..,.Gary
Dretzka
..,.Leonard
Klady
...David
Poland
...Doug
Pratt
...Ray
Pride
..Confessions Day Five ..Confessions Day Two ..Confessions Day One ..2007 Toronto Film Festival Where did everybody go?
Film festivals are, as the man says, a funny business.
Some, such as Cannes, have virtually no public component, others are user friendly, and Toronto is a sort of hybrid. It grew like Topsy, avoiding the logic of instituting a formal market component though considerable business occurs at the event.
In fact, the industry component is so large at Toronto that film reps as well as the press exist on a separate plain from the public and the paucity of interaction with local folk is downright weird. Screenings are separate as are the majority of social functions.
Toronto screens more films than any other major event in official sections - close to 300 features. Cannes screens close to 500 movies but the majority are in its market while official sections including orbit programs such as the Directors Fortnight number no more than 150 titles.
It's frankly impossible to find 300 new quality movies and therefore unsurprising that there's a fair amount of grousing about Toronto's selections. A story has been circulating that this year's event was all set to show a new film by Michael Radford titled Flawless and starring Demi Moore and Michael Caine. However, when the producers informed the organizers that Ms. Moore was unable to attend, the invitation was revoked.
There are a fair number of star-studded movies on the Toronto docket and there's an argument to be made that there are too many. Sometimes it feels like programmers simply cannot say no to anyone that might be a candidate for Entertainment Tonight. Some films are no more than a breath away from playing at the local multiplex such as The Brave One.
At the same time one has to admit that the streams of glitterati get Toronto a lot of ink and are a likely assist to raising funds and drawing in donors that get a kick from ever so briefly rubbing shoulders with the like of George Clooney and Sigourney Weaver. It has evolved into a confection that's murder for anyone with celebrity diabetes.
Still one can hope that those films that might otherwise slip through the cracks get suitable exposure and a little utz they might otherwise be denied. Certainly within the press/industry aspect of the event the heat got turned up on everything from new horror films by old hands like George Romero and Stuart Gordon to a crazy quilt of new films from Asia and the Middle East and the crackerjack thriller Before the Devil Knows You're Dead from Sidney Lumet.
