A couple of TIFF & Normal related articles
Both from Playback Magazine.
1. Hot tips from a programmer's notebook
Normal (Carl Bessai): This film is a leap forward for Bessai as well. A really smart piece about people dealing with the death of a teenage boy. Very intense and beautifully shot. Very assured. It might be his best film.
2. From gun addiction to gay hockey players
The eight Canadian films in Contemporary World Cinema are all looking for international distribution, with subject matter ranging wildly from gun addiction to gay ex-hockey players.
"Stylistically, the Canadian films are all over the place," says Canadian programmer Steve Gravestock. "There's the cultural satire of Bruce Sweeney's American Venus, or the pothead-fueled comedy of Allan Moyle's Weirdsville and the really straight-up, intense drama of Bernard Émond's Contre toute espérance (Summit Circle)."
Émond's Summit Circle focuses on a destitute switchboard operator (Guylaine Tremblay) who loses her job as her husband becomes increasingly ill. She refuses to give up hope.
The film was in the international competition section of Locarno prior to TIFF and will next open commercially in Quebec. Seville Pictures has worldwide distribution rights, but Émond states there are no plans yet for a release in English Canada.
"If distribution is going to happen in English Canada, it's going to happen as a consequence of TIFF," says Émond.
Normal director Carl Bessai also sees TIFF as a crucial stepping stone for international distribution for his drama about dysfunctional families (Mongrel is the Canadian distributor).
The $2.5-million film is based on a script by Travis McDonald exploring how different people are affected when a young boy is killed. The intersecting narrative centers on the dead boy's mother (Carrie-Anne Moss), his best friend Jordie (Kevin Segers) and literature professor Walt (Callum Keith Rennie).
Normal could hit the theaters as early as November, but Bessai says: "Mongrel wants to wait to see how the press receives the film in Toronto and what the audiences are like - to get a sense of how they can position it."
The film's producer, Brightlight Pictures partner Stephen Hegyes, is looking for international sales at the festival (see story, opposite).
Helmer Laurie Lynd says the story is much the same for Breakfast with Scot, and that Canadian distributor Mongrel will plan a theatrical release based on the response at TIFF.
Breakfast with Scot is the story of a gay couple forced to become parents. And although it's adapted from a book by U.S. writer Michael Downing, Lynd says he's Canadianized the $3.5-million flick by using an ex-hockey player (instead of a struggling photographer) and changing the backdrop from Boston to Toronto.
The ex-Toronto Maple Leaf-turned-sportscaster (Tom Cavanagh) and his better-half, a lawyer (Ben Shenkman), unwittingly become the guardians of a sissy boy (Noah Bernett).
Breakfast with Scot has been endorsed by both the NHL and the Leafs, and the director is expecting both these parties to have a "presence at the Toronto screening" to help promote it.
MORE CANADIAN FILMS IN CONTEMPORARY WORLD CINEMA
Leonard Farlinger's All Hat is a film noir about an ex-con (Luke Kirby) who returns to rural Ontario and tries to stop a wealthy thoroughbred owner from turning the farmland into a casino and golf resort.
Denis Côté's Nos vies privées (Our Private Lives) is shot almost entirely in Bulgarian and is about a couple communicating over the Internet that decides to meet in person.
Allan Moyle's Weirdsville, a pothead-fueled comedy, opens with two junkies trying to bury a corpse at a drive-in theater. It stars Taryn Manning, Wes Bentley and Scott Speedman
Bruce Sweeney's American Venus is described by the director as a film about "motherhood, anxiety and guns." It stars Rebecca De Mornay.
1. Hot tips from a programmer's notebook
Normal (Carl Bessai): This film is a leap forward for Bessai as well. A really smart piece about people dealing with the death of a teenage boy. Very intense and beautifully shot. Very assured. It might be his best film.
2. From gun addiction to gay hockey players
The eight Canadian films in Contemporary World Cinema are all looking for international distribution, with subject matter ranging wildly from gun addiction to gay ex-hockey players.
"Stylistically, the Canadian films are all over the place," says Canadian programmer Steve Gravestock. "There's the cultural satire of Bruce Sweeney's American Venus, or the pothead-fueled comedy of Allan Moyle's Weirdsville and the really straight-up, intense drama of Bernard Émond's Contre toute espérance (Summit Circle)."
Émond's Summit Circle focuses on a destitute switchboard operator (Guylaine Tremblay) who loses her job as her husband becomes increasingly ill. She refuses to give up hope.
The film was in the international competition section of Locarno prior to TIFF and will next open commercially in Quebec. Seville Pictures has worldwide distribution rights, but Émond states there are no plans yet for a release in English Canada.
"If distribution is going to happen in English Canada, it's going to happen as a consequence of TIFF," says Émond.
Normal director Carl Bessai also sees TIFF as a crucial stepping stone for international distribution for his drama about dysfunctional families (Mongrel is the Canadian distributor).
The $2.5-million film is based on a script by Travis McDonald exploring how different people are affected when a young boy is killed. The intersecting narrative centers on the dead boy's mother (Carrie-Anne Moss), his best friend Jordie (Kevin Segers) and literature professor Walt (Callum Keith Rennie).
Normal could hit the theaters as early as November, but Bessai says: "Mongrel wants to wait to see how the press receives the film in Toronto and what the audiences are like - to get a sense of how they can position it."
The film's producer, Brightlight Pictures partner Stephen Hegyes, is looking for international sales at the festival (see story, opposite).
Helmer Laurie Lynd says the story is much the same for Breakfast with Scot, and that Canadian distributor Mongrel will plan a theatrical release based on the response at TIFF.
Breakfast with Scot is the story of a gay couple forced to become parents. And although it's adapted from a book by U.S. writer Michael Downing, Lynd says he's Canadianized the $3.5-million flick by using an ex-hockey player (instead of a struggling photographer) and changing the backdrop from Boston to Toronto.
The ex-Toronto Maple Leaf-turned-sportscaster (Tom Cavanagh) and his better-half, a lawyer (Ben Shenkman), unwittingly become the guardians of a sissy boy (Noah Bernett).
Breakfast with Scot has been endorsed by both the NHL and the Leafs, and the director is expecting both these parties to have a "presence at the Toronto screening" to help promote it.
MORE CANADIAN FILMS IN CONTEMPORARY WORLD CINEMA
Leonard Farlinger's All Hat is a film noir about an ex-con (Luke Kirby) who returns to rural Ontario and tries to stop a wealthy thoroughbred owner from turning the farmland into a casino and golf resort.
Denis Côté's Nos vies privées (Our Private Lives) is shot almost entirely in Bulgarian and is about a couple communicating over the Internet that decides to meet in person.
Allan Moyle's Weirdsville, a pothead-fueled comedy, opens with two junkies trying to bury a corpse at a drive-in theater. It stars Taryn Manning, Wes Bentley and Scott Speedman
Bruce Sweeney's American Venus is described by the director as a film about "motherhood, anxiety and guns." It stars Rebecca De Mornay.