The 2008 Toronto International Film Festival

Toronto International Film Festival

The Toronto International Film Festival is a publicly-attended film festival held each September in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2010, 339 films from 59 countries were screened at 32 screens in downtown Toronto venues...

, (TIFF) was held in Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

, Ontario

Ontario

Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. This 33rd annual festival was from September 4 to September 13, 2008. The opening night gala was the World War I romantic epic Passchendaele

Passchendaele (film)

Passchendaele is a 2008 Canadian war film from Alliance Films, written, co-produced, directed by, and starring Paul Gross. The film, which was shot in Calgary, Alberta, Fort Macleod, Alberta, and in Belgium, focuses on the experiences of a Canadian soldier, Michael Dunne, at the Battle of...

 from Canadian director Paul Gross

Paul Gross

Paul Michael Gross is a Canadian actor, producer, director, singer and writer born in Calgary, Alberta. He is known for his lead role as Constable Benton Fraser in the television series Due South as well as his 2008 war film Passchendaele, which he wrote, produced, directed, and starred in...

.

About the 2008 Festival

Festival is heavy on Canadian fare as well as featuring prominent indie films and worldwide and/or North American debuts including: Adoration

Adoration (film)

Adoration is a 2008 Canadian drama film directed by Atom Egoyan and starring Rachel Blanchard, Scott Speedman and Devon Bostick. It is Egoyan's first feature film since Where The Truth Lies....

 directed by Canada's own Atom Egoyan

Atom Egoyan

Atom Egoyan, OC is a critically acclaimed Armenian-Canadian stage director and film director. Egoyan made his career breakthrough with Exotica...

, Appaloosa

Appaloosa (film)

Appaloosa is a 2008 American Western film based on the 2005 novel of the same name by crime writer Robert B. Parker. The film was directed by Ed Harris and co-written by Harris and Robert Knott. Appaloosa stars Harris alongside Viggo Mortensen, Renée Zellweger and Jeremy Irons...

 the second film from Ed Harris

Ed Harris

Edward Allen "Ed" Harris is an American actor, writer, and director, known for his performances in Appaloosa, Radio, The Rock, The Abyss, Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind, A History of Violence, and The Truman Show. Harris has also narrated commercials for The Home Depot and other companies...

 (who directed Pollock

Pollock (film)

Pollock is a 2000 biographical drama film which tells the life story of painter Jackson Pollock. It stars Ed Harris, Jennifer Connelly, Robert Knott, Bud Cort, Molly Regan, Marcia Gay Harden and Sada Thompson.-Plot:...

), Blindness

Blindness (film)

Blindness is a 2008 English-language film that is an adaptation of the 1995 novel of the same name by the Portuguese writer José Saramago about a society suffering an epidemic of blindness. The film is written by Don McKellar and directed by Fernando Meirelles with Julianne Moore and Mark Ruffalo...

 from screenwriter-director, Fernando Meirelles

Fernando Meirelles

Fernando Ferreira Meirelles is a Brazilian film director, producer and screenwriter.He was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Director in 2004 for his work in the Brazilian film City of God, released in 2002 in Brazil and in 2003 in the U.S. by Miramax Films...

, Iraq war thriller The Hurt Locker

The Hurt Locker

The Hurt Locker is a 2009 American war film about a three-man United States Army Explosive Ordnance Disposal team during the Iraq War. The film was directed by Kathryn Bigelow and the screenplay was written by Mark Boal, a freelance writer who was embedded as a journalist in 2004 with a US bomb...

 directed by Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Ann Bigelow is an American film director. Her best-known films are the cult horror film Near Dark , the surfer/bank robbery action picture Point Break , the science fiction/film noir Strange Days , the historical/mystery film The Weight of Water and the war drama The Hurt Locker...

, and veteran filmmaker Barbet Schroeder

Barbet Schroeder

Barbet Schroeder is a Franco-Swiss movie director and producer who started his career in French cinema in the 1960s, working together with directors such as Jean-Luc Godard and Jacques Rivette.-Life and career:...

's Inju, la bete dans l'ombre. Scheduled is The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond

The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond

The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond is a 2009 film by director Jodie Markell. The film is based on Tennessee Williams's long-forgotten 1957 screenplay. The film stars Bryce Dallas Howard in the leading role of Fisher Willow.- Plot :...

 (directed by Jodie Markell), based on a "rediscovered" Tennessee Williams

Tennessee Williams

Thomas Lanier "Tennessee" Williams III was an American writer who worked principally as a playwright in the American theater. He also wrote short stories, novels, poetry, essays, screenplays and a volume of memoirs...

 screenplay. TIFF screened 312 films from 64 countries. These include 249 features, most of which were North American and/or world premieres.

Neil Burger

Neil Burger

Neil Burger is an American film director who has filmed the pseudo-documentary, Interview with the Assassin , the period drama, The Illusionist, and the 2011 thriller Limitless.-Life and career:...

 (director of The Illusionist) world premiered The Lucky Ones

The Lucky Ones (film)

The Lucky Ones is a 2008 American dramedy film with a road movie plot directed by Neil Burger. The screenplay by Burger and Dirk Wittenborn focuses on three United States Army soldiers who find themselves drawn together by unforeseen circumstances.-Plot:...

 a character study of U.S. soldiers on an unplanned road trip, starring Tim Robbins

Tim Robbins

Timothy Francis "Tim" Robbins is an American actor, screenwriter, director, producer, activist and musician. He is the former longtime partner of actress Susan Sarandon...

.

Also featured was be Me and Orson Welles

Me and Orson Welles

Me and Orson Welles is a 2009 period-drama film directed by Richard Linklater and starring Zac Efron, Christian McKay, and Claire Danes. Based on Robert Kaplow's novel of the same name, the story, set in 1937 New York, tells of a teenager hired to perform in Orson Welles's stage production of...

 helmed by American "slacker" Richard Linklater

Richard Linklater

-Early life:Linklater was born in Houston, Texas. He studied at Sam Houston State University and left midway through his stint in college to work on an off-shore oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. While working on the rig he read a lot of literature, but on land he developed a love of film through...

, the Spike Lee

Spike Lee

Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee is an American film director, producer, writer, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks, has produced over 35 films since 1983....

-directed World War II film, Miracle at St. Anna

Miracle at St. Anna

Miracle at St. Anna is a 2008 war film, directed by Spike Lee and written by James McBride, based on McBride's novel of the same name. The film was released on September 26, 2008, and is set during World War II, in fall of 1944 in Tuscany and in the winter of 1983 in New York City and Rome...

 as well as the Jonathan Demme

Jonathan Demme

Robert Jonathan Demme is an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Best known for directing The Silence of the Lambs, which won him the Academy Award for Best Director, he has also directed the acclaimed movies Philadelphia, Rachel Getting Married, the Talking Heads concert movie Stop...

 directed film Rachel Getting Married

Rachel Getting Married

Rachel Getting Married is a 2008 drama film directed by Jonathan Demme, and starring Anne Hathaway, Rosemarie DeWitt, Bill Irwin and Debra Winger. The film was released in the U.S. to select theaters on October 3, 2008. The film opened the 65th Venice International Film Festival. The film also...

. Other festival highlights are screenwriter Charlie Kaufman

Charlie Kaufman

Charles Stuart "Charlie" Kaufman is an American screenwriter, producer, and director. His film work includes Being John Malkovich, Human Nature, Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Synecdoche, New York...

