The final list of Toronto titles will be announced six days from now — on Tuesday, August 19th — so today’s list of Special Presentations is not the be-all and end-all. The word from one Toronto insider is that TIFF is cutting down on the overall number of films being shown, which last year was around 300. Variety and others have complained that Toronto is a crap-shoot because they show too many films, so they’re trimming the tally back to 280, give or take. But a whole lot of titles are going to be announced next Tuesday.
Darren Aronofsky‘s The Wrestler will make it there in addition to its NY Film Festival showing. My facial-trauma Mickey Rourke moment is definitely coming and I’d better toughen up and get ready for it. And Steven Soderbergh‘s slightly shortened Che (4 hours and 5 minutes, give or take) will be presented as a single entity with a 15-minute intermission as well as two separate films — they were once called The Argentine and Guerilla but who knows what the current thinking may be? — being shown at different times.
Clint Eastwood√¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s Changeling will be the centerpiece of the New York Film Festival, but Angelina Jolie wouldn’t commit to attending so forget Toronto.
Other top-tittie titles include Kevin Smith‘s Zack and Miri Make a Porno with Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks; Guillermo Arriaga‘s The Burning Plain with Charlize Theron and Kim Basinger; Barbet Schroder‘s Inju; and Charlie Kaufman‘s smartly written but deeply morose and deterioration-obsessed Synecdoche, New York.
Other highlights of today’s announcement include Rian Johnson‘s The Brothers Bloom with Adrien Brody, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel Weisz, Rinko Kikuchi, Maximilian Schell and Robbie Coltrane; Stephan Elliott‘s Easy Virtue with Colin Firth, Jessica Biel, Kristin Scott Thomas and Ben Barnes; Christophe Barratier‘s Faubourg 36, Michael Winterbottom‘s Genova with Colin Firth, Catherine Keener and Hope Davis.
As well as John Crowley‘s Is There Anybody There? with Bill Milner and Michael Caine; Bruno Barreto‘s Last Stop 174; Stephen Belber‘s Management with Jennifer Aniston, Steve Zahn and Woody Harrelson; Richard Linklater‘s Me and Orson Welles with Zac Efron, Claire Daines, Ben Chaplin and Christian McKay; Danny Boyle‘s Slumdog Millionaire; Marc Abraham‘s Flash of Genius with Greg Kinnear, Lauren Graham, Dermot Mulroney and Alan Alda.