempestuous tale about the fraught reunion of a fractured family. Special Presentations TIFF Bell Lightbox 3
NOCTURNAL ANIMALS
(US/UK) 116mins. Universal Pictures International (int’l). Dir: Tom Ford. Cast: Amy Adams, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michael Shannon. Amy Adams, Jake Gyllenhaal and Armie Hammer headline the second feature from director Tom Ford (A Single Man), about a
10:30PM MOSTLY SUNNY
(Canada) 90mins. Mongrel International (int’l). Dir: Dilip Mehta. Cast: Sunny Leone, Daniel Weber. Film-maker Dilip Mehta (Cooking With Stella) returns to TIFF with this fascinating documentary portrait of porn actress turned Bollywood starlet Sunny Leone. TIFF Docs Isabel Bader Theatre
11:59PM BLAIR WITCH
(US) 89mins. Lionsgate (int’l). Dir: Adam Wingard. Cast: James Allen McCune, Callie Hernandez, Brandon Scott. A man seeks answers to the disappearance of his sister by venturing into an ominous, potentially haunted forest, in this nerve-wracking foundfootage thriller from Midnight Madness veterans Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett (You’re Next, The Guest). Midnight Madness Ryerson Theatre
Masters VISA Screening Room (Elgin Theatre)
9:30PM BUSTER’S MAL HEART See box, right
IT’S ONLY THE END OF THE WORLD
(Canada/France) 95mins. Seville International (int’l). Creative Artists Agency (US). Dir: Xavier Dolan. Cast: Gaspard Ulliel, Nathalie Baye, Léa Seydoux. Winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes, the new film from Quebecois wunderkind Xavier Dolan (Mommy) ropes in an all-star French cast for its tempestuous tale about the fraught reunion of a fractured family. Special Presentations TIFF Bell Lightbox 2
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September 11, 2016 Screen International at Toronto 21
SCREENINGS
PRESS AND Midnight Madness INDUSTRY Ryerson Theatre 8:30AM AFTER LOVE
(France/Belgium) 98mins. Le Pacte (int’l). Dir: Joachim Lafosse. Cast: Bérénice Bejo, Cédric Kahn. A separating couple battle over their stylish apartment, revealing the complexities of their relationship and the depth of the rifts between them. Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 13
THE WOMEN’S BALCONY
(Israel) 96mins. Dir: Emil Ben Shimon. Cast: Evelin Hagoel, Igal Naor, Orna Banay. An accident during a bar mitzvah celebration leads to a gendered rift in a devout Orthodox community in Jerusalem, in this rousing, goodhearted tale about women speaking truth to patriarchal power. Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 8
UNA See box, right
9:15AM LION
SAMI BLOOD
(Sweden/Denmark/ Norway) 110mins. The Swedish Film Institute, LevelK ApS (int’l). Dir: Amanda Kernell. Cast: Lene Cecilia Sparrok, Mia Erika Sparrok, Maj Doris Rimpi. Amanda Kernell’s powerful feature debut follows a teenage Sami girl in the 1930s who is forcibly removed from her family and sent to a state boarding school that is intended to raise its indigenous charges to a level ‘acceptable’ to Swedish society. Discovery Scotiabank 9
8:45AM LAYLA M.