's first film, Synecdoche, New York, a slice of experimental filmmaker James Benning

James Benning (film director)

James Benning is an American filmmaker. He is the son of German immigrants and studied film at the University of Wisconsin–Madison under the tutelage of David Bordwell. Working as an independent filmmaker, Benning's films focus on a sense of place, and are often built from long, unedited takes...

's Americana RR

RR (film)

RR is a 2008 film by American, James Benning. Shot in 16 mm film, as most of Benning's films are, RR is another in Benning's series of American experimental landscape films; this one focusing on trains and their surrounding environs...

 was featured in the "Wavelengths" avant-garde showcase, the four-hour-long Stephen Soderbergh epic Che

Che (film)

Che is a two-part 2008 biopic about Ernesto 'Che' Guevara directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring Benicio del Toro. Rather than follow a standard chronological order, the films offer an oblique series of interspersed moments along the overall timeline...

 (playing in two parts), as well as The Wrestler

The Wrestler (2009 film)

The Wrestler is a 2008 sports drama film directed by Darren Aronofsky, written by Robert D. Siegel and starring Mickey Rourke, Marisa Tomei and Evan Rachel Wood. Production began in January 2008 and Fox Searchlight Pictures acquired rights to distribute the film in the U.S.; it was released in a...

 lensed by Darren Aronofsky

Darren Aronofsky

Darren Aronofsky is an American film director, screenwriter and film producer. He attended Harvard University to study film theory and the American Film Institute to study both live-action and animation filmmaking...

. The Brits are also well represented with Happy-Go-Lucky

Happy-Go-Lucky

Happy-Go-Lucky is a 2008 British Comedy-drama film written and directed by Mike Leigh. The screenplay focuses on a cheerful and optimistic primary-school teacher and her relationships with those around her...

 directed by Mike Leigh

Mike Leigh

Michael "Mike" Leigh, OBE is a British writer and director of film and theatre. He studied theatre at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and studied further at the Camberwell School of Art and the Central School of Art and Design. He began as a theatre director and playwright in the mid 1960s...

 and Slumdog Millionaire

Slumdog Millionaire

Slumdog Millionaire is a 2008 British epic romantic drama adventure film directed by Danny Boyle, written by Simon Beaufoy, and co-directed in India by Loveleen Tandan. It is an adaptation of the novel Q & A by Indian author and diplomat Vikas Swarup...

 directed by Danny Boyle

Danny Boyle

Daniel "Danny" Boyle is an English filmmaker and producer. He is best known for his work on films such as Slumdog Millionaire, 127 Hours, 28 Days Later, Sunshine and Trainspotting. For Slumdog Millionaire, Boyle won numerous awards in 2008, including the Academy Award for Best Director...

.

Despite showing fewer films than last year, among the 249 features, 116 are premieres and 61 are first features. Films from as many as 64 countries were screened, with more than 340,000 admissions expected.

"Canadian Open Vault", which always highlights a restored Canadian film, focused on Quebec

Quebec

Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....

 filmmaker Francois Girard

François Girard

François Girard is a French-Canadian director and screenwriter particularly noted for his innovative film Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould. Born in Quebec, Girard's career began on the Montreal art video circuit...

's 32 Short Films About Glenn Gould made in 1993.

Actors Brad Pitt

Brad Pitt

William Bradley "Brad" Pitt is an American actor and film producer. Pitt has received two Academy Award nominations and four Golden Globe Award nominations, winning one...

, Edward Norton

Edward Norton

Edward Harrison Norton is an American actor, screenwriter, film director and producer. In 1996, his supporting role in the courtroom drama Primal Fear garnered him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor...

, Benicio del Toro

Benicio del Toro

Benicio Monserrate Rafael del Toro Sánchez is a Puerto Rican and Spanish actor and film producer. He won an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, and a BAFTA Award for his role as Javier Rodríguez in Traffic . He is also known for his roles as Fred Fenster in The Usual...

, Ethan Hawke

Ethan Hawke

Ethan Green Hawke is an American actor, writer and director. He made his feature film debut in 1985 with the science fiction movie Explorers, before making a supporting appearance in the 1989 drama Dead Poets Society which is considered his breakthrough role...

, Laura Linney

Laura Linney

Laura Leggett Linney is an American actress of film, television, and theatre. Linney has won three Emmy Awards, two Golden Globes, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. She has been nominated for three times for an Academy Award and once for a BAFTA Award...

 and film directors Julian Schnabel

Julian Schnabel

Julian Schnabel is an American artist and filmmaker. In the 1980s, Schnabel received international media attention for his "plate paintings"—large-scale paintings set on broken ceramic plates....

, Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Ann Bigelow is an American film director. Her best-known films are the cult horror film Near Dark , the surfer/bank robbery action picture Point Break , the science fiction/film noir Strange Days , the historical/mystery film The Weight of Water and the war drama The Hurt Locker...

 and Steven Soderbergh

Steven Soderbergh

Steven Andrew Soderbergh is an American film producer, screenwriter, cinematographer, editor, and an Academy Award-winning film director. He is best known for directing commercial Hollywood films like Erin Brockovich, Traffic, and the remake of Ocean's Eleven, but he has also directed smaller less...

 are among the celebs the festival has invited on its 500-plus guest list, thus completing its lineup.

The festival closed on September 13, 2008 with the North American premiere of Stone of Destiny

Stone of Destiny (film)

Stone of Destiny is a 2008 British-Canadian adventure/comedy film directed by Charles Martin Smith. It stars Charlie Cox, Billy Boyd, Robert Carlyle, Kate Mara and Brenda Fricker....

 written and directed by Charles Martin Smith

Charles Martin Smith

Charles Martin Smith is an American film actor, writer, and director.-Early life:Smith was born in Van Nuys, California. His father, Frank Smith, was a film cartoonist and animator, while his uncle Paul J. Smith was an animator as well as a director for the Walter Lantz Studios...

, the true story of four Glasgow university students who try to restore the 300-pound Stone of Destiny

Stone of Scone

The Stone of Scone , also known as the Stone of Destiny and often referred to in England as The Coronation Stone, is an oblong block of red sandstone, used for centuries in the coronation of the monarchs of Scotland and later the monarchs of England, Great Britain and the United Kingdom...

 to its rightful Scottish home.

With the film "Fifty dead men walking", Rose McGowan expressed support for the cause of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), with the reports of her comments being released into the media on September 11, 2008. After starring in Fifty Dead Men Walking, she was quoted as saying "I imagine had I grown up in Belfast, I would 100% have been in the IRA. My heart just broke for the cause. Violence is not to be played out daily and provide an answer to problems, but I understand it." Her comments were attacked by the original author Martin McCartlend. McCartland had general objections against the film, but approved of an out of court settlement, believed to be in the region of £20.000 (35.000 USD in summer 2008).

North American premieres

• Aide-toi et le ciel t'aidera directed by François Dupeyron
  François Dupeyron
  François Dupeyron is a French film director and screenwriter. He has directed 17 films since 1977. His film La chambre des officiers was entered into the 2001 Cannes Film Festival.-Filmography:...
  
   (France)
• Adoration
  Adoration (film)
  Adoration is a 2008 Canadian drama film directed by Atom Egoyan and starring Rachel Blanchard, Scott Speedman and Devon Bostick. It is Egoyan's first feature film since Where The Truth Lies....
  
   directed by Atom Egoyan
  Atom Egoyan
  Atom Egoyan, OC is a critically acclaimed Armenian-Canadian stage director and film director. Egoyan made his career breakthrough with Exotica...
  
