Considered about the heaviest of film festival juggernauts, the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) is no stranger to bringing in many (soon-to-be) award-heavy films, and this year looks to be no different. Even if it's regulations are a bit different than usual.
In their official line-up, released in a press release found on The Playlist, it was revealed that anticipated movies like The Judge, starring Robert Downey Jr., This is Where I Leave You, The Drop, featuring one of James Gandolfini final performances, Jason Reitman's Men, Women and Children and more would be making their world premiere at this year's festival.
Among the most interesting announcements are the inclusion of not one, but two world premieres for Reese Witherspoon, Wild and The Good Lie, the Canadian premiere of Jon Stewart's directorial debut Rosewater, the world premiere of Chris Evan's directorial debut, now titled Before We Go, as well as Noah Bambauch's years-in-the-making While We're Young and Alan Rickman's return to directing A Little Chaos also making their world premieres.
Some Cannes favorites have also found themselves on the list, including Foxcatcher, Mr. Turner, David Cronenberg's Maps to the Stars and Whiplash, which also won the audience award at Sundance, showing at this year's Canadian festival.
Some other award-likely films like The Imitation Game, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and the Stephen Hawking biopic The Theory of Everything are making their own Canadian and world premieres, respectively. Also popping up on the list is Chris Rock's Top Five, Nightcrawler, starring a 20-pounds lighter Jake Gyllenhaal, the world premiere of The Equalizer, starring Denzel Washington, and many, many more showing up on the list.
With TIFF artistic director Cameron Bailey making a new mandate for premieres at the festival—having any film premiering during the festival's first four days not premiering at any other festival besides theirs before their premieres there—some wondered if the festival will be the same powerhouse as it was in years past. But it looks as though the festival is not having a hard time getting some pretty well-buzzed movies in its line-up.
Plus, this is just the beginning. There are more announcements to come, with some speculating that movies like Werner Herzog's Queen of the Desert, Anton Corbijn's James Dean biopic Life and more expected to show up in due time.
TIFF was the festival which premiered last year's Best Picture winner 12 Years a Slave, as well as premiered and showcased other awards favorites like Gravity, Dallas Buyers Club and Philomena, to name a few. What award winners are in this list will have to be determined when the festival begins on September 4th and goes on to the 14th.
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