This year, many TIFF goers were upset to hear that donors to TIFFG and the Bell Lightbox Fund got first crack at tickets. While it was believed to be a new scheme by 'money-hungry' festival executives, this practice has been occurring for quite some time. TIFFG is not unlike any other arts organization in the city, where donors are given first crack at tickets. This is the same at the Canadian Opera Company, the TSO, Massey and Roy Thomson Hall, and the National Ballet, just to name a few. With massive cuts to arts funding potentially coming up, instead of sneering at donors as 'queue-jumpers' we should really be appreciating the fact that they truly support the arts that we enjoy, and leave it at that.

One of the major things I must mention would be the fact that unlike other festival-goers, I'm happy with the upgrading of the Elgin Theatre to a full-time premium theatre, like Roy Thomson Hall. Now before you run me into the ground, remember why people go to Roy Thomson Hall; for the glitz and the stars. But honestly, RTH is all fine and good, but if you want opulence, what's better than seeing these people than at the gorgeous Elgin theatre? In terms of getting the bang for your buck, it's a crapshoot either way. I saw one film at each theater this year, and while both screenings had the director in the audience, at RTH they waved at the audience and departed but at the Elgin the questions went so long I had to duck out to my next film! So take out your anger at the talent who don't want to bother taking questions, rather than the theatre.

Of course, here come the complaints about how it's not worth $40 to see films that are going to be out in a few weeks, and you know what? I fully agree! If you're going to the Toronto International Film Festival only to see films that already have wide-release dates, such as Burn After Reading, The Duchess, Blindness or Appaloosa, then you're doing it wrong. The real gems for Gala screenings are the films you probably won't be able to see ever again, except on a bootleg or foreign DVD, films like The Good, The Bad, The Weird or La Fille de Monaco. So if your complaint revolves around the matter of seeing The Duchess now, or a week later, take it elsewhere!

Amongst the changes that most people did agree on, however, one of which was the introduction of the Festival Lite and Daytime Lite packages. While people usually gape at the size of the full Festival Package, these mini-packages were deemed 'just right', with the Daytime Lite package in particular selling out way before the festival began. While I never thought it possible to work and use a Festival Pack of 50 films, the Festival Lite package may be just the ticket...

Also, the free screening of People's Choice Award winner Slumdog Millionaire? Brilliant.

Highlights from blogTO writers include:

Jason Mewes striding down the hall in the altogether, in Zack and Miri Make a Porno, with the real Mewes sitting two rows behind me.
Matt Brown

The standing ovation for Chocolate was a very proud moment for director Prachya Pinkaew, especially since his previous film at TIFF, Ong-Bak in 2003, was met with the same adoration. This warm response was probably the most emotional finish to TIFF that I've ever witnessed. Viva la Midnight Madness!
Danielle D'Ornellas

I'm not sure if it was a favourite momemt, but I found it interesting how the media and TIFF-goers relentlessly criticized festival organizers for some of their fan-unfriendly changes this year. This was perhaps epitomized in my final screening of the festival - Spike's Lee's Miracle at St. Anna - where during the intro before the film, someone from the audience at the Ryerson screamed "Thanks for Not Screening This at the Elgin". Another member of the audience then yelled "The Elgin Sucks". The TIFF representative on stage acknowledged and seemed to understand the feedback and the whole exchange was rather appreciated by the near-capacity crowd
Tim Shore

I wonder if Patrick Watson's career will take off like Feist's did after her song was played before EVERY screening.
Gary

I'm a TIFF virgin no more! My friends and I got invited to this year's opening gala which screened Passchendaele at the Roy Thomson Hall. At first I was just stoked to get all dolled up and walk (past) the red carpet, but sitting in the theatre knowing that the people I will be watching on screen are actually sitting a few rows away from me was surreal... Oh, and we also attended the afterparty at the Liberty Grand - complete with real tanks which carried some VIPs. That was surreal.
Jade Maravillas

While I may still be brewing all those free bags of ground Starbucks I got in all those lines I waited in, and finding movie stubs in my pockets, the festival is over. See you next year!

Images: Toronto International Film Festival Fans & Filmfestival Audrey by blogTO flickr-poolers Somewhere in Toronto & Trevor Haldenby

It's over. Almost.

Today is the last day of the Toronto International Film Festival, and honestly, I spent my night partying the festival away last night, so that's why this update is a little late. Apologies.

It has been a good festival for partying, I'll admit that. Whether it was a good festival for everything else has yet to be decided.

Eye Weekly's blog has an article asking if this year's TIFF was the "worst film festival ever" and Tim was interviewed by CTV asking if the festival has become too elitist. The verdict by most: a resounding yes.

It hasn't been all bad, to be honest. While Matt Mazur from PopMatters (as published in the Kansas City Star) was disappointed by the "jerks on Blackberrys and iPhones," he had a lot of good things to say about the festival and about Toronto itself — including shout outs for the Queen Mother Cafe, the helpful volunteers, and friendly Canadians on the whole.