   (Canada)
• Appaloosa
  Appaloosa (film)
  Appaloosa is a 2008 American Western film based on the 2005 novel of the same name by crime writer Robert B. Parker. The film was directed by Ed Harris and co-written by Harris and Robert Knott. Appaloosa stars Harris alongside Viggo Mortensen, Renée Zellweger and Jeremy Irons...
  
   directed by Ed Harris
  Ed Harris
  Edward Allen "Ed" Harris is an American actor, writer, and director, known for his performances in Appaloosa, Radio, The Rock, The Abyss, Apollo 13, A Beautiful Mind, A History of Violence, and The Truman Show. Harris has also narrated commercials for The Home Depot and other companies...
  
   (U.S.)
• Un Barrage center le pacifique directed by Rithy Panh
  Rithy Panh
  Rithy Panh is an internationally and critically acclaimed Cambodian documentary film director and screenwriter.The French-schooled director's films focus on the aftermath of the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia...
  
  
• Blindness
  Blindness (film)
  Blindness is a 2008 English-language film that is an adaptation of the 1995 novel of the same name by the Portuguese writer José Saramago about a society suffering an epidemic of blindness. The film is written by Don McKellar and directed by Fernando Meirelles with Julianne Moore and Mark Ruffalo...
  
   directed by Fernando Meirelles
  Fernando Meirelles
  Fernando Ferreira Meirelles is a Brazilian film director, producer and screenwriter.He was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Director in 2004 for his work in the Brazilian film City of God, released in 2002 in Brazil and in 2003 in the U.S. by Miramax Films...
  
   (Brazil/Japan/Canada coprod.)
• The Brothers Bloom
  The Brothers Bloom
  The Brothers Bloom is a 2008 American postmodern caper film written and directed by Rian Johnson. The film stars Mark Ruffalo, Adrien Brody, Rachel Weisz, Ricky Jay, Rinko Kikuchi, and Robbie Coltrane...
  
   directed by Rian Johnson
  Rian Johnson
  Rian Craig Johnson is an American writer and director, who won the Special Jury Prize for Originality of Vision at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival with his debut feature, Brick.-Background:...
  
  
• Un conte de Noël
  A Christmas Tale
  A Christmas Tale is a 2008 French comedy-drama film by Arnaud Desplechin, starring Catherine Deneuve, Jean-Paul Roussillon, Mathieu Amalric, Anne Consigny, Melvil Poupaud, Emmanuelle Devos and Chiara Mastroianni. It tells the story of a family with strained relationships which gathers at the...
  
   directed by Arnaud Desplechin
  Arnaud Desplechin
  Arnaud Desplechin is a French film director.-Biography:Arnaud Desplechin is the son of Robert and Mado Desplechin, and grew up in the Nord department...
  
  
• Disgrace directed by Steve Jacobs
  Steve Jacobs
  Steve Jacobs is an American born film director and actor. He directed the movie La Spagnola , which was written and produced by Monticelli. In 2008 he directed John Malkovich in a film adaptation of J. M. Coetzee's novel Disgrace, again produced and adapted by Monticelli. It premiered at the...
  
  
• Il Divo
  Il Divo (film)
  Il Divo is a 2008 Italian biographical drama film directed by Paolo Sorrentino. It is based on the figure of former Italian Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti. It competed at the Cannes Film Festival in 2008, where it was awarded the Jury Prize...
  
   directed by Paolo Sorrentino
  Paolo Sorrentino
  Paolo Sorrentino is an Italian film director and screenwriter. He was born in Naples.Sorrentino's first film as screenwriter, Polvere di Napoli, was released in 1998. He began directing several short movies, like L'amore non ha confini, in 1998, and La notte lunga, in 2001...
  
  
• The Duchess
  The Duchess (film)
  The Duchess is a 2008 British drama film based on Amanda Foreman's biography of the 18th-century English aristocrat Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire. It was released in September 2008 in the UK...
  
   directed by Saul Dibb
  Saul Dibb
  Saul Dibb is the British director of Bullet Boy, for which he was nominated for the Douglas Hickox Award, The Line of Beauty, and The Duchess. He is a graduate of the University of East Anglia.-Notes:...
  
  
• Easy Virtue
  Easy Virtue (2009 film)
  Easy Virtue is a 2008 British-Canadian romantic comedy film based on Noël Coward's play of the same name. The play was previously made into the silent movie Easy Virtue by Alfred Hitchcock. This adaptation is directed by Stephan Elliott, written by Elliott and Sheridan Jobbins, and stars Jessica...
  
   directed by Stephen Elliot (U.S./U.K.)
• Fifty Dead Men Walking
  Fifty Dead Men Walking
  Fifty Dead Men Walking is a 2008 English-language crime thriller film written and directed by Kari Skogland. It is a loose adaptation of Martin McGartland's 1997 autobiography of the same name...
  
   directed by Kari Skogland (Canada)
• Food, Inc.
  Food, Inc.
  Food, Inc. is a 2008 American documentary film directed by Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Robert Kenner. The film examines corporate farming in the United States, concluding that agribusiness produces food that is unhealthy, in a way that is environmentally harmful and abusive of both animals and...
  
   directed by Robert Kenner
  Robert Kenner
  Robert Kenner is an American film and television screenwriter, television director, film director, film producer, and television producer.His career began in 1971 as an assistant cinematographer, and produced his first motion picture, 3:15 - The Moment of Truth, in 1984...
  
   (Canada)
• Genova
  Genova (film)
  Genova is a film directed by Michael Winterbottom and starring Colin Firth, Catherine Keener, and Hope Davis. It was filmed in the titular city of Genoa during the summer of 2007. It was written by Wonderland screenwriter Laurence Coriat...
  
   directed by Michael Winterbottom
  Michael Winterbottom
  Michael Winterbottom is a prolific English filmmaker who has directed seventeen feature films in the past fifteen years. He began his career working in British television before moving into features...
  
  
• Gomorrah
  Gomorra (film)
  Gomorrah is a 2008 Italian film directed by Matteo Garrone, based on the book by Roberto Saviano. It deals with the Casalesi clan, a crime syndicate within the Camorra — a traditional criminal organization based in Naples and Caserta, in the southern Italian region of Campania.-Plot summary:The...
  
    directed by Matteo Garrone
  Matteo Garrone
  Matteo Garrone is an Italian film maker.Born in Rome, the son of a theatre critic, Nico Garrone and a photographer, in 1996 Garrone won the Sacher d'Oro, an award sponsored by Nanni Moretti, with the short film Silhouette, that became one of the three episodes that are on his first long film ...
  
  
• Good
  Good (film)
  Good is a British-German-Hungarian motion picture based on the stage play by C. P. Taylor and starring Viggo Mortensen, Jason Isaacs and Jodie Whittaker...
  
   directed by Vincente Amorim
• The Good, the Bad, the Weird
  The Good, the Bad, the Weird
  The Good, the Bad, the Weird is a 2008 South Korean western film directed by Kim Ji-woon, starring Song Kang-ho, Lee Byung-hun, and Jung Woo-sung...
  
   directed by Kim Jee-woon (South Korea)
• Heaven on Earth
  Heaven on Earth (film)
  Heaven on Earth a.k.a Videsh is a 2008 Canadian film directed and written by Deepa Mehta. Preity Zinta plays the leading role of Chand, a young Indian Punjabi woman who finds herself in an abusive arranged marriage with an Indo-Canadian man, played by theatre actor Vansh Bhardwaj...
  
   directed by Deepa Mehta
  Deepa Mehta
  Deepa Mehta, LLD is a Genie Award-winning Indian-born Canadian film director and screenwriter, most known for her Elements Trilogy, Fire , Earth , and Water , among which Earth was submitted by Indian government for Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film...
  
