By Jim Slotek, Thom Ernst, Karen Gordon, Kim Hughes, John Kirk, Liam Lacey and Bonnie Laufer

So… did you survive the weekend? Excellent! Us too.

The Toronto International Film Festival continues apace until September 18 with countless titles spread across multiple programs. Original-Cin writers are previewing as many films as possible to help you better strategize.

Check out our TIFF preview piece and watch for incoming ephemera such as interviews. Note that because of TIFF embargoes, our capsule reviews are tied to a film’s second public screening, not its first.

752 Is Not a Number (TIFF Docs)

Sat, Sept. 17, 12:50 pm, Scotiabank 3.

Processing grief is hard enough. But processing the grief of senseless murder committed in the name of war games is almost unimaginable. That’s the narrative heart of filmmaker Babak Payami’s documentary, which follows Ontario dentist Hamed Esmaeilion as he attempts to collect the remains of wife Parisa and nine-year-old daughter Reera, who died when the Iranian military senselessly shot down Ukrainian airliner 752 in January 2000 as it left Tehran, killing all 176 passengers and crew. The Iranian government’s response to that calamity was suitably dire: while they denied involvement and obfuscated international investigation, looters were permitted access to the unsecured site. Then the war in Ukraine happened. Payami, who became deeply entrenched in Esmaeilion’s battles while making the film, tells this story with great compassion. It’s a tough watch, and arguably overlong, but it’s also a beacon in an otherwise relentlessly grim story for which no on will be held accountable. KH

A Jazzman’s Blues (Gala Presentations)

Mon, Sept. 12, 12:30 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 3; Sun, Sept. 18, 9 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 3.

Written, produced, and directed by Tyler Perry, A Jazzman’s Blues is like nothing we’ve seen from the filmmaker, who wrote the screenplay over 25 years ago. Sensitive, sweeping, and heartbreaking, the film starts off in 1987 with a stack of letters delivered to a state’s Attorney General. Upon reading the letters, he gets swept up in the forbidden love story of Bayou and Leanne which began in 1947. Leanne’s despicable mother forbids their love and moves her daughter away to find a better life, or more specifically a rich suitor. Bayou is devastated but writes Leanne letters every day in hopes that they will reach her. Many years later Bayou’s incredible singing talent lands him a gig at the most prestigious club in Chicago but finally meeting up again with his one true love only brings more sadness and tragedy. Newcomers Joshua Boone and Solea Pfeiffer are revelations to watch on screen; I was mesmerized by their chemistry. Kudos also to actress Amirah Vann who plays Bayou’s jazz-singing mother. Plus, A Jazzman’s Blues features songs by the great Terence Blanchard, choreography by Debbie Allen, and music composed by Aaron Zigman. If Perry keeps making more movies like this, some well-deserved awards will come his way. BL

The Eternal Daughter (Special Presentations)

Mon, Sept. 12, 3 pm Scotiabank 2; Thurs, Sept. 15. 5:30 pm, Scotiabank 1; Sun Sept. 18, 1 pm, Scotiabank 1.

Writer-director Joanna Hogg again teams with actor Tilda Swinton for a wonderfully engaging, offbeat, and quiet movie that plays a bit like a gothic ghost story with Hitchcockian overtones that subtly shifts gears a few times before it reveals its hand. Swinton plays Julie, a filmmaker who has brought her gracious, elderly mother, Rosalind (also played by Swinton) and their adorable dog Louis to spend time at an old manor house-turned-hotel. Julie plans to spend her days developing a new film project, while her mother sorts through a bag of her memorabilia. They’ll celebrate Rosalind’s birthday there as well. As the taxi takes them through the fog-shrouded night to the hotel, the driver tells the women that some locals believe the place is haunted, and a face has been seen looking out a window at night. Indeed, the hotel, which seems to have no other guests, is perpetually surrounded by that blanket of fog. At night, it bangs and shudders, keeping Julie awake and off balance. She can’t seem to get going on her new project. On top of it, her mother spent part of her childhood at the manor when it was an aunt’s home, and as Julie draws out her mother’s memories, she discovers that they were not all happy. Julie is genuinely upset at her mother’s distress. Hogg is driving at several things here — memory, family, storytelling, filmmaking — and with a tour-de-force performance by Swinton, she weaves a delicate, fascinating web. KG

Living (Contemporary World Cinema)

Mon, Sept 12. 6:30 pm, Scotiabank 2; Fri, Sept. 16, 12 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2.

Both minimal and memorable, director Oliver Hermanus’s British-based take on Akira Kurosawa’s Ikiru (with a script by author Kazuo Ishiguro) suggests that officious devotion to duty and a rigid class system are things the English and Japanese share. Set in 1950s London (and beautifully shot to reflect same), it stars Bill Nighy as Mr. Williams, a dour, hat-and-suited district bureaucrat surrounded by underlings who follow his leaden lead. That is, until a terminal cancer diagnosis makes him reassess his life. But Nighy’s laconic Williams takes baby steps to seize the day, including a rare bender, the friendship of a vivacious former employee (Aimee Lou Wood), and finally, a small, passionate fight on behalf of a working-class neighbourhood. A quietly triumphant tale. JS

My Policeman (Special Presentations)

Mon, Sept. 12, 12 pm, Scotiabank 1; Fri, Sept. 16, 2 pm, Visa Screening Room at the Princess of Wales Theatre; Sat, Sept. 17, 1:30, Royal Alexandra Theatre.