If you're looking to send off the festival in style, TIFF is hosting a free outdoor concert and wrap party in Yonge Dundas Square tonight. The party will feature performances by Esthero, The Midway State, and Cadence Weapon, kicks off at 8pm tonight, and is open to anyone in the city.

Finally, if you're not looking to party but instead looking to catch a screening some time today, here are a few films that have been getting some good buzz but might have slipped under your radar. (They all still have tickets available too!) If you do decide to check any of them out, let us know what you think of them!

• Delta
• Kisses
• Lovely, Still
• Only
• Parc
• Treeless Mountain
• Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love

Happy festivaling! Keep checking blogTO over the next few days for wrapup and final coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

That's why I can understand — not excuse, mind you, just understand — Lou Lumenick's mindset when he allegedly thwacked Roger Ebert with a binder. When your nerves are on edge and someone starts poking you, it's hard to keep your composure. (Of course, after this incident, I've lost whatever little respect I ever had for Lumenick. Tired as you are, you have to keep your cool.)

Today is the second-to-last day of the festival, so things are winding down slowly. For those of you that still have some energy and want to watch more movies, I've heard that you might still be able to get a seat for Soderbergh's 4.5-hour epic, Che. For those of you that are a bit tired of festivaling, get some rest and eat some homemade food — you need to be fresh for the last bit of TIFF fun tonight and tomorrow.

Looking for some more information about the festival today? Here are a few other TIFF headlines from around the web:

• Nearing end, filmmakers vent (Variety)
• Toronto Film Festival offers brash, poignant breakout hits (CNN)
• Moviegoing to Great Lengths: Cinetourists Take Toronto (WaPo)
• Breakouts and fakeouts at Toronto film fest (Reuters)

Most of the big name celebs are making their way out of town now, but if you're deciding to skip the films and check out the celebs, here's a list of who's expecting to be arriving in town today:

• Billy Boyd
• Kate Mara
• Charlie Cox
• Mark Rudd

Finally, if you're looking to catch a screening some time today, here are three films that have been getting some good buzz but might have slipped under your radar. If you do decide to check any of them out, let us know what you think of them!

• Universalove: Exploring manifestations of love through poetic visuals and music.
• Pontypool: Bruce McDonald once again pushes the boundaries of contemporary cinema.
• El Greco: A look at the life of famed 16th century Greek artist Domenikos Theotokopoulos.

Happy festivaling! Keep checking blogTO over the next few days for final coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

(Photo: Still from Universalove.)

While I've already written up two of the best and one of the worst films I've seen so far at the festival, there are still several I have yet to address. To simplify things, these films are organized from my most recommended to my least.

Food Inc, dir Robert Kenner, USA

While I usually get my fill of documentaries during Hot Docs, the Reel to Reel program has really taken it up a notch with their programming this year, most notably with their selection of Food Inc. Working with literary food critics such as Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser, director Robert Kenner spent the last several years attempting to facilitate a dialogue between food conglomerates and their consumers, regarding food safety standards and increasing corporate control of food.

While it would have been so easy for Kenner to simply rehash information from the novels of Schlosser and Pollan, he manages to find his own stories, usually tragic, of those who are suffering from the pinch on farmers or farming practices, or those who have suffered from lax food and safety standards. In the end, the film is really effective due to the lack of propaganda or stunts which have become common in political documentaries as of late, instead Kenner relies on skilled story-telling and persuasive editing techniques to inform and hopefully inflame consumers into taking action.

The Dungeon Masters, dir Keven McAlester, USA

The charm about The Dungeon Masters is that it really isn't about the game, it's all about the players of the game. Similar in theme to recent docs such as Carny, The Dungeon Masters is more interested in the personal lives of the characters, and discovering what D&D fills in their lives and why, as opposed to a documentary about the playing of the game itself. McAlester follows three Dungeon Masters (the leaders/creators of the events that will happen in each game) about their daily lives, superficially focusing on what the game offers them, but really delving into their own personal histories, whether it be spousal abuse, abandonment, career failure, and their attempts at creativity, focusing on their hobbies and interests. The best way to describe their dedication is as Thom Powers mentions in his synopsis of the film, whether it's film festivals or D&D, we all need a little escapism sometimes.

Firaaq, dir Nandita Das, India

To describe the narrative organization of Firaaq, just imagine the editing style of Stephen Mirrione (Traffic, Babel) but transcribed to India, following individuals affected by the religious clashes between Hindus and Muslims. Directed by prominent actress and first time director Nandita Das, the film flourishes. You can tell she understands working with actors, as each of her characters are carefully constructed and offer varying and sensitive perspectives, opinions and actions. The only thing I can hope for in the future is for her to embrace a little more subtlety because at several points the film overdoses on overly dramatic scoring when simply the visuals would have been effective enough.