   (Canada)
• The Hurt Locker
  The Hurt Locker
  The Hurt Locker is a 2009 American war film about a three-man United States Army Explosive Ordnance Disposal team during the Iraq War. The film was directed by Kathryn Bigelow and the screenplay was written by Mark Boal, a freelance writer who was embedded as a journalist in 2004 with a US bomb...
  
   directed by Kathryn Bigelow
  Kathryn Bigelow
  Kathryn Ann Bigelow is an American film director. Her best-known films are the cult horror film Near Dark , the surfer/bank robbery action picture Point Break , the science fiction/film noir Strange Days , the historical/mystery film The Weight of Water and the war drama The Hurt Locker...
  
   (U.S.)
• Is There Anybody There? directed by John Crowley
  John Crowley (director)
  John Crowley is an Irish television, theatre and film director. He is perhaps best known for his feature film debut Intermission .-Education:Crowley earned a B.A. in philosophy from University College Cork.-Career:...
  
  
• It's Not Me directed by Philippe Falardeau
  Philippe Falardeau
  Philippe Falardeau is a Canadian film director and screenwriter.His first feature film, La Moitié gauche du frigo won "Best Canadian First Feature" at the Toronto International Film Festival and a Best Screenplay nomination at the Quebec-based Jutra Awards...
  
   (Canada)
• The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond
  The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond
  The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond is a 2009 film by director Jodie Markell. The film is based on Tennessee Williams's long-forgotten 1957 screenplay. The film stars Bryce Dallas Howard in the leading role of Fisher Willow.- Plot :...
  
   directed by Jodie Markell
• The Lucky Ones
  The Lucky Ones (film)
  The Lucky Ones is a 2008 American dramedy film with a road movie plot directed by Neil Burger. The screenplay by Burger and Dirk Wittenborn focuses on three United States Army soldiers who find themselves drawn together by unforeseen circumstances.-Plot:...
  
   directed by Neil Burger
  Neil Burger
  Neil Burger is an American film director who has filmed the pseudo-documentary, Interview with the Assassin , the period drama, The Illusionist, and the 2011 thriller Limitless.-Life and career:...
  
  
• Management
  Management (film)
  Management is a 2009 romantic comedy-drama directed by Stephen Belber and starring Jennifer Aniston and Steve Zahn. It premiered at the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival and received a limited theatrical release on May 15, 2009....
  
   directed by Stephen Belber
  Stephen Belber
  Stephen Belber is an American playwright , screenwriter and film director.-Early life:Belber was born in Washington, D.C.. He studied philosophy as an undergraduate at Trinity College in Hartford, CT, and moved to New York at the age of 25. There he unwittingly moved in with a roommate with AIDS,...
  
  
• Me and Orson Welles
  Me and Orson Welles
  Me and Orson Welles is a 2009 period-drama film directed by Richard Linklater and starring Zac Efron, Christian McKay, and Claire Danes. Based on Robert Kaplow's novel of the same name, the story, set in 1937 New York, tells of a teenager hired to perform in Orson Welles's stage production of...
  
   directed by Richard Linklater
  Richard Linklater
  -Early life:Linklater was born in Houston, Texas. He studied at Sam Houston State University and left midway through his stint in college to work on an off-shore oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. While working on the rig he read a lot of literature, but on land he developed a love of film through...
  
   (U.S.)
• Miracle at St. Anna
  Miracle at St. Anna
  Miracle at St. Anna is a 2008 war film, directed by Spike Lee and written by James McBride, based on McBride's novel of the same name. The film was released on September 26, 2008, and is set during World War II, in fall of 1944 in Tuscany and in the winter of 1983 in New York City and Rome...
  
   directed by Spike Lee
  Spike Lee
  Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee is an American film director, producer, writer, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks, has produced over 35 films since 1983....
  
   (U.S.)
• Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist directed by Peter Sollett
  Peter Sollett
  Peter Sollett is an American film director and screenwriter known for his feature films Raising Victor Vargas and Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist .-Career:...
  
  
• O' Horten
  O' Horten
  O' Horten is a 2007 Norwegian film directed by Bent Hamer. The film's title character Odd Horten is a habit-bound train driver, who is about to retire. On the day of his retirement he ends up in an unexpected situation, and is forced to reconsider his life. As in other films by Hamer, the themes...
  
   directed by Bent Hamer
  Bent Hamer
  Bent Hamer is a film director, writer and producer, born in Sandefjord, Norway in 1956.-Biography:Hamer studied film theory and literature at the University of Stockholm and the Stockholm Film School. In addition to his feature films, he has written and directed a number of short films and...
  
   (Norway)
• One Week directed by Michael McGowan (Canada)
• The Other Man
  The Other Man (2008 film)
  The Other Man is a British-American movie directed by Richard Eyre. It stars Liam Neeson and Antonio Banderas as competitors for a woman's love .-Plot:...
  
   directed by Richard Eyre
  Richard Eyre
  Sir Richard Charles Hastings Eyre CBE is an English director of film, theatre, television, and opera.-Biography:Eyre was educated at Sherborne School, an independent school for boys in the market town of Sherborne in north-west Dorset in south-west England, followed by Peterhouse at the University...
  
  
• Pedro directed by Nicholas Oceano
• Pride and Glory
  Pride and Glory (film)
  Pride and Glory is a 2008 crime drama film directed by Gavin O'Connor. It stars Edward Norton, Colin Farrell, Jon Voight, and Noah Emmerich. The film was released on October 24, 2008, in the United States....
  
   directed by Gavin O'Connor
• Rachel Getting Married
  Rachel Getting Married
  Rachel Getting Married is a 2008 drama film directed by Jonathan Demme, and starring Anne Hathaway, Rosemarie DeWitt, Bill Irwin and Debra Winger. The film was released in the U.S. to select theaters on October 3, 2008. The film opened the 65th Venice International Film Festival. The film also...
  
   directed by Jonathan Demme
  Jonathan Demme
  Robert Jonathan Demme is an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Best known for directing The Silence of the Lambs, which won him the Academy Award for Best Director, he has also directed the acclaimed movies Philadelphia, Rachel Getting Married, the Talking Heads concert movie Stop...
  
   (U.S.)
• The Secret Life of Bees
  The Secret Life of Bees (film)
  The Secret Life of Bees is a 2008 American drama film, adapted from the novel of the same name by Sue Monk Kidd. The film was directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood and produced by Will Smith, with his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, as executive producer. The film is noted for Queen Latifah's critically...
  
   directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood
  Gina Prince-Bythewood
  Gina Prince-Bythewood is an American film director and writer. Her primary credits as a director include the films Disappearing Acts and Love & Basketball, produced by Spike Lee and starring Omar Epps and Sanaa Lathan, which won her the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Screenplay.Bythewood...
  
