The 49th edition of the Toronto International Film Festival welcomes just over 200 feature films. In this long list, more than twenty are in French. The figure is down from 2023: the strike by American actors and screenwriters had led the Festival to make more room for cinema from the rest of the world.
Despite the return of major Hollywood productions and their stars for this edition, French remains the second language spoken in the films showing at the Festival.
An always welcoming event
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Denis Villeneuve has not always been a director who has made Hollywood’s heyday. Who remembers that the filmmaker behind the saga Dune was welcomed at the Toronto Festival in the late 1990s with August 32 on Earth?
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Filmmaker Denis Villeneuve was in Toronto to present an award to actress Amy Adams at the TIFF Tribute gala.
Photo: Radio-Canada / Rozenn Nicolle
He remembers it very well. This year, he was one of the guests at TIFF, where he presented an award to Amy Adams, an actress with whom he worked in The Arrival.
It’s a festival where I’ve always felt very welcome, even when I was starting out, he says. Denis Villeneuve sees it as a magnificent event where there is a nice balance between auteur cinema and more imposing productions.
It is true that every year, the program is full of surprises. This 49th edition gave pride of place to icons like Pamela Anderson and Angelina Jolie, but that did not prevent Marie-Hélène Viens and Philippe Lupien from coming to present their first feature film to a packed house.
The young filmmakers who met in high school share Denis Villeneuve’s feelings about the welcome that TIFF gives to young French-speaking filmmakers: We were really touched and honored that the film was selected, we are truly spoiled.
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The film by Marie-Hélène Viens and Philippe Lupien, “You Are Not Alone”, had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Photo: Courtesy of TIFF
You are not alone is an ambitious film that questions both solitude and how a love story can be born, in a Montreal crisscrossed by an alien taxi driver and kidnapper. A strange and very particular feature film that was presented in the Discovery category of the Festival.
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French as a language of creation
Can you get more Canadian than the feature film that will represent the country in the race for the Oscar for best foreign language film this year? It’sA universal language, by Matthew Rankin. First presented at Cannes, it arrived in Toronto this week. It is a story where French and Farsi are the official languages of the country.
But then why did Matthew Rankin, who is an English speaker, choose to make a film in a context where English has disappeared? There are far too many films in English, according to him. The choice to work in languages that are not his own also interests him as a filmmaker who loves to live linguistic experiences.
This choice of French rather than her mother tongue is also the one made by Jasmin Gordon, who presents The Brave Ones world premiere in Toronto. The Swiss-American director is more comfortable in English, and yet her film is in French and stars a famous French actress, Ophelia Kolb.
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Jasmin Gordon’s film “The Courageous” had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Photo: Courtesy of TIFF
I live in Switzerland, so it was important for a first feature film that it be in a national language, she explains. She adds that her screenwriter, Julien Bouissoux, is French-speaking, so the choice was obvious.
To these technical considerations, Jasmin Gordon adds that she finds her second language very beautiful, very close to [s]on heart and she is happy to be part of the French-speaking cinema family with this first work.
Throughout the programming, we also find the opposite situation: Coralie Fargeat came to present The Substance, starring Demi Moore. The film, about a late-career Hollywood star who takes a drug with terrifying side effects to stay young, is one of the sensations of TIFF this year.
When asked about the choice of English, the French director first recalls that the film was shot in her country and that she wanted to synthesize what she prefers in French and American cinema to build her universe. My desire for cinema comes from American cinema, she admits, before adding: French cinema is more in reality, there is not this letting go that we find in American, South Korean or Japanese cinema.
However, she assures that this is the country from which [elle] comes who built it and that’s why she stays there to work. There are plenty of examples of directors who went to work in Hollywood and got eaten up. I shoot in English, but I shoot in France, specifies Coralie Fargeat.
And what about Jacques Audiard who presents, with Emilia Perez, a movie in spanish?