Ashes of Time Redux, dir Wong Kar-Wai, Hong Kong/China

While not exactly a new release at this years festival, the audience came out in full force to see the final cut of one of Kar-Wai's earliest cinematic works, and to add to the excitement, Wong Kar-Wai was able to attend the Toronto International Film Festival for the first time in thirteen years. The film is a ronin/mercenary film done Kar-Wai style, following the lives and loves of swordsmen, starring late actor Leslie Cheung, retired actress Brigitte Lin, Tony Leung Chiu Wai and more. New additions for the redux included a new score for the film and some reorganization of scenes, but the digital restoration itself is worth the price of admission. The film looks fantastic and will be an extra special treat for Kar-Wai fans unable to see the film in cinemas the first time around.

Gigantic, dir Matt Aselton, USA

To begin with, Gigantic really isn't that big of a film. The central character is Brian (Paul Dano), a 28 year old mattress salesman awaiting approval to adopt a Chinese baby, when he meets the charming and flighty Happy (Zooey Deschanel) and his life becomes a little more unclear. Gigantic could have been your typical boy-meets-girl film of yesteryear, but Aselton, as noted in his Q and A session, really didn't want us knowing exactly what came next. While the film stars John Goodman and Ed Asner as parents of our main characters, they don't overwhelm and act as great supports for Dano and Deschanel whose characters have become one of my favourite accidental couples in recent movie memory.

The Paranoids, dir Gabriel Medina, Argentina.

The Paranoids is an interesting film from Argentina about Luciano, an awkward late twenty-something male who has a penchant for keeping his real emotions bottled up inside when it's about something that really matters, and for sweating the small stuff. When his best friends' girlfriend stays over at his place for a few days, those things begin to change. The first half of the film felt really disconnected and unfocused, around the 1 hour mark I was actually ready to leave, but the second half felt really charged and with purpose, thus I stayed. I have a sneaking suspicion that this disconnect between the first and second halves of the film was intentional, as a reflection of the changes in Luciano's life, but if not, the film may need some retooling in the first half.

Daytime Drinking, dir Noh Young-seok, South Korea.

I was very excited to see South Korean film Daytime Drinking when I first read about it in the programme book, but when the film turned out to be like watching a South Korean TV drama, I very quickly tuned out. The same shiny, glossy, bizarre style of film has worked in the past with extremely successful films coming out of South Korea such as My Sassy Girl, but the lead character Hyuk-jin in Daytime Drinking doesn't bring out any of that charm or comedy, as he is more of a whiny pushover than anything else.

Image: TIFF08-5187 by blogTO flickr-pooler Ryan Coleman, the rest from TIFFG

(Apologies for the background noise. It gets a bit difficult finding quiet spaces at the Sutton Place Hotel during festival time.)

Pudge opens tonight as part of Short Cuts Canada programme 5. Tonight's screening may be sold out, but I'm pretty sure you'll be able to grab rush tickets if you try.

There are a few tickets left for tomorrow's screening, so do check it out if you get the chance.

I am referring to, of course, the TIFF volunteers.

You've seen them out and about with their green shirts, showing you where to go, checking your tickets, and in general making the festival a much more pleasant experience for everyone. And it's not just your movie nerds that are donning the green shirts. Mary, a volunteer that has been helping out at TIFF for eight years now, told me that she's been having more fun this year than any other because of the diversity of both the audiences and the volunteers.

Jason, a first-time volunteer, was in awe of the sheer amount of work and organization that goes into making the festival happen: "I've always heard of TIFF, but I never realized just how big it really was until I decided to volunteer." His volunteer experiences as a theater usher have been nothing but positive: "I'm so glad I had the chance to volunteer. I've met people that I never would have met before, and everyone is really grateful of the work we're doing. And it's a lot of fun."

Fun aside, volunteers are the lifeblood of the festival. To Mary, Jason, and everyone else volunteering at the festival, thank you from all of us at blogTO.

Looking for some more information about the festival today? Here are a few other TIFF headlines from around the web:

• Amid Slump in Film Market, Toronto Film Festival Energizes Industry (WSJ)
• Surprises light up Toronto film fest (Boston Globe)
• Sluggish Toronto Sees Surprise Buys (Variety)
• Toronto lesson: War is swell? (THR)
• Gritty Realism Lights Up Toronto (FemaleFirst)

The stars are out in full force in Toronto. If you're deciding to skip the films and check out the celebs, here's a list of who's expecting to be arriving in town today:

• Bryce Dallas Howard
• Robert Carlyle
• Chris Evans

Finally, if you're looking to catch a screening some time today, here are three films that have been getting some good buzz but might have slipped under your radar. If you do decide to check any of them out, let us know what you think of them!

• Sauna: Crazy Finnish thriller where the worst thing you can do is relax in the sauna.
• 24 City: A hyper-realistic film that lingers on the memories of the fall of a Communist factory.

Happy festivaling! Keep checking blogTO over the next few days for continuous coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

(Photo: Still from 24 City.)

Martyrs has been brought in to fit the bill, a neo-horror picture so extreme, Midnight programmer Colin Geddes described it as "a suckerpunch." And if you can suckerpunch that guy, you've certainly earned a place in the program. After disappointing with Deadgirl and The Burrowers but hitting the nail on the head with Acolytes, how did Martyrs fare?

