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

We’re now at the halfway point of the Toronto International Film Festival. Seen anything amazing? Perhaps based on one of our discerning reviews? We sure hope so. Original-Cin writers continue viewing what’s on offer to help you maximize your TIFF experience. And away we go again.

Evil Does Not Exist (Special Presentations)

Tues, Sept 12. 3:30 pm, TIFF Bell Lightbox 1; Wed, Sept. 13, 4:30 pm, Scotiabank 12; Sun, Sept. 17, 2 pm, Scotiabank 12.

Japanese director Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s follow-up to his internationally acclaimed and Oscar-winning Drive My Car is an enigmatic, genre-shifting film. Takumi, a man of few words, lives with his eight-year-old daughter Hana in a small rural community a few hours drive from Tokyo. It has pristine water and a beautiful forest. Takumi is very connected with the natural world and is passing that on to Hana. When consultants for a Tokyo business hold an information session in the town, to show the locals plans for a “glamping resort” they’re planning to build, Takumi and his fellow citizens poke so many holes in the proposal that the agents are left speechless. For a while the movie seems to shift from a quiet rural story to a kind of modern version of Local Hero, but then why the ominous soundtrack music? Hamaguchi is a master of character and mood, and he deploys both here to an ending that will have audiences debating. But not juries: this past weekend, the film was awarded the Silver Bear at the Venice Film Festival. KG

Fitting In (Centrepiece)

Tues, Sept. 12, 11:30 am TIFF Bell Lightbox 2.

Molly McGlynn’s follow up to the acclaimed Mary Goes Round is a surprisingly humour-driven take on a teen trauma, which opens with a line from Simone de Beauvoir: “The body is not a thing, it’s a situation.” The situation here is that Lindy (Maddie Ziegler) is considering sex with her boyfriend, (D’Pharoah Woon-A-Tai), and a gynecological exam reveals a rare condition that precludes her having children, making sex all but impossible. Despite the inevitable life lessons, what could be merely teen soap is leavened with why-me? sarcasm and angst-driven misadventure. Emily Hampshire is also a welcome addition to the mix as Lindy’s still-learning single mom. JS

Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person (Centrepiece)

Tues, Sept 12, 4:00 p.m. TIFF Bell Lightbox

Quebec director Ariane Louis-Seize won the Director’s Award at the Venice FIlm Festival for this quirky, teen movie that slightly plays with the vampire canon. She’s created a loving vampire family in Quebec that is trying to graduate their teenaged daughter Sasha, (wonderfully played by Sara Montpetit), from blood packs to hunting her own dinner, now that she’s reached an age where her fangs have come in. This appalls her, and she refuses, (not to mention that her fangs don’t seem to come in unless she’s feeling protective towards someone she likes). So they send her to her cousin who pledges tough love to teach her the ropes. At the same time, Sasha meets the morose and possibly suicidal Paul (Félix-Antoine Bénard). They end up hanging out while she tries to work up the will to drink his blood, which he soundly endorses. Sounds dark, and as you can tell by the title, the film touches on some difficult subjects. But Louis-Seize understands teen angst and finds a wonderful way through. Overall, the film is darkly funny, and in it’s gothy way, quite sweet. KG

Next Goal Wins (Special Presentations)

Tues, Sept. 12, 6:30 pm, Visa Screening Room at the Princess of Wales Theatre; Thurs, Sept 14. 5:30 pm, Royal Alexandra Theatre.

The newest crowd-pleaser from Taika Waititi is based on the real story of the American Samoa soccer team. But it also seems to be built on the question: What if Ted Lasso were an asshole? In 2011, following 38 consecutive losses — including a record-breaking 31-0 match against Australia in 2001 — the team hired a new manager (a mildly miscast Michael Fassbender) to turn their fortunes around. One problem: he might be even worse as a manager than they are as players. Unless... he can heal whatever it is that’s hurting his heart? No points for guessing his tragic backstory; everything about Next Goal Wins is telescoped and by-the-numbers, making it funny but not particularly fresh or inventive. Great work by newcomer Kaimana, however, playing a transgender member of the team. CK

Shame on Dry Land (Platform)

Tues, Sept. 12, 2:45 pm, Scotiabank 3; Sat, Sept. 16, 9:15 pm, Scotiabank 10.

‘What happens in Malta stays in Malta’ might be the tagline for director Axel Petersén’s fabulous thriller, which follows a group wealthy Swedes on the perennially sunny island nation in Southern Europe. When a penitent former fraudster turns up to apologize to his embittered onetime partner, whom he left high and dry in a scam — and who is about to be married — he sets in motion a domino effect that will impact almost everyone in the tightknit expat community, largely not for the better. A skronking, twitchy score by Baba Stiltz ratchets up the tension as hidden agendas are exposed. Saying anything else would spoil the fun. KH

Sorry/Not Sorry (TIFF Docs)

Tues, Sept. 12, 7:35 pm, Scotiabank 11; Sun, Sept. 17, 2:45 pm, Scotiabank 5.