  
• Stone of Destiny
  Stone of Destiny (film)
  Stone of Destiny is a 2008 British-Canadian adventure/comedy film directed by Charles Martin Smith. It stars Charlie Cox, Billy Boyd, Robert Carlyle, Kate Mara and Brenda Fricker....
  
   directed by Charles Martin Smith
  Charles Martin Smith
  Charles Martin Smith is an American film actor, writer, and director.-Early life:Smith was born in Van Nuys, California. His father, Frank Smith, was a film cartoonist and animator, while his uncle Paul J. Smith was an animator as well as a director for the Walter Lantz Studios...
  
  
• Synecdoche, New York directed by Charlie Kaufman
  Charlie Kaufman
  Charles Stuart "Charlie" Kaufman is an American screenwriter, producer, and director. His film work includes Being John Malkovich, Human Nature, Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Synecdoche, New York...
  
   (U.S.)
• The Wrestler
  The Wrestler (2009 film)
  The Wrestler is a 2008 sports drama film directed by Darren Aronofsky, written by Robert D. Siegel and starring Mickey Rourke, Marisa Tomei and Evan Rachel Wood. Production began in January 2008 and Fox Searchlight Pictures acquired rights to distribute the film in the U.S.; it was released in a...
  
   directed by Darren Aronofsky
  Darren Aronofsky
  Darren Aronofsky is an American film director, screenwriter and film producer. He attended Harvard University to study film theory and the American Film Institute to study both live-action and animation filmmaking...
  
   (U.S.)
• Zack and Miri Make a Porno
  Zack and Miri Make a Porno
  Zack and Miri Make a Porno is a 2008 romantic comedy film written and directed by Kevin Smith, distributed by The Weinstein Company, and starring Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks. It is Smith's second film not to be set within the View Askewniverse and the first not set in New Jersey. It was...
  
   directed by Kevin Smith
  Kevin Smith
  Kevin Patrick Smith is an American screenwriter, actor, film producer, and director, as well as a popular comic book writer, author, comedian/raconteur, and internet radio personality best recognized by viewers as Silent Bob...
  
   (U.S.)

Special presentations

• Ashes of Time Redux directed by Wong Kar-wai
  Wong Kar-wai
  Wong Kar-wai BBS is a Hong Kong Second Wave filmmaker, internationally renowned as an auteur for his visually unique, highly stylized, emotionally resonant work, including Days of Being Wild , Ashes of Time , Chungking Express , Fallen Angels , Happy Together and 2046...
  
  
• Empty Nest directed by Daniel Burman
  Daniel Burman
  Daniel Burman is a film director, screenplay writer, and producer.According to film critic Joel Poblete, who writes for Mabuse, a cinema magazine, Daniel Burman is one of the members of the so-called "New Argentina Cinema" which began c...
  
  
• Every Little Step directed by James Stern and Adam Del Deo
• La Fille de Monaco directed by Anne Fontaine
  Anne Fontaine (filmmaker)
  Anne Fontaine is a filmmaker and screenwriter who used to be an actor. She lives and works in France.Born Fontaine Sibertin-Blanc, sister of actor Jean-Chrétien Sibertin-Blanc, she went as a young child to live in Lisbon, where her father, Antoine Sibertin-Blanc, is a music professor and cathedral...
  
   (France)
• Kanchivaram directed by Priyadarshan
  Priyadarshan
  Priyadarshan is an Indian film director, producer, and screenwriter. In a career spanning over two decades, Priyadarshan has directed over 80 films in several Indian languages including Malayalam, Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu...
  
   (India-Tamil)
• Ghost Town
  Ghost Town (film)
  Ghost Town is a 2008 American comedy-drama film directed by David Koepp, who also co-wrote the screenplay with John Kamps. It stars English comedian Ricky Gervais in his first leading feature-film role, as a dentist who can see and talk with ghosts, along with Téa Leoni as a young widow and Greg...
  
   directed by David Koepp
  David Koepp
  -Career:As a writer, Koepp has worked on such blockbuster Hollywood films as Jurassic Park, Mission Impossible, and Spider-Man. Koepp had a cameo as the "Unlucky Bastard" in The Lost World: Jurassic Park, in which he was serving as Writer and Second Unit Director.His work as a director has not had...
  
   (U.S.)
• Happy-Go-Lucky
  Happy-Go-Lucky
  Happy-Go-Lucky is a 2008 British Comedy-drama film written and directed by Mike Leigh. The screenplay focuses on a cheerful and optimistic primary-school teacher and her relationships with those around her...
  
   directed by Mike Leigh
  Mike Leigh
  Michael "Mike" Leigh, OBE is a British writer and director of film and theatre. He studied theatre at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and studied further at the Camberwell School of Art and the Central School of Art and Design. He began as a theatre director and playwright in the mid 1960s...
  
  
• I've Loved You So Long
  I've Loved You So Long
  I've Loved You So Long is a 2008 French-language drama film written and directed by Philippe Claudel. It tells the story of a woman struggling to interact with her family and find her place in society after spending fifteen years in prison.-Plot:...
  
   directed by Philippe Claudel
  Philippe Claudel
  Philippe Claudel , is a French writer and film director.Claudel was born in Dombasle-sur-Meurthe, Meurthe-et-Moselle. In addition to his writing, Claudel is a Professor of Literature at the University of Nancy....
  
   (France)
• New York, I Love You
  New York, I Love You
  New York, I Love You is a 2009 romance film released in the United States on October 16, 2009. From the producer of Paris, je t'aime, it stars an ensemble cast, among them Bradley Cooper, Shia LaBeouf, Natalie Portman, Anton Yelchin, Hayden Christensen, Orlando Bloom, Irrfan Khan, Rachel Bilson,...
  
   (a compilation of short films from 12 directors) including Natalie Portman
  Natalie Portman
  Natalie Hershlag , better known by her stage name Natalie Portman, is an actress with dual American and Israeli citizenship. Her first role was as an orphan taken in by a hitman in the 1994 French action film Léon, but major success came when she was cast as Padmé Amidala in the Star Wars prequel...
  
  , Allen Hughes
  Hughes Brothers
  Albert Hughes and Allen Hughes , known together professionally as the Hughes brothers, are American film directors, producers and screenwriters...
  
  , and Mira Nair
  Mira Nair
  Mira Nair is an Indian film director and producer based in New York. Her production company is Mirabai Films.She was educated at Delhi University and Harvard University. Her debut feature film, Salaam Bombay! , won the Golden Camera award at the Cannes Film Festival and also earned the nomination...
  
  
• Religulous
  Religulous
  Religulous is a 2008 American comic documentary film written by and starring comedian Bill Maher and directed by Larry Charles. The title of the film is a portmanteau derived from the words "religion" and "ridiculous"; the documentary examines and mocks organized religion and religious...
  
    directed by Larry Charles
  Larry Charles
  Larry Charles is an American writer, director, and producer. He is best known as a staff writer for the American sitcom Seinfeld for its first 5 seasons, contributing some of the show's darkest and most absurd storylines...
  
   (U.S.)
• RocknRolla
  RocknRolla
  RocknRolla is a 2008 British crime film written and directed by Guy Ritchie, and starring Gerard Butler, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Strong, Toby Kebbell, Tom Hardy, Idris Elba, Karel Roden, and Thandie Newton...
  
   directed by Guy Ritchie
  Guy Ritchie
  Guy Stuart Ritchie is an English screenwriter and film maker who directed Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch, Revolver, RocknRolla and Sherlock Holmes.-Early life:...
  
