The 2020 version of the Toronto International Film Festival will be dramatically reduced in terms of presence and number of films, especially Canadian films. Like most of the TIFFs in the 2010s, the opening night film is not Canadian.
Spike Lee's take on David Byrne's American Utopia is the opening night film for 2020 TIFF. There are only 50 films in the 2020 TIFF.
Here are the full-length Canadian films for the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival:
Beans is a coming of age story in the time of the Oka Crisis in 1990. The film comes from Tracey Deer, who created the documentary and subsequent TV show Mohawk Girls.
Inconvenient Indian is an adaptation from Michelle Latimer of the Thomas King book on the cultural colonisation of Indigenous peoples. Latimer's future CBC show Trickster, adapted from the Eden Robinson novel Son of a Trickster, will get a premiere of the opening episode during 2020 TIFF.
The New Corporation: An Unfortunately Necessary Sequel is the sequel to the Canadian documentary The Corporation (2003). Joel Bakan wrote the original film and the sequel; he co-directed the sequel. Jennifer Abbott co-directed the sequel with Bakan and the original film with Mark Achbar. The original documentary delved into the modern-day corporation. Can easily imagine the potential for a sequel.
No Ordinary Man is a documentary that explores the legacy of American jazz musician and trans icon Billy Tipton. Aisling Chin-Yee and Chase Joynt co-directed the film. Chin-Yee had her directorial debut at 2019 TIFF with The Rest of Us with Heather Graham and Sophie Nélisse.
Violation centres on a traumatic betrayal and the revenge that follows. The film is the feature debut from Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinell.
A traumatic betrayal drives a woman to seek revenge in Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli's debut feature VIOLATION, starring Madeleine Sims-Fewer, @annacmaguire, Jesse LaVercombe, and Obi Abili. #TIFF20 https://t.co/qGK2GnbYR7 pic.twitter.com/Tbrs5svFpr
— TIFF (@TIFF_NET) July 30, 2020
There are a few co-productions to note. Viggo Mortensen makes his directorial debut in Falling (Canada/UK). Mortensen starred in 3 David Cronenberg films: A History of Violence; Eastern Promises; and A Dangerous Method. The other titles are Fauna by Nicolas Pereda (Mexico/Canada); Night of the Kings | La Nuit des rois by Philippe Lacote (Cote d’Ivoire/France/Canada/Senegal); Pieces of a Woman by Kornel Mundruczo (USA/Canada/Hungary); and Shiva Baby by Emma Seligman (U.S./Canada).
Molly Parker is in Pieces of a Woman.
Enemies of the State from Sonia Kennebeck is a documentary about an American family seeking refuge in Canada after their hacker son is targeted by the U.S. government.
Just to be crystal clear: these aren't the highlights. This is the whole list.
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While there will be Indigenous languages in some of the films, none of the 2020 TIFF entries are French-Canadian. We were critical of the 2018 Windsor International Film Festival for only having 2 Quebec films.
Canada's entry for the Best International Feature Film is guaranteed not to run at the 2020 TIFF. Antigone from Sophie Deraspe won Best Canadian Film at the 2019 TIFF and went on to be Canada's entry in the Best International Feature Film category.
The unofficial front runner for Canada's entry into the Academy Awards in Pascal Plante's Nadia, Butterfly, depending on whether the film has "too much English." The film was on the original list at Cannes in 2020.
The film festival often adds films at the last minute. The cap this year is at 50 films, so we aren't sure how that will work.
We are also keeping at eye out of the 2020 version of TIFF Rising Stars. Priority is given to candidates with a principal role in a feature film in the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival. 40% of the list are documentaries, so that narrows the list.
TIFF will announce showtimes on August 25. The 2020 Toronto International Film Festival runs a day shorter than usual, going from September 10-19.
photo credit: Beans film
Twitter capture: @TIFF_net
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