News

With the Toronto International Film Festival kicking off yesterday, the reviews have started to roll in (though only the tip of the proverbial iceberg) along with more and more buzz. While we're gathering more news from our people on the ground up in Toronto, we got our hands on exclusive photos and trailer from Tiff Doc "Midway." Directed by photo-based artist Chris Jordan and "March of the Penguins" editor Sabine Emiliani (both making their directorial debut), "Midway" follows the albatrosses of Midway Atoll Island (a U.S. territory roughly midway between the U.S. and Asia) and their sometimes terrible fate.  The birds make their homes amongst left behind WWII machinery and the filmmakers documented their life-cycles: from babies hatching to young birds struggling for survival to the species' mating rituals to their ultimate demise amongst the abandoned artifacts and garbage . Sound familiar? It is that poignant familiarity that drove the filmmakers with this project.

Alfonso Cuarón's Gravity, one of many Special Presentations at this year's Tiff.

The Toronto International Film Festival has begun to announce its lineup for its 2013 edition, beginning with Gala and Special Presentations. To browse the festival's programming on their web site, visit here.

Gala Presentations

American Dreams in China (Peter Chan, China)

The Art of the Steal (Jonothan Sobol, Canada)

August: Osage County (John Wells, USA)

Cold Eyes (Cho Ui-seok & Kim Byung-seo, Korea)

The Fifth Estate (Bill Condon, USA)

The Grand Seduction (Don McKellar, Canada)

Kill Your Darlings (John Krokidas, USA)

Life of Crime (Daniel Schechter, USA)

The Love Punch (Joel Hopkins, France)

The Lunchbox (Ritesh Batra, India/France/Germany)

Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (Justin Chadwick, South Africa)

Parkland (Peter Landesman, USA)

The Railway Man (Jonathan Teplitzky, Australia/UK)

The Right Kind of Wrong (Jeremiah Chechik, Canada)

Rush (Ron Howard, UK/Germany)

Shuddh Desi Romance (Maneesh Sharma, India...

Not too long ago we saw a rather impressive list of films announced for the upcoming Toronto International Film Festival 2013. With titles like Gravity, 12 Years a Slave and The Fifth Estate all set to appear, I simply cannot wait for September to arrive. With all the Oscar contenders flying around though, it’s easy to forget about some of the other films at the festival.

With that in mind, the Midnight Madness lineup has been announced today, showcasing some quality horror/thriller films that will serve as a break from the serious, weighty dramas that popular the majority of the festival lineup.

Amongst the highlights are the world premiere of Ei Roth’s The Green Inferno as well as the next film from Lucky McKee, All Cheerleaders Die.

Additionally, Tiff also revealed their documentary lineup today, which can be seen below along with the Midnight Madness films.

The Toronto International...

Yesterday we looked back at the exquisite documentaries that have graced us with their presence thus far in 2013, but now it is time to look to the Toronto International Film Festival which plays host to the biggest docu titles of the fall festival season. While Sundance tends to be the spring launching pad for politically charged films, Tiff tends to have a broader spectrum of non-fiction fare. This morning, Tiff Docs programmer Thom Powers and the rest of the team at the Lightbox dropped a press release with the list of non-fiction films joining this year’s already stacked lineup.

Unsurprisingly there are a few titles making their way over from Cannes in Frank Pavich’s hilarious and tragic Jodorowsky’s Dune, Claude Lanzmann’s continued Holocaust investigation with The Last of the Unjust and Mark Cousins’s film history follow up The Story of Children and Film. Expectedly, Errol Morris...

The 2013 Toronto Film Festival selection grew quite a bit today as the organizers announced the Midnight Madness, Documentary, Vanguard, City to City and Cinematheque selections for this year's festival. Among the title announced there aren't exactly a ton of names that pop off the paper immediately. The Midnight Madness selection will open with Lucky McKee's All Cheerleaders Die in which a young girl who practices the dark arts turns on her best friend after she joins the cheer squad. However, I assume most attention will be on Eli Roth's The Green Inferno, a film in which a group of humanitarians go to the Amazon to help a native tribe only to have the tribe kidnap them and later learn their cannibalistic heritage is very much intact. The Documentary selection includes plenty of familiar faces such as Marcel Ophuls, Claude Lanzmann and Errol Morris and Frank Pavich will be bringing Jodorowsky's Dune,...