  
• Waltz with Bashir
  Waltz with Bashir
  Waltz with Bashir is a 2008 Israeli animated documentary film written and directed by Ari Folman. It depicts Folman in search of his lost memories from the 1982 Lebanon War....
  
   directed by Ari Folman
  Ari Folman
  Ari Folman is an Israeli film director, screenwriter and film score composer.-Biography:Ari Folman was born in Haifa to Holocaust survivors. His wife is also a film director...
  
  

Other films to be screened

• $9.99
  $9.99
  $9.99 is a 2008 Australian/Israeli stop motion film written and directed by Tatia Rosenthal, with the screenplay by Etgar Keret. This film marks the third collaboration between Rosenthal and Keret...
  
   directed by Tatia Rosenthal
• Before Tomorrow directed by Marie-Hélène Cousineau and Madeline Ivalu (Canada)
• Burn After Reading
  Burn After Reading
  Burn After Reading is a 2008 black comedy film written, produced, and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. The film stars George Clooney, John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, and Brad Pitt. It was released in the United States on September 12, 2008, and it was released on October 17, 2008...
  
   directed by Ethan Coen and Joel Coen
  Coen Brothers
  Joel David Coen and Ethan Jesse Coen known together professionally as the Coen brothers, are American filmmakers...
  
  
• Che
  Che (film)
  Che is a two-part 2008 biopic about Ernesto 'Che' Guevara directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring Benicio del Toro. Rather than follow a standard chronological order, the films offer an oblique series of interspersed moments along the overall timeline...
  
   (in two pieces) directed by Stephen Soderbergh (U.S.)
• The Class
  Entre les murs
  The Class is a 2008 French drama film directed by Laurent Cantet. Its original French title is Entre les murs, which translates literally to "Between the walls". It is based on the 2006 novel of the same name by François Bégaudeau...
  
   directed by Laurent Cantet
  Laurent Cantet
  Laurent Cantet is a French director, born on June 15, 1961 at Melle . His parents were schoolteachers in Ardilleux.On 25 May 2008, he received the Palme d'Or at the Festival de Cannes 2008, for the movie Entre les murs.- As director :...
  
  
• Cooper's Camera directed by Warren Sonada (Canada)
• Daytime Drinking directed by Young-seok Noh (Korea)
• Dean Spanley
  Dean Spanley
  Dean Spanley is a 2008 New Zealand and British comedy-drama film, with fantastic elements, from Miramax Films, Atlantic Film Group and General Film Corporation , directed by Fijian New Zealander Toa Fraser...
  
   directed by Toa Fraser
  Toa Fraser
  Toa Fraser, born in Britain in 1975, of a Fijian father and a British mother, is a playwright and film director. His second feature film, Dean Spanley, starring Sam Neill, Jeremy Northam and Peter O'Toole, premiered in September 2008.-Life:...
  
  
• Edison and Leo
  Edison and Leo
  Edison and Leo is a 2008 stop-motion animated feature film produced by Perfect Circle Production and Infinity Entertainment. It is Canada's first stop-motion animated feature.-Plot:...
  
   directed by Neil Burns
  Neil Burns
  Neil David Burns is a former English cricketer who played as a wicketkeeper/batsman for various clubs but spent the majority of his career at Leicestershire and Somerset...
  
   (Canada)
• Gigantic
  Gigantic (film)
  Gigantic is a 2008 independent comedy film directed by Matt Aselton and starring Paul Dano, Zooey Deschanel, John Goodman, Edward Asner and Jane Alexander...
  
   directed by Matt Aselton
• Hunger
  Hunger (2008 film)
  Hunger is a 2008 film about the 1981 Irish hunger strike. It was written by Enda Walsh and Steve R. McQueen, who also directed. It was made by Blast! Films and commissioned by Channel 4 and Film4. It premiered at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, winning the prestigious Caméra d'Or award for...
  
   directed by Steve McQueen
  Steve McQueen (artist)
  Steve Rodney McQueen CBE is a British artist and filmmaker. He is a winner of the Golden Camera at the Cannes Film Festival, a Turner Prize and BAFTA.-Early years:...
  
  
• Inju, la bete dans l'ombre
  Inju: The Beast in the Shadow
  Inju: The Beast in the Shadow is a 2008 film by Barbet Schroeder based on a 1928 novel by Japanese writer Edogawa Rampo...
  
   directed by Barbet Schroeder
  Barbet Schroeder
  Barbet Schroeder is a Franco-Swiss movie director and producer who started his career in French cinema in the 1960s, working together with directors such as Jean-Luc Godard and Jacques Rivette.-Life and career:...
  
  
• Last Stop 174 directed by Bruno Barreto
  Bruno Barreto
  Bruno Barreto is a Brazilian film director born in Rio de Janeiro. He has been making feature-length films ever since he was seventeen years old and remains one of Brazil’s most accomplished and popular directors to this day...
  
   (Brazil)
• Lovely, Still directed by Nik Fackler
• Lymelife directed by Derick Martini and Steve Martini
• Nothing But the Truth
  Nothing But the Truth (2008 film)
  Nothing but the Truth is a 2008 American drama film written and directed by Rod Lurie. According to comments made by Lurie in The Truth Hurts, a bonus feature on the DVD release, his inspiration for the screenplay was the case of journalist Judith Miller, who in July 2005 was jailed for contempt of...
  
   directed by Rod Lurie
  Rod Lurie
  Rod Lurie is an Israeli-American director, screenwriter and former film critic.-Early life and career:The son of internationally syndicated cartoonist Ranan Lurie, he was born in Israel but moved to the United States at a young age, growing up in Greenwich, Connecticut, and Honolulu,...
  
  
• Public Enemy No. One directed by Jean-Francois Richet
• Real Time directed by Randall Cole (Canada)
• Singh Is Kinng
  Singh Is Kinng
  Singh is Kinng is a 2008 Bollywood comedy film. The film is directed by Anees Bazmee and stars Akshay Kumar and Katrina Kaif, the film also featured a music video with Snoop Dogg. About 75% of the movie was shot in Australia, around the Gold Coast region and Brisbane using an Australian production...
  
   directed by Anees Bazmee
  Anees Bazmee
  Anees Bazmee is an Indian film director, film writer, Screenplay writer who works in the Bollywood film industry.-Career:Bazmee started his career in 1988, as a dialogue writer for the film Hum Farishte Nahin. He then took a year break, and returned in 1990 as a writer for the film Swarg, which was...
  
  
• Slumdog Millionaire
  Slumdog Millionaire
  Slumdog Millionaire is a 2008 British epic romantic drama adventure film directed by Danny Boyle, written by Simon Beaufoy, and co-directed in India by Loveleen Tandan. It is an adaptation of the novel Q & A by Indian author and diplomat Vikas Swarup...
  
   directed by Danny Boyle
  Danny Boyle
  Daniel "Danny" Boyle is an English filmmaker and producer. He is best known for his work on films such as Slumdog Millionaire, 127 Hours, 28 Days Later, Sunshine and Trainspotting. For Slumdog Millionaire, Boyle won numerous awards in 2008, including the Academy Award for Best Director...
  