(Netherlands/Belgium/ Germany/Jordan) 98mins. Beta Cinema (int’l). Dir: Mijke de Jong. Cast: Nora El Koussour, Ilias Addab. Radicalised by her adopted country’s antiMuslim measures, a Dutch-Moroccan teenager marries a devout jihadist and leaves Amsterdam to join an Islamist cell in the Middle East — only to discover her new community has its own restrictions and prejudices. Platform, Next Wave Scotiabank 14
9:00AM SHORT CUTS PROGRAMME 03
95mins. Short Cuts Scotiabank 6
(Australia) 129mins. The Weinstein Company (int’l). Dir: Garth Davis. Cast: Nicole Kidman, Dev Patel, Rooney Mara. Dev Patel, Rooney Mara and Nicole Kidman star in the true story of Saroo Brierley, who was adopted by an Australian couple after being separated from his family in India at the age of five, and then located his original home using Google Earth 25 years later. Special Presentations Scotiabank 1
9:30AM QUEEN OF KATWE
(Uganda/South Africa) 124mins. Walt Disney Studios Pictures (US). Dir: Mira Nair. Cast: David Oyelowo, Lupita Nyong’o, Madina Nalwanga. David Oyelowo (Selma) and Academy Award winner Lupita Nyong’o (12 Years A Slave) star in the true story of a young girl from rural Uganda (played by newcomer Madina Nalwanga) who discovers a passion for chess, and sets out to pursue her dream of becoming an international champion. Gala Presentations Scotiabank 2
THE SKYJACKER’S TALE
(Canada) 75mins. Cave 7 International (int’l). Dir: Jamie Kastner. Cast: Ishmael Muslim Ali, Margaret Ratner Kunstler, Michael Ratner. Canadian documentarian Jamie Kastner (The
22 Screen International at Toronto September 11, 2016
PRESS AND INDUSTRY Secret Disco Revolution) looks back at a notorious 1970s murder trial in the Virgin Islands — where five politicised young islanders were convicted of a massacre at a ritzy country club — and its dramatic aftermath a decade later, when the culprits’ ostensible leader staged a skyjacking and found refuge in Cuba. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 7
10:00AM BARRY
(US) 104mins. Cinetic Media, Black Bear Pictures (US). Dir: Vikram Gandhi. Cast: Devon Terrell, Anya Taylor-Joy, Jason Mitchell. Devon Terrell and Anya Taylor-Joy star in this biopic about the young Barack Obama’s college days in New York City. Special Presentations Scotiabank 4
10:45AM GAZA SURF CLUB
(Germany) 87mins. XYZ Films (US). Dir: Philip Gnadt. Cast: Sabah Abu Ghanem, Mohammed Abu Jayab, Ibrahim Arafat. This handsome and heartfelt documentary takes us into the world of the Gaza Strip’s surfing enthusiasts, and reveals a formidable resilience pulsing within a beleaguered population. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 13
9:00AM UNA
(UK) 94mins. WestEnd Films (int’l). WestEnd Films, William Morris Endeavor Entertainment (US). Dir: Benedict Andrews. Cast: Rooney Mara, Ben Mendelsohn, Riz Ahmed. Rooney Mara (Carol) and Ben Mendelsohn
11:00AM HELLO DESTROYER
(Canada) 110mins. Dir: Kevan Funk. Cast: Jared Abrahamson, Kurt Max Runte, Joe Dion Buffalo. Jared Abrahamson plays a painfully shy but ruggedly capable enforcer on a minor-league hockey team who discovers the cutthroat nature of his locker-room ‘family’, in the forceful first feature from Canadian director Kevan Funk Discovery Scotiabank 9
I AM THE PRETTY THING THAT LIVES IN THE HOUSE
(Canada/US) 87mins. Paris Film (int’l and US). Dir: Osgood Perkins. Cast: Ruth Wilson, Paula Prentiss, Lucy Boynton. A naive young nurse caring for an ageing, reclusive horror novelist begins to believe that her patient’s new novel contains ominous clues about her own fate,
(Bloodline) star in this adaptation of David Harrower’s play Blackbird, about a young woman who arrives in the workplace of an older man from her past, seeking answers for the long-ago events that have fatefully shaped both of their lives. Special Presentations Scotiabank 3
in the new film from director Osgood Perkins (February).
Dir: Andrzej Wajda. Cast: Boguslaw Linda, Bronislawa Zamachowska, Zofia Wichlacz. Passionate biopic about avant-garde artist Wladyslaw Strzeminski who battled Stalinist orthodoxy and his own physical impairments to advance his progressive ideas about art. Masters Scotiabank 7
12:00PM A UNITED KINGDOM
(India) 121mins. Dir: Adoor Gopalakrishnan. Cast: Dileep, Kavya Madhavan. After years spent living off the modest wealth of his in-laws, a man hatches a desperate plan that draws his respectable middle-class family into a vortex of crime, in this first feature in eight years from south Indian master Adoor Gopalakrishnan.