In a full circle, this documentary on the history of comedian Louis C.K.’s sexual misbehavior opens six years to the day after I Love You Daddy, what was meant to be his big break as a Hollywood director, opened at TIFF and was never seen again. Directors Caroline Suh and Cara Mones are smart enough to focus this cautionary tale directly on the stand-up comedy world, and devote more time to the people who were complicit in shutting down the talk (Canada’s Just For Laughs festival comes off particularly badly) than to the offender. But veteran comedians like Jen Kirkman can trace the comic’s “ask” to masturbate in front of them back to the turn of the century. That’s a long time to cover for someone who would quickly be directed to psychiatric help in any other line of work. The movie also asks how real cancel culture is, given that C.K. has won a Grammy and played Madison Square Garden since, while at least one of the whistleblowers hasn’t been hired to perform for a year. A doc with a lot to unpack about the boy’s club of comedy. JS

Tautuktavuk (What We See) (Discovery)

Tues, Sept. 12, 12:15 pm, Scotiabank 10.

The most famous image in Inuit cinema, at least since Robert Flaherty’s Nanook of the North, is that of a naked man running in the snow in Zacharias Kunuk’s 2001 modern classic, Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner. That image is echoed in a recurrent scene in Tautuktavuk (What We See) as a woman, in shorts and a T-shirt, runs barefoot through the snow, fleeing domestic violence. The film Tautuktavuk was co-directed and stars Carol Kunnuk and Lucy Tulugarjuk as two sisters, one in Montreal and one in Nunavut, communicating by video during the COVID lockdown, and revisiting family traumas. Formally, the film breaks conventions, shifting back and forth between fiction and documentary, as we see scenes of daily life during the pandemic in a portrait of a community working to forgive and heal. LL

Read our interview with Tautuktavuk (What We See) co-director Lucy Tulugarjuk

The Holdovers (Special Presentations)

Tues, Sept. 12, 12 pm, Visa Screening Room at the Princess of Wales Theatre.

Sweet, funny, touching and at times tearjerking, Alexander Payne’s period piece focuses on the relationship between Professor Hunham (Paul Giamatti), an irascible teacher at a snobby New England private school in 1970, and a smart but troubled and abrasive student (Dominic Sessa), a tale of wounded people teaching each other to carry on. It’s Christmas, and one teacher must remain to care for the one student that ends up not going home. Keeping them fed is the kitchen manager Mary (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) who remains at the school, whisky bottle in hand, to avoid dealing with the recent loss of her son in Vietnam. Not dissimilar to other films in the teacher/student genre, but with funnier lines than most, and most of them Giamatti’s, as when he refers to his pampered students as “rancid Philistines.” JS

Walls (TIFF Docs)

Tues, Sept. 12, 3:45 pm, Scotiabank 9.

Last year, Poland built a huge wall on its border with Belarus, after the Belarusian dictator offered refugees free passage into his country, knowing they would use it as an entry point into the EU. Polish-born actor (and now first-time director) Kasia Smutniak decided to explore the situation, mostly by connecting with humanitarian groups who were trying to help refugees stranded in the “red zone” between two countries, neither of which wanted them. Her resulting documentary, while personal and emotional, could use a little more background for those unfamiliar with the crisis. Coincidentally, TIFF this year also plays host to the North American premiere of Green Border, Agnieszka Holland’s fictionalized take on the same topic. CK

We Grown Now (Centerpiece, TIFF Next Wave Selects)

Tues, Sept. 12, 9:30 pm, Scotiabank 4; Sat. Sept. 16, 12:45 pm, Scotiabank 9.

In We Grown Now, two nine-year-old boys discover the joys and hardships of growing up in Chicago’s sprawling Cabrini-Green public housing complex in the early 90s. Malik and Eric experience the joys and tribulations of childhood in the aftermath of a fatal shooting of a seven-year old boy which impacts them, their families, and their entire community. Written and directed by native Chicagoan Minhal Baig, the film is grounded by solid performances but is carried by newcomers Blake Cameron James and Gian Knight Ramirez whose resilience and vulnerability are clear. BL

Yellow Bus (Discovery)

Tues, Sept. 12, 6 pm, Scotiabank 13.

When their daughter is forgotten on a school bus and dies in the heat, devastated parents Ananda (Tannishtha Chatterjee) and Gagan (Amit Sial) are left to cope on their own, far from home. Ananda questions the truth about what they’re told regarding the incident; as their family falls apart she and Gagan both question their decision to leave India for a better life in the Arabian Gulf. Heartbreaking tale of tragedy and cultural displacement is a feature directorial debut from Wendy Bednarz. LB

TIFF ’23: What To See at This Year’s Fest, Sept. 12

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