2009 Toronto International Film Festival

2009 Toronto International Film Festival
2009 Toronto International Film Festival

Official 2009 poster
Location Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Hosted by Toronto International Film Festival Group
Number of films 300 - 400
Language International
Official website

The 34th annual Toronto International Film Festival, (TIFF) was held held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada between September 10 and September 19, 2009. The opening night gala presented the Charles Darwin biography Creation. The Young Victoria, based on the early years of Queen Victoria, closed the festival on September 19.[1]

Contents

About the 2009 Festival

TIFF is a non-profit organization whose goal is to change the way people look at the world through film. The festival is Canada's largest film festival, receiving 4,209 submissions in 2008. Of this total, 312 films were screened coming from 64 different countries. TIFF creates an annual economic impact of $135 million CAD. Aided by over 2,000 volunteers, 100 full-time staff members and 500 seasonal or part-time staff are responsible for organizing the festival. Two screenings of each of the invited films are presented to the public and at least one screening is provided for press and industry. The 2009 festival contained 19 different Programmes, or categories of films. After the ten days of film, the Awards reception was held at Intercontinental Hotel on Front Street in Toronto.

Perhaps the most prestigious of the awards was bestowed to Lee Daniels's Precious: based on the novel Push by Sapphire. This award was the 2009 Cadillac People's Choice Award and is based solely on votes by Festival audiences. This award carries a $15,000 cash prize and also comes with a custom made award from Cadillac. It is widely considered to be the most prestigious because it has had the greatest impact on audiences and inspires film distributors to sign the winning film for larger international releases. Last year's winner Slumdog Millionaire directed by Danny Boyle, went on to reap huge international spotlight which culminated at the 2009 Academy Awards where it won Best Picture. Lee Daniel's Precious was also a big Oscar contender as it was nominated for Best Picture and Best Director, however it lost to The Hurt Locker and its helmer Katheryn Bigelow. The First runner-up was Bruce Beresford's Mao's Last Dancer and the second runner-up was Jean-Pierre Jeunet's Micmacs (Micmacs à tirelarigot).

The City of Toronto and Astral Media's The Movie Network Award for Best Canadian Feature Film went to Cairo Time directed by Ruba Nadda. Sponsored by Astral Media's the Movie Network and the City of Toronto, this award came with a cash prize of $30,000.

Future endeavors by the TIFF will be aided by the ongoing construction of TIFF Bell Lightbox, a 1,750,000-square-foot (163,000 m2) facility with an estimated annual economic impact of over $200 million. Complete with 5 cinemas, learning studios, galleries and a rooftop lounge, this will become the hub of TIFF in 2010 when construction is scheduled to be completed.

Controversy over Tel Aviv spotlight

More than 50 prominent film artists, including academics, writers, and filmmakers have signed a letter of protest directed at the Toronto International Film Festival regarding its decision to spotlight Tel Aviv and the work of 10 Israeli filmmakers.[2] The protest leaders have emphasized that it is not a call for a boycott.[3][4] The original protest letter in part reads (according to an excerpt quoted by a Canadian newspaper[2]):

"As members of the Canadian and international film, culture and media arts communities, we are deeply disturbed by [TIFF's] decision to host a celebratory spotlight on Tel Aviv. We protest that TIFF, whether intentionally or not, has become complicit in the Israeli propaganda machine. We do not protest the individual Israeli filmmakers included in City to City, nor do we in any way suggest that Israeli films should be unwelcome at TIFF. However ... we object to the use of such an important international festival in staging a propaganda campaign on behalf of ... an apartheid regime."

