TIFF’s Canadian choices are Chloe, Young Victoria
Canadian lineup offers cornucopia of film genres
CBC News (Canada)
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Chloe, Atom Egoyan’s latest drama, Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginariam of
Dr. Parnassus and Robert Stefaniuk’s star-studded rock’n’roll vampire
comedy Suck exemplify the wide assortment of Canadian content
unspooling at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival.
Organizers announced the Canadian lineup, which includes 29 features
and 41 shorts, in Toronto on Tuesday afternoon.
This year’s offerings have "a lot of films that break the
mold. They’re not what you consider stereotypically Canadian, whatever
the stereotypes people have about Canadian film," Steve Gravestock,
TIFF’s associate director of Canadian programming, told CBC News.
"Some of these are genre-busting films, so it’s hard to classify
them," he said, citing Peter Stebbings’ superhero film Defendor
(starring Woody Harrelson), Stefaniuk’s Suck, Corey Adams and Alex
Craig’s skateboarding world debut comedy Machotaildrop and Blaine
Thurier’s "domestic film noir," A Gun to the Head.
The boundary-pushing, hard-to-define nature of some of the Canadian
selections, along with the mixed subject matter was "great" for
programmers, Gravestock said. "It certainly made viewing the films
easier. You’re never seeing the same thing over and over again."
Egoyan’s Chloe, which Gravestock dubbed "one of his best films,
easily," stars Julianne Moore as a wife who hires a young woman
(Amanda Seyfried) to test the fidelity of her husband, portrayed by
Liam Neeson. It will be featured as a gala along with Gilliam’s Doctor
Parnassus, Heath Ledger’s final film and also showcasing Johnny Depp,
Jude Law and Colin Farrell, who stepped in after the young actor’s
sudden death.
Canadian Dilip Mehta’s Cooking with Stella, a New Delhi-set social
satire starring Don McKellar, Lisa Ray and Seema Biswas, also won a
coveted gala spot, while award-winning Quebec filmmaker Jean-Marc
Vallée’s The Young Victoria, a fresh look at the iconic B
‘s youth, snagged this year’s closing-night slot.
Other notable Canadian films to screen at TIFF include:
* J’ai tué ma mère (I Killed My Mother ) – Quebec wunderkind Xavier
Dolan’s film that wowed Cannes in May.
* Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist and Rebel – Brigitte Berman’s
surprising documentary featuring insider access and rare archival
footage.
* Leslie, My Name is Evil – Reg Harkema’s film about a sheltered
juror who falls for a former homecoming queen embroiled in a hippie,
death-cult murder trial.
* Glenn Gould: The Inner Life – Peter Raymont and Michele Hozer’s
documentary casting new light on the iconic Canadian pianist and his
private and romantic life.
* Petropolis: Aerial Perspectives on the Alberta Tar Sands –
filmmaker and visual artist Peter Mettler’s documentary exploration of
the controversial site.
* Reel Injun – a documentary by filmmaker Neil Diamond exploring
Hollywood’s inaccurate portrayals of native peoples.
* Excited – a quirky Bruce Sweeney romantic comedy about a man
whose mother gets in the way of his love life.
* High Life – Gary Yates’s crime comedy about two brothers
attempting one last score.
* The Trotsky – Jacob Tierney’s comedy about a Montreal high
schooler who believes himself the reincarnation of Leon Trotsky.
The Toronto International Film Festival takes place Sept. 10-19.
With files from Jessica Wong
/tiff-canadian-lineup.html?ref=rss
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