There's been a collision coming between the French horror new wave (expertly exemplified at last year's Midnight Madness with Frontiere(s) and Inside) and American torture porn (think Hostel or The Passion of the Christ). Torture porn is an exercise in gratuitous gruesomeness, the brutalization of human bodies and souls for the pleasure of the audience. The French horror new wave, meanwhile, has spent the last few years building momentum by turning all the old horror/slasher tropes we grew up with on their ear via almost blindingly cathartic shock cinema. I have a growing respect for the latter - who knew the French were so fucked up? - and little more than lazy contempt for the former. Their inevitable collision finally occurs in Martyrs.

This film's first act is an effective primal scream of vengeance picture fury, as a teenage girl named Lucie escapes from an urban dungeon where unseen captors have been abusing her, only to return 15 years later and slaughter the family responsible for the crime. It's rat-a-tat cinema, blood-soaked as hell. Lucie's murderous rampage also introduces the freakiest jump-out-of-the-shadows monster since that Japanese kid spider-walked in Ju-On, five years ago.

Lucie's best friend and guardian angel, Anna, arrives at the scene of the crime to try to sort out the mess - Lucie is unabashedly psychotic, gibbering and crying and beating her own head against the wall - but as some clues to the motivation of Lucie's original imprisonment are revealed, Martyrs flips over and becomes torture porn through and through. Any hope that the flick would redeem its excesses vanishes as the audience is put through an entirely gratuitous 20 or 25 minute sequence of Anna being brutalized past the point of being recognizable as a human body. When she resembles nothing so much as a BodyWorks exhibit, and a weird, quasi-metaphysical "answer" is provided as to the machinery of the plot as a whole, the film sputters and dies.

There will always be something useful in cinematic horror, the film world's amped-up psychodrama which lets the audience confront, and hopefully purge, its deepest and least-accessible neuroses. Torture porn, on the other hand, is little more than an exercise in human cruelty dressed up in a game of one-upsmanship of "who can come up with the grossest gag." Martyrs falls shamefully into the T.P. camp, a mean-spirited, wholly unlikeable plane crash of a movie whose only lingering aftertaste is shame.

Had enough Midnight yet? Thursday night brings Eden Log, a Heavy Metal-inspired (the magazine, not the music) science fiction flick from France, followed on Friday night by Sexykiller, a killer comedy (pun intended). The 2008 show closes on Saturday night with Chocolate, which puts the Muay Thai firmly back where it belongs: on the screens of Midnight Madness in Toronto.

We tend to forget too often — as press or as the movie-watching public — that for many filmmakers, showing at TIFF is not just something they have to do in order to get a distribution deal. For many filmmakers, the festival gives them an opportunity to see and understand the impact that their films have on people from around the world.

Okay, that's enough sentimentality from me for today. (And if you haven't seen Lymelife yet, check out one of its final two screenings. It's a gem.)

Looking for some more information about the festival today? Here are a few other TIFF headlines from around the web:

• Toronto Ringing Its Bell (Variety)
• Acquisitions Slow at Toronto Fest (THR)
• Toronto talks Oscar, but do movie fans listen? (Reuters)
• (Name of movie here) Rocks! (MJS)
• Midway Through the Toronto Film Fest, and Things are Looking Bleak (VV)

The stars are out in full force in Toronto. If you're deciding to skip the films and check out the celebs, here's a list of who's expecting to be arriving in town today:

• Rachel McAdams
• Vincent Cassel
• Tim Robbins
• Michael Pena

Finally, if you're looking to catch a screening some time today, here are three films that have been getting some good buzz but might have slipped under your radar. If you do decide to check any of them out, let us know what you think of them!

• Sugar: Young boys in the Dominican Republic grow up wanting to baseball players too.
• Kabuli Kid: Would you leave your kid in a cab in Kabul? In this movie, someone does.
• Tears for Sale: Witchcraft, intrigue, and superstition in a dark, erotic, and magical comedy.

Happy festivaling! Keep checking blogTO over the next few days for continuous coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

(Photo: Still from Sugar.)

In this edition of TIFF: Reviewed, five very special reviews by Tim and special guest critic Matthew Price: Hunger, The Real Shaolin, Lymelife, Slumdog Millionaire, and Me and Orson Welles.

Hunger

Bobby Sands 66 day hunger strike is a pivotal moment in the history of Irish independence. It deserves the dramatic treatment, obviously. The problem is always how to deal with the story without falling into sentiment, or becoming didactic. Straight linear storytelling would put this into movie of the week with better makeup effects and do no justice for the audience. Hunger takes a remarkably different tack and emerges as one of the best films of the year.

After a brief title card let's us know that IRA members are on a "blanket and no wash" protest, Margaret Thatcher's voice is heard describing the government's response to the "terrorists". From that moment on, director Steve McQueen escapes the narrative trap by structuring almost the entire script subjectively. It isn't just what we are allowed to see, like a prison guard checking under his car for bombs before going to work, or two prisoners being beaten and forcibly washed, or inmates pouring their piss under the doors of their cells and into the hallways. It's what we don't see that works on us twice as well. The movie chooses no big picture and no history lesson and it forces the audience to actively engage and think about what's going on outside of the protests without being shown any of it.