The signatories and supporters include Ken Loach, David Byrne, Naomi Klein, Alice Walker, Jane Fonda, Wallace Shawn, Danny Glover[2], John Greyson[5], Viggo Mortensen and the American Jewish group Jewish Voice for Peace.[4]

John Greyson's letter of protest highlighted an interview "Israeli Consul General Amir Gissin gave to Canadian Jewish News in which he described the TIFF spotlight as a culmination of his year-long Brand Israel campaign, which included ads on buses, radio and television."[5][6] Greyson claims that "This isn't the right year to celebrate Brand Israel, or to demonstrate an ostrich-like indifference to the realities (cinematic and otherwise) of the region, or to pointedly ignore the international economic boycott campaign against Israel."[5]

The protest letter was met with condemnation by some, such as Simcha Jacobovici, "a Toronto filmmaker who recently moved with his family to Israel, noted in a statement that the Palestinian government in Gaza had recently called a U.N. proposal to teach the Holocaust in Palestinian schools a war crime." Jacobovici asked "Why does [protest supporter John Greyson] want to align himself with Holocaust deniers?"[2] Others accused those who signed the protest letter as engaging in a boycott of Israel films.[2]

Rabbi Marvin Hier, the founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, has stated that "it is clear that the script [the protesters] are reading from might as well have been written by Hamas."[7]

Patrick Goldstein, writing in the Los Angeles Times, wrote against the protest and made an analogy to actions by musician Paul Simon:

"At the height of apartheid in South Africa, Paul Simon made "Graceland", an album of glorious music with South African musicians. He was criticized at the time for breaking a worldwide cultural boycott, but Simon believed that exposing the musicians' gifts to the world far outweighed any tacit endorsement his use of South African musicians would have provided for the country's repressive regime. History long ago proved him right. The same openness should apply to a film festival."[8]

In response to the protest, a counter-protest letter made a number of Hollywood stars circulated a letter on September 15, 2009. which appeared simultaneously in the Los Angeles Times and the Toronto Star amongst whose signatories were Jerry Seinfeld, Sacha Baron Cohen, Natalie Portman, Jason Alexander, Lisa Kudrow, Lenny Kravitz, Patricia Heaton, Jacob Richler, Noah Richler, George F. Walker and Moses Znaimer. The letter said:

Anyone who has actually seen recent Israeli cinema, movies that are political and personal, comic and tragic, often critical, knows they are in no way a propaganda arm for any government policy. Blacklisting them only stifles the exchange of cultural knowledge that artists should be the first to defend and protect.[9]

Jane Fonda, in a posting on Huffington Post, says that she now regrets some of the language used in the original protest letter and how it "was perhaps too easily misunderstood. It certainly has been wildly distorted. Contrary to the lies that have been circulated, the protest letter was not demonizing Israeli films and filmmakers." She continued writing "the greatest 're-branding' of Israel would be to celebrate that country's long standing, courageous and robust peace movement by helping to end the blockade of Gaza through negotiations with all parties to the conflict, and by stopping the expansion of West Bank settlements. That's the way to show Israel's commitment to peace, not a PR campaign. There will be no two-state solution unless this happens."[10]

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun Times initially came out against the protest but then changed his mind saying that he initially didn't know all of the facts.[11] He wrote: "I thought of it as an innocent goodwill gesture, but now realize it was part of a deliberate plan to 're-brand' Israel in Toronto, as a pilot for a larger such program. The Festival should never have agreed to be used like this."[11]

Programmes

Special presentations

City to City

Contemporary World Cinema

Discovery

  • The Angel directed by Margreth Olin
  • Applause directed by Martin Pieter Zandvliet
  • Bare Essence of Life directed by Satoko Yokohama
  • Beautiful Kate directed by Rachel Ward
  • A Brand New Life directed by Ounie Lecomte
  • The Day Will Come directed by Susanne Schneider
  • The Disappearance of Alice Creed directed by J. Blakeson
  • Eamon directed by Margaret Corkery
  • Everyday is a Holiday directed by Dima El-Horr
  • Five Hours from Paris directed by Leon Pruddovsky
  • Gigante directed by Adrián Biniez
  • The Happiest Girl in the World directed by Radu Jude
  • Heliopolis directed by Ahmad Abdalla
  • Le Jour Ou Dieu Est Parti en Voyage directed by Philippe van Leeuw
  • Kelin directed by Ermek Tursunov
  • Last Ride directed by Glendyn Ivin
  • The Man Beyond the Bridge directed by Laxmikant Shetgaonkar
  • My Dog Tulip directed by Paul Fierlinger and Sandra Fierlinger
  • My Tehran for Sale directed by Granaz Moussavi
  • Northless directed by Rigoberto Perezcano
  • La Pivellina directed by Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel
  • Samson and Delilah directed by Warwick Thornton
  • Shirley Adams directed by Oliver Hermanus
  • Should I Really Do It? directed by Ismail Necmi
  • La Soga directed by Josh Crook
  • Toad's Oil directed by Koji Yakusho
  • Together directed by Matias Armand Jordal
  • The Unloved directed by Samantha Morton