   (U.K.)
• Snow directed by Aida Begić
• The Stoning of Soraya M.
  The Stoning of Soraya M.
  The Stoning of Soraya M. is a 2008 American drama film adapted from French-Iranian journalist Freidoune Sahebjam's 1990 book La Femme Lapidée, based on a true story...
  
   directed by Cyrus Nowrasteh
  Cyrus Nowrasteh
  Cyrus Nowrasteh , born September 19, 1956, is an American screenwriter and director of theatrical films, television shows, and made-for-TV movies. He is best known for his involvement in the controversial docudrama The Path to 9/11.- Biography :...
  
  
• Tulpan directed by Sergey Dvortsevoy
• Who Do You Love?
  Who Do You Love?
  "Who Do You Love?" is a song written and recorded in 1956 by Bo Diddley. The record features Jody Williams, then a member of Bo Diddley's band, on lead guitar.-Legacy:...
  
   directed by Jerry Zaks
  Jerry Zaks
  Jerry Zaks is a German-born American stage and television director, and actor. He won the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Play and Drama Desk Award for directing The House of Blue Leaves, Lend Me A Tenor, and Six Degrees of Separation and the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical and Drama...
  
  
• What Doesn't Kill You directed by Brian Goodman
  Brian Goodman
  Brian Goodman is an American film and television director, writer, and actor.-Brief background:At 12, Goodman quit school and started living on the streets. He sold drugs, married young, and served time in prison for his criminal activity. It was not until he saw Brian's Song that Goodman made a...
  
  
• Anonyma - Eine Frau in Berlin (A Woman in Berlin) directed by Max Färberböck
  Max Färberböck
  Max Färberböck is a German film director and writer. He was born in Degerndorf, Münsing, Bavaria. He began his career at theaters in Buenos Aires and in Italy. He later studied at the University of Television and Film in Munich and worked for Constantin Film and as an assistant for Peter Zadek at...
  
   (Germany)
• A Year in Winter directed by Caroline Link
  Caroline Link
  Caroline Link , is a German film director and screenwriter.-Life and work:Caroline Link is the daughter of Jürgen and Ilse Link. From 1986 to 1990 she studied at the Munich Academy of Film and Television , and then worked as an assistant director and script writer.Link's early work includes the...
  
  

Masters program

• 24 City
  24 City
  24 City is a 2008 film directed and co-written by Chinese filmmaker Jia Zhangke. The film follows three generations of characters in Chengdu as a state-owned factory gives way to a modern apartment complex...
  
   directed by Jia Zhangke
  Jia Zhangke
  Jia Zhangke is a Chinese film director. He is generally regarded as a leading figure of the "Sixth Generation" movement of Chinese cinema, a group that also includes such figures as Wang Xiaoshuai and Zhang Yuan....
  
  
• Adam Resurrected directed by Paul Schrader
  Paul Schrader
  Paul Joseph Schrader is an American screenwriter, film director, and former film critic. Apart from his credentials as a director, Schrader is most notably known for his screenplays for Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver and Raging Bull....
  
  
• Everlasting Moments
  Everlasting Moments
  Everlasting Moments is a 2008 Swedish drama film directed by Jan Troell, starring Maria Heiskanen, Mikael Persbrandt and Jesper Christensen. It is based on the true story of Maria Larsson, a Swedish working class woman in the early 1900s, who wins a camera in a lottery and goes on to become a...
  
   directed by Jan Troell
• Four Nights With Anna directed by Jerzy Skolimowski
  Jerzy Skolimowski
  Jerzy Skolimowski is a Polish film director, screenwriter, dramatist and actor. A graduate of the prestigious National Film School in Łódź, Skolimowski has directed more than twenty films since his 1960 début Oko wykol...
  
  
• Of Time and the City
  Of Time and the City
  Of Time and the City is a 2008 documentary film directed by Terence Davies.The film has Davies recalling his life growing up in Liverpool in the 1950s and 1960s, using newsreel and documentary footage supplemented by his own commentary voiceover and contemporaneous and classical music...
  
   directed by Terence Davies (U.K.)
• Lorna's Silence directed by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne (U.K.)
• Three Monkeys
  Three Monkeys
  Three Monkeys a 2008 Turkish film directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan. The film was Turkey's official submission for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film at the 81st Academy Awards, and it made the January short-list but was not nominated.-Plot:...
  
   directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan
  Nuri Bilge Ceylan
  Nuri Bilge Ceylan is a Turkish photographer and film director. He is married to the filmmaker, photographer, and actress Ebru Ceylan, his co-star in İklimler .-Life:Ceylan learned photography at age 15, and developed an interest in film at 22....
  
   (Turkey)
• Tokyo Sonata
  Tokyo Sonata
  is a 2008 film directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa. It won the award for Best Film at the 3rd Asian Film Awards and received 2008 Asia Pacific Screen Awards nominations for Achievement in Directing and Best Screenplay...
  
   directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa
  Kiyoshi Kurosawa
  is a Japanese filmmaker. He is best known for his many contributions to the Japanese horror genre.-Biography:Born in Kobe on July 19, 1955, Kiyoshi Kurosawa is not related to director Akira Kurosawa...
  
  

Vanguard and visions

• Afterwards
  Afterwards
  Afterwards is a 2009 English-language psychological thriller film directed by Gilles Bourdos and starring Romain Duris, John Malkovich and Evangeline Lilly. Based on Guillaume Musso's novel Et après..., the story tells of a workaholic lawyer who is told by a self-proclaimed visionary that he must...
  
   directed by Gilles Bourdos
  Gilles Bourdos
  Gilles Bourdos is a French film director, screenwriter and producer. He is best known for his atmospheric thrillers, which use troubling themes in contrast with powerful aesthetic imagery...
  
  
• Uncertainty
  Uncertainty (film)
  Uncertainty is a 2008 indie drama and thriller film, written, produced, and directed by American independent filmmakers Scott McGehee and David Siegel, and starring Lynn Collins and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. It was first released at the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival.Distribution rights were...
  
   directed by Scott McGehee and David Siegel
• Universalove
  Universalove
  Universalove is a 2008 Austrian romantic tragedy film directed by Thomas Woschitz. It debuted in Canada at the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival on September 5, 2008, and, after a re-edit which involved substituting the New York episode, was awarded the Max-Ophüls Preis at the 30th...
  
   directed by Thomas Woschitz (Austria)
• Tears For Sale
  Charleston & Vendetta
  Tears for Sale also known internationally as Charleston & Vendetta or also as Funeral Brides is a Serbian film.Directed by Uroš Stojanović, it's starring Sonja Kolačarić, Katarina Radivojević, Nenad...
  
   directed by Uros Stojanovic (Serbia)
• Vinyan
  Vinyan
  Vinyan is a 2008 drama film with horror themes directed and co-written by Fabrice du Welz. The film was du Welz' second as a director. The film premiered at the Venice Film Festival on 30 August 2008....
  
   directed by Fabrice du Welz
  Fabrice Du Welz
  Fabrice Du Welz is a Belgian film director and screenwriter.- Biography :Du Welz studied at the Conservatory of Dramatic Arts in Liège and at INSAS, a film school in Brussels. In the 90's he directed many films in Super 8 and wrote humorous sequences for Canal +...
  