By the time the film gets to the hunger strike itself, we're past literal story and completely engaged on a subjective level in the lives of these men. Almost all of the script is economical with dialogue, showing wherever possible instead if telling. In sharp contrast, is a scene at it's centre, a ten minute plus single take discussion of the morality and practicality of the hunger strike between Sands and a priest that is verbose, articulate and stunning. It's the knockout punch. This is the movie I'll be rooting for to get traction coming out of TIFF, because movies like this are the reason for film festivals to exist in the first place. -MP

The Real Shaolin

A doc following four people attempting to be accepted as Shaolin monks. After a brief narration describing Shaolin's significance as the birthplace of Zen Buddhism and martial arts we are introduced to the principals. There's an American, a Frenchman and two Chinese - one adolescent and one young boy. They aren't really presented as characters, more types and none of them very interesting except the young boy. And we don't really see enough of him.

The whole thing fails in pretty much every way possible for a doc like this. Unimpressive photography and obvious editing choices aren't even the real problem here. The problem is that the director just simply did not get a story out of the footage he was able to take. When you make an investigative documentary, one where the outcome isn't known, you have to be ready to admit to yourself when the events that have unfolded haven't come together at the end. Three of the four subjects completely fail in their attempts at acceptance to the monastery. The fourth, the little orphan boy who may be accepted someday is the only one of the four worth spending time with and you'd need a lot more time before there was a story there either.

When the director was asked what drew him to the subject, he said he graduated from film school and was looking for something to do. Maybe you need a better reason to make a film than that. I certainly needed more of one to enjoy it. -MP

Lymelife

I had high expectations going into this film that it just might be this year's American Beauty but when I arrived at the Ryerson I started to have my doubts. A good half of the upper balcony was empty and Alec Baldwin, one of Lymelife's stars who was in Toronto earlier in the day, was a no show at the screening. Never a good sign.

Well, Baldwin and the rest of the TIFF crowd sure missed a good one. While it wasn't quite on par with 1999's Academy Award winning film, it delivered a fresh take on the lives of two dis-functional suburban families living in early 1980s Long Island. Cue the checklist: Guns, drugs, fights, teen sex, infidelity and, uh, deer?

Rory Culkin was the revelation here. While performances from Timothy Hutton, Cynthia Nixon and older brother Kieran were all stellar, Rory scooped the most screen time and will likely win accolades for his nuanced and ultimately believable performance. -TS

Slumdog Millionaire

This is my favourite film I've seen at TIFF so far and has serious potential to be the most buzzed about indie flick that comes out this year. Even before the screening, the film was getting glowing reviews from its screening at Telluride with some calling it groudbreaking and earth-shattering.

Directed by Danny Boyle, Slumdog takes place in the slums and streets of Mumbai and centers around a former "slumdog" named Jamal who finds himself in an unlikely position to clean up on India's version of the game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.

Even with that as the central premise, this film is about way more than a gameshow and Boyle is the perfect director to take us on an illuminating and emotional ride. The packed house at the Ryerson gave him and the actors - all excellent - a well deserved standing ovation. -TS

Me and Orson Welles

I liked this film as much as I could probably have liked any period piece about the story of a high school kid and Orson Welles putting on a production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in 1930's Manhattan.

Directed by Richard Linklater, the film is well crafted although I found the ending a little heavy on the fromage. Christian McKay is the real relevation here and delivers an Oscar worthy performance as the mercurial and bombastic Welles. Almost so that Claire Danes and Zac Efron seem merely along for the ride.

Post screening, with a packed house at the Ryerson (again), the director and actors were subject to a somewhat embarrassing Q&A as teen girls insisted on asking Efron a series of lame questions (he replied with lame answers) and asked Danes to reminisce about her experience on My So Called Life. -TS

And that, folks, is how silly celebrity spotting has become. Do people really care how skinny someone is? Apparently, they do. Because of the lack of Oscar-buzzworthy films at TIFF this year, most of the festival-related headlines around the web have more to do with celeb lifestyle than with film. Sad.

Entertainment Weekly has gone so far as saying that the Academy Awards and the Toronto International Film Festival have officially broken up. Now, most people might think that's a bad thing, but I think, in the long run, the decreased focus on Hollywood flicks will be good for cinephiles who will have better access to smaller, independent and foreign films.

Looking for some more information about the festival today? Here are a few other TIFF headlines from around the web:

• Music and Musicians Play Major Role at Toronto Festival (NYT)
• Slumdog' leads the pack at Toronto Film Festival (CS-T)
• Toronto film festival is short on slam-dunk, breakaway movies (Detroit News)
• TIFF: The Toronto (semi-)international film festival (Globe & Mail)

The stars are out in full force in Toronto. If you're deciding to skip the films and check out the celebs, here's a list of who's expecting to be arriving in town today:

• Ethan Hawke
• Jim Sturgess
• Colin Farrell
• Edward Norton
• Steven Soderbergh
• Benicio del Toro

Finally, if you're looking to catch a screening some time today, here are three films that have been getting some good buzz but might have slipped under your radar. If you do decide to check any of them out, let us know what you think of them!