Future Projections

Gala Presentations

Masters

  • Air Doll directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda
  • La Donation directed by Bernard Emond
  • Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl directed by Manoel de Oliveira
  • Les Herbes folles directed by Alain Resnais

Midnight Madness

Reel to Reel

  • The Art of the Steal directed by Don Argott
  • Bassidji directed by Mehran Tamadon
  • Cleanflix directed by Andrew James and Joshua Ligairi
  • Collapse directed by Chris Smith
  • Colony directed by Carter Gunn, Ross McDonnell
  • Genius Within: The Inner Life of Glenn Gould directed by Peter Raymont and Michele Hozer
  • Google Baby directed by Zippi Brand Frank
  • How to Fold a Flag directed by Michael Tucker and Petra Epperlein
  • L' Enfer de Henri-Georges Clouzot directed by Serge Bromberg and Ruxandra Medrea
  • The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers directed by Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith
  • Petropolis: Aerial Perspectives on the Alberta Tar Sands directed by Peter Mettler
  • Presumed Guilty directed by Roberto Hernández and Geoffrey Smith
  • Reel Injun directed by Neil Diamond
  • Schmatta: Rags to Riches to Rags directed by Marc Levin
  • Snowblind directed by Vikram Jayanti
  • Stolen directed by Violeta Ayala and Dan Fallshaw
  • The Topp Twins directed by Leanne Pooley
  • Videocracy directed by Erik Gandini

Vanguard

  • Accident directed by Soi Cheang
  • The Ape directed by Jesper Ganslandt
  • Bunny and the Bull directed by Paul King
  • Carcasses directed by Denis Cote
  • The Dirty Saints directed by Luis Ortega
  • Enter the Void directed by Gaspar Noé
  • Fish Tank directed by Andrea Arnold
  • Hipsters directed by Valery Todorovsky
  • The Misfortunates directed by Felix Van Groeningen
  • Leslie, My Name Is Evil directed by Reginald Harkema
  • My Queen Karo directed by Dorothée van den Berghe
  • Spring Fever directed by Lou Ye
  • The White Stripes Under Great White Northern Lights directed by Emmett Malloy

Visions

References

  1. ^ "'Creation' will open 2009 TIFF". The GATE. Archived from the original on 2009-08-16. http://www.thegate.ca/front-page/04984/creation-will-open-2009-tiff/. Retrieved 2009-07-18. 
  2. ^ a b c d e TIFF focus on Tel Aviv draws protests. Globe and Mail. September 8, 2009.
  3. ^ We don't feel like celebrating with Israel this year, Globe and Mail, September 10, 2009. Accessed 2009-09-15. Archived 2009-09-17.
  4. ^ a b A Blizzard of Lies, Jewish Voice for Peace. Accessed 2009-09-15. Archived 2009-09-17.
  5. ^ a b c Canadian director protests TIFF Tel Aviv spotlight, CBC News. August 29, 2009.
  6. ^ Brand Israel set to launch in GTA, Canadian Jewish News, August 21, 2009.
  7. ^ To criticize Israel is a dangerous thing in today's Canada. Toronto Star. September 11, 2009. Accessed 2009-09-15. Archived 2009-09-17.
  8. ^ Protest over Israel roils Toronto Film Festival. LA Times. September 12, 2009.
  9. ^ Natasha Mozgovaya and Itamar Zohar (16 September 2009). "Hollywood Jews hit back at protest of Toronto Film Fest". Haaretz. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1114902.html. 
  10. ^ Expanding the Narrative. Jane Fonda. Huffington Post. September 15, 2009.
  11. ^ a b /tiff_8_the_destructive_grandst.html TIFF #8: The protest: A change of mind, Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times, September 15, 2009. Accessed 2009-09-17. Archived 2009-09-26.

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