New work from Errol Morris and Frederick Wiseman will screen in the Toronto International Film Festival’s Tiff Docs strand, while City To City spotlights Athens and Alex Aja’s Horns is among the Vanguard offerings.

Festival staff remind readers that the following listing is not complete or final and is subject to change.

Premieres key

Wp = World PremiereIP = International PremiereNAP = North American PremiereCP = Canadian PremiereTIFF Docs

A Story Of Children And Film

Mark Cousins (UK) Nap

Ain’t Misbehavin’

Marcel Ophüls (France) Nap

At Berkeley

Frederick Wiseman (Us) Nap

Beyond The Edge

Leanne Pooley (New Zealand) Wp

Burt’s Buzz

Jody Shapiro (Canada) Wp

The Dark Matter Of Love

Sarah McCarthy (UK) Nap

The Dog

Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren (Us) Wp

Faith Connections

Pan Nalin (France/India) Wp

Filthy Gorgeous: The Bob Guccione Story

Barry Avrich (Canada) Wp

Finding Vivian Maier

John Maloof and Charlie Siskel (Us) Wp

Hi-Ho Mistahey!

Alanis Obomsawin (Canada...

New work from Errol Morris and Frederick Wiseman will screen in the Toronto International Film Festival’s Tiff Docs strand, while City To City spotlights Athens and Alex Aja’s Horns is among the Vanguard offerings.

Festival staff remind readers that the following listing is not complete or final and is subject to change.

Premieres key

Wp = World PremiereIP = International PremiereNAP = North American PremiereCP = Canadian PremiereTIFF Docs

A Story Of Children And Film

Mark Cousins (UK) Nap

Ain’t Misbehavin’

Marcel Ophüls (France) Nap

At Berkeley

Frederick Wiseman (Us) Nap

Beyond The Edge

Leanne Pooley (New Zealand) Wp

Burt’s Buzz

Jody Shapiro (Canada) Wp

The Dark Matter Of Love

Sarah McCarthy (UK) Nap

The Dog

Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren (Us) Wp

Faith Connections

Pan Nalin (France/India) Wp

Filthy Gorgeous: The Bob Guccione Story

Barry Avrich (Canada) Wp

Finding Vivian Maier

John Maloof and Charlie Siskel (Us) Wp

Hi-Ho Mistahey!

Alanis Obomsawin (Canada...

The Toronto International Film Festival last week began its annual series of program announcements that will eventually culminate in 250+ of the most anticipated films of the year screening in Canada's largest city this September. Last week, the festival revealed a slew of narrative films that made the cut, including opening night WikiLeaks drama "The Fifth Estate," and today the festival has announced some of the documentaries making their world, North American and Canadian premieres at the festival. Read More: Tiff List 2013: A List of All The Announced Films At The Toronto International Film Festival Among the standout docs making their world premieres: "Midway," the feature debut from Seattle based artist Chris Jordan, who documents albatrosses on Midway Island, 2,000 miles away from any continent. The almost wordless film is said to be visually striking and a standout because of the uniqueness of the author's voice. Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren's "The Dog" tracks the.

This year's Toronto International Film Festival documentary world premieres include works by Penn & Teller, artist Chris Jordan, Jehane Noujaim and Leanne Pooley; and North American premieres by directors Errol Morris, Frederick Wiseman, Marcel Ophuls and Claude Lanzmann. (Full line-up is below.) Among the world premieres that programmer Thom Powers believes will pop for audiences is Chris Jordan's visually striking, almost wordless "Midway." Known in the art world, the photographer is making his feature film debut. He's been filming albatrosses on the Pacific Ocean's remote Midway Island, 2000 miles from any continent. But the danger to birds is the consumption of plastics that float up on shore, says Powers. "We've seen photographs of decomposing albatrosses with stomachs full of plastic bottle caps." (Jordan's heart-tugging short that has more than 10 million YouTube views is posted below, along with his Ted Talk.)  (Backed by Impact Partners' Dan Cogan, the film is...