• Two-Legged Horse: A stunning film set in remote Afghanistan by a young filmmaker from a legendary film making family.
• Gigantic: Paul Dano falls for Zooey Deschanel in a awkward romantic film. Then again, who wouldn't fall for Zooey?
• Snow: Two widowed women bond in post-war Bosnia, full of affection, despair, and hope.

Happy festivaling! Keep checking blogTO over the next few days for continuous coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

(Photo: Still from Gigantic.)

Regardless, I've had good luck so far. Read further for mini-reviews of Treeless Mountain, All Around Us, and Sauna.

The method to my film-going madness this year has been random at best - I skimmed the program book and the website, trying to check out films that looked interesting, but since I'm a huge fan of rushing, it's all about timing. Of the films I've seen so far, the ones I'm recommending the highest are the South Korean film Treeless Mountain and Japanese film, All Around Us.

Highly Recommended

Treeless Mountain (dir So Yong Kim, South Korea):

The tone of South Korean feature Treeless Mountain has been compared to the outstanding film Nobody Knows and for good reason. The film follows Jin and her younger sister Bin, as their lives begin to reflect the fairy tales that young Bin is fond of, that is, a tragic Hans Christian Anderson-esque fairy tale tinged with disappointment and hardship but with a silver lining of hope.

We meet the girls just before Jin's mother makes the difficult decision to send the girls from their cramped urban apartment to live with their aunt in the slums, on the outskirts of the city, "just for a while". While their aunt is willing and well-meaning, she carries her own financial and personal troubles, leaving the girls alone to their own devices most of the day and unable to send them to school.

Much of the film follows the girls exploring their new terrain, and while they are very cute, the film is careful to shy away from moments that are too sentimental, tragic or saccharine, which kept the movie intimate yet grounded. Throughout the film, I was worried that director So Yong Kim would be unable to resist cliche, giving the film an undeserved and unrealistic happy ending, but she manages to keep the audience hopeful and invested to the conclusion. One of the best films I've seen at the festival in several years.

All Around Us (dir Ryosuke Hashiguchi, Japan):

All Around Us was one of the films where I was desperate to witness a Q and A session with the director after the film, but Hashiguchi fell ill before the festival and was unable to attend whatsoever. I found this to be quite a shame, as his film is so grand and emotional that it begged for a discussion period.

The film follows almost ten years in the lives of a young couple, Kanao and Shoko, from 1992 to 2001 - a timespan which follows them through illness (mental and physical), aimlessness, and heartache. One of my favourite thematic choices of the film was the marking of the passage of time in Japan through major crimes from those ten years. To facilitate this, the husband Kanao becomes a courtroom sketch artist, and at first is seemingly unaffected by the trials he starts to witness, but as his personal life becomes more complicated, we begin to see more compassion develop in him through these courtroom sequences.

But most of the character development in the film belongs to Tae Kimura, who portrays the wife Shoko. Shoko learns to make mistakes, that she doesn't have to be perfect, and to let go of her expectations of herself. Watching her develop from an over-scheduled and hyper-controlling wife (she has their sex life planned in a calendar!) to an artist discovering her abilities is quite rewarding and resonates strongly, I believe, as a comment on Japanese societal expectations.

Worth Seeing

Sauna (dir Antti-Jussi Annila, Finland):

It seems that I'm continually disappointed by films like Sauna, that is, films that just ooze atmosphere and tension with excellent character choices and plotlines... which soon disintegrate into cliche and absurdity.

In the case of Sauna, the film has a great start; brothers Knut and Erik who are as similar as night and day both play a part in an unwarranted act of violence which Knut can't atone for and Erik could care less about. You see, the men are nearing the end of an arduous mapping expedition concerning Russian and Swedish borders which has been difficult considering the tensions between the religions on both sides. As they try to forget their crime and continue on their journey, it takes a turn for the weird when the team discovers an unmapped village, unclaimed by either country, in the middle of the swamp.

But just when the village mystery becomes interesting, the film bites off more than it can chew and relies too heavily on overused ghost imagery, creating 'scare' sequences that could be from a number of lookalike Japanese horror films like Ringu, One Missed Call or the Grudge. While Ville Virtanen tries very hard to play the complex character of Erik, a former soldier and mercenary, he can't make up for the ridiculous conclusion to an otherwise very tense and atmospheric film. Maybe on DVD, but don't pay $20 for this.

Check back for more TIFF reviews later in the week for reviews of Daytime Drinking, Firaaq (hopefully!) JCVD, The Paranoids and more...

Images: All Around Us, Treeless Mountain, All Around Us, Sauna, from TIFFG. Lead photo from sjgardiner in the blogTO Flickr pool.

I'm no mathematician, but his idea seemed like another way to highlight American dominance and show how Canada was underperforming, until I realized that in his model, countries like Canada and Germany actually shine based on the business they've been doing at TIFF this year. Look out for France to make a late charge.