(UK) 105mins. Pathé International (int’l). William Morris Endeavor Entertainment (US). Dir: Amma Asante. Cast: David Oyelowo, Rosamund Pike, Jack Davenport. Biopic of Seretse Khama (David Oyelowo), the former African royal who courted controversy with his interracial marriage to Englishwoman Ruth Williams (Rosamund Pike) and later led his nation to independence from the British Empire as the first president of Botswana.
Masters Scotiabank 8
Gala Presentations Scotiabank 1
Vanguard Scotiabank 14
11:15AM ONCE AGAIN
SHORT CUTS PROGRAMME 04
93mins. Short Cuts Scotiabank 6
11:30AM AFTERIMAGE
(Poland) 98mins. Films Boutique (int’l).
12:15PM PLANETARIUM
(France/Belgium) 106mins. Kinology (int’l and US). Dir: Rebecca Zlotowski. Cast: Natalie Portman, Lily-Rose Depp, Emmanuel Salinger. In 1930s France, two sisters who perform as
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supernatural mediums cross paths with a visionary film producer. Gala Presentations Scotiabank 2
12:30PM TRAMPS
(US) 82mins. WestEnd Films (int’l). United Talent Agency (US). Dir: Adam Leon. Cast: Callum Turner, Grace Van Patten, Mike Birbiglia. A young man and woman find love in an unlikely place while carrying out a shady deal. Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 4
12:45PM MOONLIGHT
(US) 111mins. Dir: Barry Jenkins. Cast: Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris, Trevante Rhodes. The second feature from writer-director Barry Jenkins (Medicine For Melancholy) follows its young protagonist from childhood to adulthood as he navigates both the dangers of drugs and violence in his depressed Florida neighbourhood, and his complex love for his best friend. Platform, Next Wave Scotiabank 12
THE HUMAN SURGE
(Argentina/Brazil/ Portugal) 97mins. Dir: Eduardo Williams. Cast: Sergio Morosini, Shine Marx, Domingos Marengula. An ingeniously shapeshifting debut from Eduardo Williams, which follows the lives of mostly young men in disparate parts of the world who are bored by (or released from) their jobs and seeking fulfilment elsewhere. Wavelengths Scotiabank 5
1:30PM HEARTSTONE
(Iceland/Denmark) 129mins. Danish Film Insititute, Icelandic Film Centre, Films Boutique (int’l). Dir: Gudmundur Arnar Gudmundsson. The years-long friendship between two pre-teen boys in a small Icelandic village is threatened when they strike up romantic
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relationships with a pair of local girls. Discovery Scotiabank 6
THE JOURNEY
(UK) 94mins. IM Global (int’l). Dir: Nick Hamm. Cast: Timothy Spall, Colm Meaney, John Hurt. Timothy Spall and Colm Meaney star in this dramatisation of the events preceding the historic 2006 St. Andrews Agreement, which brought peace to Northern Ireland after years of violent strife between Unionist and Republican factions. Special Presentations Scotiabank 9
1:45PM ARQ
(US/Canada) 88mins. Dir: Tony Elliott. Cast: Robbie Amell, Rachael Taylor. Orphan Black screenwriter Tony Elliott makes his feature directorial debut with this brain-twisting sci-fi thriller, about a husband and wife living in a dystopic future who become trapped in a mysterious time loop — one that may have something to do with an ongoing battle between an omnipotent corporation and a band of rebels. Discovery Scotiabank 7
2:00PM I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO
(US/France/Belgium/ Switzerland) 93mins. Wide House (int’l). ICM Partners (US). Dir: Raoul Peck. Cast: Samuel L. Jackson. Working from the text of James Baldwin’s unfinished final novel, director Raoul Peck creates a stunning meditation on what it means to be black in America. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 3