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The film “A Missing Part” had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Photo: Courtesy of TIFF
A hub of the planet’s cinema
Throughout its history, the TIFF has become one of the gateways for world cinema to the American continent.We feel that TIFF is a big market and that the public comes, it talks business and at the same time, there is this heart of spectators, explains Romain Duris, who came to present A missing part, by Guillaume Senez, world premiere.
Those who participate for the first time are also always very surprised by the importance that the public has at the Festival. Koya Kamura came to present Winter in Sokcho, starring Roschdy Zem and Bella Kim. The director feels like he is dreaming.
The duo behind the film’s music Emilia PerezCamille and Clément Ducol, also discovered the Festival. They found it both very prestigious and on a human scale, there is something informal, in a good way.
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Musicians Camille and Clément Ducol were in Toronto for the TIFF Tribute gala.
Photo: Radio-Canada / Rozenn Nicolle
Questions beyond language
Showing a language also means putting into images the questions and challenges of the cultures that speak it. The Festival notably welcomes the documentary that won the Golden Bear in Berlin in 2024, Dahomey, by Mati Diop. The film tells the historical repatriation of 26 royal treasures from France to Benin, their country of origin, from where they were taken during the colonial era.
Still in the political vein, the Festival hosted The Barbarians, by Julie Delpy. A comedy where a French village prepares to receive a family of Ukrainians, but sees Syrian refugees arrive instead. Reactions are mixed in the community. It is a way of showing the two-speed solidarity with which victims of conflict are sometimes treated.
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Filmmaker Julie Delpy presented her film “Les Barbares” as an international premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Photo: Radio-Canada / Rozenn Nicolle
Julie Delpy takes a somewhat caustic look at a part of French society. She sees her country slowly sliding towards a form of lack of empathy towards others, racism…. A way for her to hold up a mirror to her vision of France in 2024.
Other countries, other challenges. TIFF presents the first feature film by Montrealer Halima Elkhatabi, Cohabit. A documentary shot using a simple method: a camera films discussions between residents of different homes and candidates for shared accommodation. But through these conversations, the director illustrates an aspect of the housing crisis and the difficulty of finding a roof over one’s head.
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The documentary “Cohabiter,” by director Halima Elkhatabi, has been selected for the 49th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), which runs from September 5 to 15, 2024.
Photo: Courtesy / ONF
So, she takes the opportunity to question an entire generation. We see that the topics addressed in particular by generation X and Y are questions of identity, mental health, finding a place to live, but also how we find ourselves in society, explains Halima Elkhatabi.
So, whether for its language, its commercial importance, its creativity or the problems it highlights and denounces, French-language cinema continues to be part of TIFF’s identity.
Toronto Film Festival 2024
The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF): A Celebration of Diversity and Language
The 49th edition of the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) has kicked off, welcoming over 200 feature films from around the world. This year’s festival boasts an impressive lineup of films, with more than 20 French-language films making the cut. Despite the return of major Hollywood productions, French remains the second most spoken language at the festival.
TIFF: A Platform for Emerging Talent
The Toronto International Film Festival is renowned for its inclusive and welcoming nature. Denis Villeneuve, the acclaimed filmmaker behind the Dune saga, attests to this, having been welcomed at the festival in the late 1990s with his film August 32 on Earth. “It’s a festival where I’ve always felt very welcome, even when I was starting out,” Villeneuve says. The festival’s commitment to showcasing emerging talent is evident in its programming, which includes films from budding filmmakers like Marie-Hélène Viens and Philippe Lupien, who presented their first feature film, You Are Not Alone, to a packed house.
The film, which premiered at TIFF, is an ambitious and unique exploration of solitude and love, set in a Montreal crossed by an alien taxi driver and kidnapper. The young filmmakers share Villeneuve’s sentiments about the festival’s welcoming nature, stating, “We were really touched and honored that the film was selected, we are truly spoiled.”
French as a Language of Creation
French is a prominent language at TIFF, with many filmmakers choosing to create in this language despite their native