Speaking of the CFC barbecue, Culture Minister Aileen Carroll took her opportunity to speak at the event to announce an additional $2.5million in funding for the Canadian Film Centre. She went on to say that, "The entertainment industry is an important part of Ontario's economy. By supporting the development of our best creative talent, we help strengthen Ontario's position in the rapidly growing cultural industries."

Finally, in my effort to remain a somewhat objective reporter, I will refrain from talking about Ann Hathaway — one of my celebrity crushes — and her appearance on the TIFF red carpet yesterday. Instead, I'll talk about how silly Paris Hilton is for cancelling two screenings of her documentary at TIFF because she wants to create "more hype" for the film.

I don't know if she realizes that she'll get better "hype' and word-of-mouth if people actually get the chance to watch the fim.

Looking for some more information about the festival today? Here are a few other TIFF headlines from around the web:

• Toronto sellers hope distribs stock up (Variety)
• Toronto Film Buyers See the Light (THR)
• Toronto: Gifting Grows (The Circuit)
• Unexpected connections liven up Toronto International Film Festival (Dallas News)

The stars are out in full force in Toronto. If you're deciding to skip the films and check out the celebs, here's a list of who's expecting to be arriving in town today:

• Paul Dano
• Zooey Deschanel
• Alec Baldwin
• Sir Ben Kingsley

Finally, if you're looking to catch a screening some time today, here are three films that have been getting some good buzz but might have slipped under your radar. If you do decide to check any of them out, let us know what you think of them!

• Still Walking: A family drama reminiscent of the great Tokyo Story, but fresher.
• New York, I Love You: Paris, Je T'aime, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.
• Tulpan: A real Kazakhstani love story, not at all like Borat.

Happy festivaling! Keep checking blogTO over the next few days for continuous coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

(Photo: Still from New York, I Love You.)

Special guest critic Matthew Price chimes in once again with his amazing reviews. This time, he takes a look at A Film With Me In It, It Might Get Loud, Vinyan, and Religulous.

A Film With Me In It

AFWMII is as high concept as they come, but works brilliantly to spin the fear of the unemployed actor into Weekend at Bernie's if Samuel Beckett did a script polish.

Mark is the unemployed actor, and he and his neighbour Pierce are both a few months behind on their rent to Jack, the world's least likeable landlord. They're trying to get a script together for Mark to star in, and Mark is also trying to keep his relationship from completely falling apart and take care of his severely handicapped brother. Pierce is just trying to get through twin alcohol and gambling addictions while not making too big an impact on life. So all told a fairly typical pair of Irishmen.

This would be more than enough for a respectable slice of life story, a kind of likeable slacker tour through Full Monty country. So it was a nice surprise to find out that we were leaving the tour and heading straight into a Danny De Vito world of very black comedy indeed.

Mark's apartment needs a lot of fixing, and once the shelf falls off the wall and onto the dog it's a fairly linear ride to several dead bodies and Mark and Pierce having some pretty serious 'splaining to do.

Mark is essentially playing himself, and both he and Dylan Moran's Pierce have great chemistry as they wrestle with events much much bigger than themselves. The darker the action gets, the more deadpan they play it and the more outlandish it gets the more believable it all seems.

AFWMII never tries too hard and walks the fine line of it's depressed Irish humour better than most.

It Might Get Loud

Jimmy Page, The Edge and Jack White get together to talk electric guitars in this music geek out documentary from director Davis Guggenheim. That's pretty much the whole movie, with 3 of the greatest guitarists ever to populate the planet discussing music and the creative process and how much they love their instruments. And it's waaaay more than enough for us.

Credit goes to director Guggenheim for opening up the idea with side trips into each individual's world. Jack shows us how to build a guitar out of a two by four, Edge takes us to the beach house where War was recorded and Page plays us his favourite records. All of which just set the landscape fir the main event yet to come.

At one point midway through, the three of them start to play together and I got an honest to goodness lump in my throat just watching it all happen. The sheer weight of the creative accomplishments of all of them almost overwhelms the entire movie and had me thinking supergroup through the rest of the proceedings. Music documentary is a kind of endless fascination because of the sideroads you can travel down. It can be history, it can be art, it can be the creative process and It Might Get Loud delivers on all three. If there's a rock junkie in your house, your holiday shopping is officially concluded.

Vinyan

Vinyan sells itself as a Heart of Darkness journey with a lost child at the end of the ride. After Calvaire played midnight madness a couple of years ago, director Fabrice Du Welz returns with another tale of people lost in dangerous surroundings.

Pretty couple Paul (Rufus Sewell) and Jeanne (Emannuelle Béart) are living in a Thai beach paradise and attend a tony fundraiser, but something is wrong as Jeanne seems particularly affected by a young child at the party. It becomes clear that they have lost their own young child, recently, when Jeanne thinks she sees him in an aid video shown to raise money for those trapped inside the Burmese border.

They inevitably go off to search for their lost son, and things go inevitably wrong, and there you have the movie. After ten minutes I stopped caring about whether or not they were going to find their little boy. After twenty minutes I was hoping for one of them to get bitten by a snake.