3:00PM WULU
(France/Senegal) 95mins. Indie Sales (int’l). Dir: Daouda Coulibaly. Cast: Ibrahim Koma, Inna Modja, Ismael N’Diaye. A pulse-pounding political thriller about a low-level transit worker turned drug trafficker, whose
rapid ascent in Bamako’s criminal underworld entangles him with the military, the government, and eventually al-Qaeda. Discovery Scotiabank 5
3:15PM (RE)ASSIGNMENT
(Canada/France/US) 95mins. The Solution Entertainment Group, SBS International (int’l). SBS International, ICM Partners (US). Dir: Walter Hill. Cast: Michelle Rodriguez, Tony Shalhoub, Anthony LaPaglia. Audacious revenge thriller about a lowlife killer put through full male-to-female gender reassignment surgery by a score-settling surgeon. Special Presentations Scotiabank 12
THE LIMEHOUSE GOLEM
(UK) 105mins. HanWay Films (int’l). HanWay Films, William Morris Endeavor Entertainment (US). Dir: Juan Carlos Medina. Cast: Bill Nighy, Olivia Cooke, Douglas Booth. In Victorian-era London, an intrepid police inspector investigates a series of brutal killings that seem to be linked to a fearsome creature of Jewish legend. Special Presentations Scotiabank 4
3:30PM THE BLEEDER
(US) 101mins. Millennium Films (int’l). United Talent Agency (US). Dir: Philippe Falardeau. Cast: Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber, Elisabeth Moss. Biopic of New Jersey boxer Chuck Wepner, whose legendary ability to take punishment in the ring made him the inspiration for Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky. Special Presentations Scotiabank 1
4:00PM
the global arena when its natural resources become the focal point for international wheeling, dealing and politicking, in this energetic political satire from Quebec director Chloé Robichaud (Sarah Prefers To Run). Contemporary World Cinema Scotiabank 7
4:30PM BELOW HER MOUTH
(Canada) 92mins. Elle Driver (int’l). Cinetic Media (US). Dir: April Mullen. Cast: Natalie Krill, Erika Linder, Sebastian Pigott. The story of an unexpected romance between two women whose passionate connection changes their lives forever. Special Presentations Scotiabank 6
5:15PM WE CAN’T MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE TWICE
(Canada) 163mins. National Film Board of Canada (int’l and US). Dir: Alanis Obomsawin. The new film from documentarian Alanis Obomsawin chronicles the events following the filing of a humanrights complaint by a group of activists, which charged that the federal government’s woefully inadequate funding of services for Indigenous children constituted a discriminatory practice. Masters Scotiabank 5
6:30PM JUST NOT MARRIED
(Nigeria) 102mins. Dir: Uduak-Obong Patrick. Cast: Judith Audu, Stan Nze, Rotimi Salami. A bright but broke undergrad striving to escape the slums gets in over his head when his modest criminal enterprise goes a bit too far. City to City Scotiabank 6
6:45PM
BOUNDARIES
BOYS IN THE TREES
(Canada) 100mins. Indie Sales (int’l). Dir: Chloe Robichaud. Cast: Macha Grenon, Emily VanCamp, Nathalie Doummar. A tiny island nation off Canada’s east coast enters
(Australia) 112mins. Mushroom Pictures Pty (int’l). Paradigm (US). Dir: Nicholas Verso. Cast: Toby Wallace, Gulliver McGrath, Mitzi Ruhlmann.
A unique coming-of-age tale about teenage former friends whose all-night trek one fateful Halloween night becomes half descent into old fears and nightmares, half reckoning with the future.
