A still from ‘All We Imagine as Light’
| Photo Credit: @TIFF_NET/X
The Toronto International Film Festival announced its gala and special presentation line-up on Monday. The Angelina Jolie-directed war film Without Blood, a documentary about Bruce Springsteen, and Mike Leigh’s contemporary tragicomedy Hard Truths will have their world premieres, while Payal Kapadia’s Cannes favourite All We Imagine As Light will be screened in the special presentation segment.
Jolie’s film stars Salma Hayek and Demián Bichir and is based on the Alessandro Baricco novel Without Blood. The Springsteen film, Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band, charts behind the scenes of his world tour. Leigh’s film, his first in six years, has him reuniting with his Secrets & Lies star Marianne Jean-Baptiste.
Meanwhile, Kapadia’s film, which tells the story of two Kerala nurses living in contemporary Mumbai, was the first Indian film in 30 years to compete in the main competition at Cannes and the only Indian film ever to win the Palme d’Or. It stars Kani Kusruti, Divya Prabha and Chhaya Kadam.
Also announced were the world premieres of Gia Coppola’s The Last Showgirl, starring Pamela Anderson, Jamie Lee Curtis, Dave Bautista, and Kiernan Shipka, and Rachel Morrison’s directorial debut The Fire Inside, about the first woman to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing. Barry Jenkins wrote the screenplay.
Edward Burns has a new film, Millers in Marriage, with Minnie Driver and Morena Baccarin, as does David Mackenzie with the thriller Relay, starring Riz Ahmed and Lily James. Jennifer Lopez co-stars in the Ben Affleck-produced sports drama Unstoppable, about American wrestler Anthony Robles. And Hugh Grant leads the eerie Scott Beck and Bryan Woods-directed A24 pic Heretic.
One year after TIFF went on through the actors strikes, the star power has returned to the prestigious film festival, which helps inform the conversation around the season’s awards hopefuls.
Focus Features will play its Edward Berger-directed, and Ralph Fiennes-starring papal thriller Conclave at the festival. But it won’t be the world premiere for Conclave — that event will likely happen at either Venice or Telluride, which have yet to announce their full lineups. The studio will also bring Piece by Piece to TIFF, Morgan Neville’s Pharrell Williams documentary told with LEGOs.
Films previously announced as part of the TIFF slate include the animated The Wild Robot; Marielle Heller’s Nightbitch, starring Amy Adams; John Crowley’s We Live In Time, with Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh; David Gordon Green’s comedy Nutcrackers, with Ben Stiller; R.J. Cutler and David Furnish’s Elton John: Never Too Late;and Ron Howard’s survival thriller Eden with Ana de Armas, Sydney Sweeney, and Jude Law.
Apart from All We Imagine As Light, the festival will also play some Cannes favourites including Sean Baker’s Anora, Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada and Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Pérez, and the Will Ferrell friendship documentary Will & Harper which debuted at Sundance.
More TIFF films will be announced in the coming weeks, as will the lineups for other important fall festivals including Venice, Telluride, and New York Film Festival.
TIFF kicks off on September 5 and runs through September 15.