Based on a novel by Bethan Roberts, My Policeman is a mid-level British melodrama about the consequences borne by individuals in an era when homosexuality was a crime. In the late 1950s Marion (Emma Corrin) falls for the handsome Tom (Harry Styles), who is studying to be a police officer. They meet Patrick (David Dawson), a curator at a local museum, who invites them on a private tour and becomes part of their circle. Marion and Tom marry, but what she doesn’t know, or prefers not to see, is the relationship between the two men. The film jumps back and forth between the 1950s and present day when the retired Marion (Gina McKee) cares for Patrick (Rupert Everett) after he’s had a stroke and Tom (Linus Roache) refuses to go near him. We learn why as the film jumps back in time. The results are mixed. To its credit, My Policeman does get across the awful tragedy of lovers who weren’t able to be true to themselves, and the damage that caused to these three characters, representative of generations who couldn’t live freely. But that’s an intellectual understanding. The film never goes deep enough on an emotional level, and instead feels detached and cliché. KG

Something You Said Last Night (Discovery)

Tues, Sept. 13. 7:30 pm, Scotiabank 2.

In her feature directorial debut, Luis De Filippis brings us the ultimate (and very relatable) summer story about twenty-something Ren (Carmen Madonia) and her younger sister Siena (Paige Evans) who reluctantly accompany their parents on a family vacation. For the most part the girls are pretty bored, trying to fill their days by the water, taking naps, and eating home-cooked meals made by their Italian mom. Tensions run high when Siena disappears for hours on end, not texting mom to let her know that she is safe. Fights aplenty erupt. What stands out in this touching film is that Ren is transgender and it is not an issue. Although you clearly see Ren’s discomfort, she is truly loved and accepted by her devoted family, in particular her loving father. Something You Said Last Night is a sweet film that will inevitably move everyone who watches it. BL

The Swearing Jar (Contemporary World Cinema)

Thu, Sept. 15, 4 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 2.

The Swearing Jar is a tender film about love, loss and what if? Directed by Lindsay MacKay, whose debut Wet Bum premiered at TIFF in 2014, the film introduces us to singer-songwriter Carey (Adelaide Clemens) and her very handsome husband Simon (Patrick J. Adams). The couple is madly in love, but each has a secret. Adelaide, who is pregnant, is rife with mood swings, and Simon — who is sweet, loving, and attentive — is dealing with something major that he keeps to himself. Australian actress Clemens holds this fraught love story together. Not only does she truly love her husband but has misguided feelings when she meets Owen, a clerk at the local bookstore whom she finds herself very attracted to. Kathleen Turner is wonderful if fleetingly on screen as Simon’s mother. While the different timelines might seem confusing at first, stick with it as the film takes a very sharp turn about halfway through that definitely makes you want to stick around to the end. BL

Victim (Contemporary World Cinema)

Mon, Sept. 12, Scotiabank 11, 11:35 am.

A sturdy social-message drama from Czech director Michael Blasko, which debuted at the Venice Film Festival, Victim is essentially a reworking of Aesop’s tale of the boy who cried wolf. Irina (a very good Vita Smachelyuk) is a Ukrainian immigrant and beleaguered single mother toiling as a housecleaner in a small Czech town. As the film begins, she is returning from a trip to her homeland to secure documents when she learns that her teenaged son, Igor, who she left alone in the apartment, has been found unconscious, apparently the victim of a vicious beating. Suspicion falls on the sons of Irina’s troublesome Roma neighbours who live in her apartment complex. As Irina begins to learn what happened to Igor, local demagogues and the media use the momentum of public outrage for their own ends. While this plays out in predictable fashion, the film brings fresh empathy for the vulnerability of immigrants who above all do not want to be noticed. LL

We Are Still Here (Contemporary World Cinema)

Wed, Sept. 14, 8:30 pm, Scotiabank 4; Thu, Sept. 15, 10 am, digital TIFF Bell Lightbox; Sun, Sept. 18, 3:35 pm, Scotiabank 11.

Created to mark the 250th anniversary of Captain James Cook’s arrival in the South Pacific, We Are Still Here brings together 10 Indigenous filmmakers from Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific islands to create this lively anthology of stories spanning the past, present and future, linked by the continuity of anti-colonial resistance. An introductory segment, using the quasi-animation style of Rotoscope, features a mother and daughter fishing, when they are interrupted by a giant European ship. The fishing sequence returns, joining the other stories, which intertwine throughout the running time.

The strongest sequence is a dramatic re-enactment of a Maori community debating whether or not to join the 1864 Battle of Orakau, during a major colonial invasion into Maori land by colonial forces. Another 19th century tale is a kind of ghost story, in which a white man is led by an Indigenous man to a grisly revelation. In the First World War fields of Galipoli, there’s an unexpectedly light encounter between a Samoan soldier and his Turkish counterpart. A jump two centuries in the future sees the ravages of climate change; a jump back a year takes us to the 2021 Invasion Day protest in Melbourne. In the most light-hearted piece, a persistent Aboriginal man, infatuated with a local store clerk in a bottle shop, must work around a racist cop. “Sorry you had to go through that yesterday,” the clerk consoles him. “And the day before that. And the day before that.” LL

TIFF ’22: What To See at This Year’s Fest, Round 4

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