Screen office Meeting room 12, fifth floor, TIFF Bell Lightbox, 350 King Street West, Toronto, ON, M5V 3X5
Discovery Scotiabank 7
Editorial Tel +1 416 599 8433 ext 2512
8:30PM KATI KATI
(Kenya/Germany) 75mins. Rushlake Media (int’l). Dir: Mbithi Masya. Cast: Nyokabi Gethaiga, Elsaphan Njora. Bereft of earthly memories, a new arrival in the afterlife struggles to recover the past, in this poetic fantasy that offers a dark reflection on personal atonement in the shadow of Kenya’s violent past. Discovery Scotiabank 5
9:00PM TRANSPARENT SEASON 3
(US) 88mins. Dir: Jill Soloway. Cast: Anjelica Huston, Jeffrey Tambor, Gaby Hoffmann. Premiere of the first three episodes from the new season of Jill Soloway’s Emmy-winning comedydrama, starring Jeffrey Tambor as transgender retiree Maura Pfefferman. Primetime Scotiabank 6
9:30PM GIANTS OF AFRICA
(Canada) 83mins. Dir: Hubert Davis. Cast: Masai Ujiri, Peter Amegbor, Sodiq Seyi Awogbemi. Chronicles the inspirational work of Giants of Africa, a programme founded by Toronto Raptors GM Masai Ujiri that uses basketball to educate and enrich the lives of underprivileged African youth. TIFF Docs Scotiabank 7
10:15PM I HAD NOWHERE TO GO
(Germany) 100mins. Dir: Douglas Gordon. Cast: Jonas Mekas. An intimate portrait of avant-garde cinema legend Jonas Mekas.
Editor Matt Mueller, matt.mueller@screendaily.com, +44 7880 526 547 US editor Jeremy Kay, jeremykay67@gmail.com, +1 310 922 5908 Chief critic & reviews editor Finn Halligan, finn.halligan@ screendaily.com, +44 7798 571 270 Group head of production & art Mark Mowbray, mark.mowbray@screendaily.com, +44 7710 124 065 Reporter Tom Grater, tom.grater@screendaily.com, +44 7436 096 420 Sid Adilman mentorship programme Aaditya Aggarwal, aadiaggarwal@gmail.com Advertising and publishing Publishing director Nadia Romdhani, nadia. romdhani@screendaily.com Senior sales manager Scott Benfold, scott.benfold@ screendaily.com, +44 7765 257 260 International account managers Ingrid Hammond +39 05 7829 8768, ingridhammond@mac.com Pierre-Louis Manes, pierre-louis. manes@screendaily.com, +44 7768 237 487 Gunter Zerbich, gunter.zerbich@ screendaily.com, +44 7768 237 487 VP business development, North America Nigel Daly, nigeldalymail@gmail.com, +1 213 447 5120 US sales and business development executive Nikki Tilmouth, nikki.screeninternational@gmail. com +1 323 868 7633 Production manager Jonathon Cooke, jonathon.cooke@mb-insight.com, +44 7584 335 148 Chief executive, MBI Conor Dignam Printer Big Bark Graphics, S/B — 68 Healey Road, Units 1-3, Bolton, ON L7E 5A4 Screen International, London MBI, Zetland House, 5-25 Scrutton Street, London EC2A 4HJ, United Kingdom Subscription enquiries help.subscribe@screendaily.com +44 (0) 330 333 9414
Wavelengths Scotiabank 5
September 11, 2016 Screen International at Toronto 23
DIR: JOHN BUTLER CONTEMPORARY WORLD CINEMA
DIR: LORCAN FINNEGAN VANGUARD
DIR: ALAN GILSENAN SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS
Handsome Devil
Without Name
Unless
DIR: JIM SHERIDAN GALA PRESENTATIONS
DIR: AISLING WALSH SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS
The Secret Scripture
Maudie
DIR: MAYA ZINSHTEIN TIFF DOCS
DIR: GERARD BARRETT SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS
DIR: VINCENT GALLAGHER SHORT CUTS
Forever Pure
Brain on Fire
Second to None
Irish Film at TIFF 2016 Find out more at EFP booth #11 at the Industry Centre
www.irishfilmboard.ie
IFB_ScreenInternational_BC_FA.indd 1
07/09/2016 17:13