The two leads actually have no discernable chemistry and are unable to even be convincing as distraught parents. There isn't a moment in this film where I buy that they even had a son, or in fact have ever interacted with children at any time. In order for the story to get them where it needs to go the decisions they make are what can charitably be described as retarded.

It's a shame too because as a director Du Welz has some pretty great ideas about the use of subjective camera and is a fluid and capable storyteller on a technical level. The film has some interesting points to make about the thin veneer of society being so easily stripped away. Too bad it's all hung around the necks of two people no one could give a crap about.

Religulous

Here's a little comedy premise: Religion ought to be gotten rid of, as it stands directly in the way of rational problem solving about the pressing questions of our age. Yup, let's get ready to laugh!

As you may be aware this is in fact exactly what comedian Bill Maher sets out to prove in his essay film collaboration with Larry Charles. Does he prove it? Does it matter? Maher is certainly game to try as he takes the argument to religious fundamentalists of every stripe and meets their illogic head on. Obviously this kind of movie rises and falls on the strength of these encounters, and Maher is more than up to the task.

The movie's an entertaining and well paced look at the sheer frustrating kookiness of the true believers and it makes its points in a convincing fashion. Maher doesn't get to every facet of religion (moderates are of course excluded) but overall this is a convincingly sound attempt to cut a swath through the nonsense surrounding intelligent attempts to deal with some very real problems affecting our continued existence on this planet. Told you it was funny.

(Religulous screening photo by Matt Price.)

In town to promote the More Than A Game — a film that tracks the trials, challenges, and successes of a high school basketball team from Akron, Ohio, and which also happens to be the team where LeBron James first received national attention before his NBA stint — James took some time out to host a slam dunk exhibition in Dundas Square before Youssou Ndour's performance.

While everyone loves a slam dunk expo, the movie itself was actually pretty good, garnering a standing ovation from the crowd and causing LeBron James himself to greet the audience in tears.

Looking for some more information about the festival today? Here are a few other TIFF headlines from around the web:

• Toronto Film Festival vs. Brangelina - Who Gets the Spotlight? (eFlux)
• A pair of Coens might as well be one at Toronto (Reuters)
• Brad Pitt rocks to Madonna (FOX)
• Oscar Buzz for Hathaway (TO Sun)
• Zellweger shakes up the old west (CTV)
• The Lighter Side of TIFF (National Post)

The stars are out in full force in Toronto. If you're deciding to skip the films and check out the celebs, here's a list of who's expecting to be arriving in town today:

• Emma Roberts
• Jill Hennessy
• Alan Alda
• Kate Beckinsale
• Joshua Jackson
• Liam Neeson
• Antonio Banderas
• Akshay Kumar
• Jessica Biel
• Charlie Kaufman
• Phillip Seymour Hoffman
• Catherine Keener
• Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Finally, if you're looking to catch a screening some time today, here are three films that have been getting some good buzz but might have slipped under your radar. If you do decide to check any of them out, let us know what you think of them!

• The Real Shaolin: Learning to be a kung fu master, one step at a time.
• Domovoy: Writers and assassins work together sometimes, sometimes not.
• Gomorra: Probing the depths of an Italian mafia organization.

Happy festivaling! Keep checking blogTO over the next few days for continuous coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival.

(Photo: Still from Domovoy.)

Programmer Colin Geddes has been calling Wednesday night's Martyrs "one of the most controversial titles in the history of Midnight Madness," but it was this evening's Deadgirl that had the most on-the-ground buzz for its queasy, I-don't-know-if-I-want-to-see-that subject matter. Hardly surprising: the film's potentially awesome, potentially awful, definitely troubling premise concerns two teenage boys who discover the body of a dead, naked girl... and proceed to "take advantage of the situation."

The good news is that it becomes almost immediately apparent that "Deadgirl" ain't dead, so strike those necrophilia concerns out of your mind. The bad news, though, is that with Deadgirl alive and unwilling, this movie revolves around rape - lots of it, and usually (!) played for gags.

It's a vile piece of work. As with anything, the point need not be what you're using but how you're using it, meaning that if all of this had been in service of a really well-developed (if bent) coming-of-age story for the lead characters, or if the thematic underscore had skewed towards a metaphor about the truly monstrous lusts of the average American teenage male, then maybe we'd have something here.

But we don't. Deadgirl plays like amateurs playing dressup, brash up-and-comers with a terroristic ability to think up a nasty scenario, but no artistic ability to take it anywhere, even down the well-trod road of straight shock-n'-shlock. In the end, the initial qualms were justified: this flick is just gross.

Coming up at midnight: Sunday night sees the premiere of Not Quite Hollywood, a documentary about Australia's oft-overlooked exploitation craze of the 1970s and 1980s. The down-under flavour continues on Monday night with Jon Hewitt's Acolytes, an Aussie fright flick that mirrors Deadgirl when some high school kids stumble upon a corpse. (This time, the corpse is both clothed, and Canadian.) Then, on Tuesday night, comes period western horror flick The Burrowers, which I am really looking forward to - the old west is a terrific, and largely underused, goldmine for scary stories in the night.