  

Midnight Madness

• Acolytes directed by Jon Hewitt
• The Burrowers
  The Burrowers
  The Burrowers is a 2008 horror/thriller film with a Western theme. The film is based on a seven-part television series from director JT Petty.-Plot:...
  
   directed by J.T. Petty
• Chocolate
  Chocolate (2008 film)
  Chocolate , also known as Zen, Warrior Within, is a 2008 Thai martial arts film starring Yanin "Jeeja" Vismistananda in her debut film performance. It is directed by Prachya Pinkaew, with martial arts choreography by Panna Rittikrai...
  
   directed by Prachya Pinkaew
  Prachya Pinkaew
  Prachya Pinkaew is a Thai film director, film producer and screenwriter. His films include Ong-Bak: Muay Thai Warrior and Tom-Yum-Goong, both martial arts films starring Tony Jaa.-Biography:...
  
   (Thailand)
• Deadgirl directed by Marcel Sarmiento and Gadi Harel (U.S.)
• Detroit Metal City
  Detroit Metal City
  is a vulgar comedy manga series, serialized in Young Animal from 2005 to 2010. An anime OVA series, twelve episodes of approximately 13 minutes each, was released starting on August 8, 2008. A live film adaptation directed by Toshio Lee appeared in Japanese theaters on August 23, 2008...
  
   directed by Toshio Lee
• Eden Log directed by Franck Vestiel
• JCVD
  JCVD
  JCVD is a crime-based comedy drama directed by French-Tunisian director Mabrouk El Mechri, and starring Jean-Claude Van Damme as a semi-fictionalized version of himself, a down-and-out action star whose family and career are crumbling around him as he is caught in the middle of a post office heist...
  
   directed by Mabrouk El Mechri
• Martyrs
  Martyrs (film)
  Martyrs is a 2008 French-Canadian horror film written and directed by Pascal Laugier. It was first screened during the 2008 Cannes Film Festival at the Marché du Film. The film was released in France publicly on 3 September 2008. The U.S. rights for Martyrs were bought by The Weinstein Company, who...
  
    directed by Pascal Laugier
• Not Quite Hollywood
  Not Quite Hollywood
  Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation! is a 2008 Australian documentary film about the Australian New Wave of 1970s and '80s low-budget cinema...
  
   directed by Mark Hartley (Australia)
• Sexykiller
  Sexykiller
  Sexykiller, morirás por ella is a 2008 Spanish comedy horror film directed by Miguel Martí, the film was released in Spain in October 2008.-Cast:* Macarena Gómez - Bárbara / Sexykiller* Angel De Andrés - Inspector* Carolina Bona - María...
  
   directed by Miguel Marti

Sprockets (family fare)

• Bridge to Terabithia
  Bridge to Terabithia (2007 film)
  Bridge to Terabithia is a 2007 fantasy drama film directed by Gábor Csupó and adapted for film by David L. Paterson and Jeff Stockwell. The film is based on the Katherine Paterson novel of the same name, and distributed by Walt Disney Pictures in the US. The film stars Josh Hutcherson, AnnaSophia...
  
   directed by Gábor Csupó
  Gábor Csupó
  Gábor Csupó is a Hungarian-born animator, writer, film director and music producer. He is co-founder of the animation studio Klasky Csupo, which has produced shows like Rugrats, Duckman, and Aaahh!!! Real Monsters.-Career:...
  
   (Germany)
• Krabat directed by Marco Kreuzpaintner
• Mia et le Migou directed by Remy Girerd
• The Secret of Moonacre
  The Secret of Moonacre
  The Secret of Moonacre is a film adaptation of the novel The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge. The film, which started filming on 1 October 2007, was released in the UK February 2009 by Warner Bros. The film will be distributed to select theatres in the United States on August 12, 2010...
  
   directed by Gábor Csupó
  Gábor Csupó
  Gábor Csupó is a Hungarian-born animator, writer, film director and music producer. He is co-founder of the animation studio Klasky Csupo, which has produced shows like Rugrats, Duckman, and Aaahh!!! Real Monsters.-Career:...
  
  
• Sunshine Barry & the Disco Worms directed by Thomas Borch Nielsen

Wavelengths (avant-garde showcase)

• Derrière moi directed by Rafael Ouellet (Canada)
• Le Genou d'Artemide directed by Jean-Marie Straub
  Jean-Marie Straub
  Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet were a duo of filmmakers who made two dozen films between 1963 and 2006...
  
  
• Pontypool directed by Bruce McDonald
• RR
  RR (film)
  RR is a 2008 film by American, James Benning. Shot in 16 mm film, as most of Benning's films are, RR is another in Benning's series of American experimental landscape films; this one focusing on trains and their surrounding environs...
  
   directed by James Benning
  James Benning (film director)
  James Benning is an American filmmaker. He is the son of German immigrants and studied film at the University of Wisconsin–Madison under the tutelage of David Bordwell. Working as an independent filmmaker, Benning's films focus on a sense of place, and are often built from long, unedited takes...
  
   (U.S.)
• The Secret History of the Dividing Line (part of series) directed by David Gatten
  David Gatten
  David Edward Gatten is an American experimental filmmaker and moving image artist. Since 1996 Gatten's films have explored the intersection of the printed word and moving image, cataloging the variety of ways in which texts functions in cinema as both language and image, writing and drawing, often...
  
  
• When It Was Blue directed by Jennifer Reeves

Contemporary world cinema

• 33 Scenes From Life directed by Malgosia Szumowska (Poland)
• Five Dollars a Day
  Five Dollars a Day
  Five Dollars a Day is a comedy film directed by Nigel Cole, produced by Capitol Films subsidiary ThinkFilm and starring Christopher Walken, Alessandro Nivola, Amanda Peet, and Sharon Stone. The project dates back to 2003 when Nick Cassavetes had signed on to direct, but a year later was replaced...
  
   directed by Nigel Cole
  Nigel Cole
  Nigel Cole is a British film and television director.Cole began his career in the 1980s, directing current affairs shows and documentaries for Central Independent Television. Into the 1990s, Cole co-wrote the play Sod with Arthur Smith, which he also directed and presented at the Pleasance during...
  
  
• Acne directed by Frederica Veiroj
• The Country Teacher directed by Bohdan Sláma
  Bohdan Sláma
  Bohdan Sláma is a Czech film director. He studied at the Film and Television Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague .- Filmography :* 2008 – Venkovský učitel...
  
   (Czech Republic/Germany/France)
• Delta directed by Kornel Mundruczo
• Un ete sans point ni coup sur directed by Francis Leclerc
  Francis Leclerc
  Francis Leclerc is a Canadian film and television director, screenwriter and film editor.- Recognition :* 2005 Genie Award for Best Achievement in Direction - Looking for Alexander - Won...
  
   (Canada)
• Fear Me Not directed by Kristian Levring
  Kristian Levring
  Kristian Levring is a Danish director born in 1957. He was the fourth signatory of Dogme95 movement in cinema.-Biography:He lived eight years in France. He graduated in editing at the National Film School of Denmark and has edited a large number of documentaries and feature films besides directing...
  
  
• Flame & Citron
  Flame & Citron
  Flame & Citron is a 2008 Danish drama/action co-written and directed by Ole Christian Madsen. The film, a fictionalized account based on fact, is about two Danish resistance movement fighters during the Nazi occupation of Denmark.- Plot :...
  
   directed by Ole Christian Madsen
• El Greco directed by Yannis Smaragdis
  Yannis Smaragdis
  Yannis Smaragdis is a Greek film director.He was born in Crete in 1946 and studied film in Greece and Paris, France. He appeared in 1972 with his short film Two Three Things... which received the first prize in the Athens Festival as well as a Special Mention in the Montreal Film Festival...
  
  
• L'Heure d'été
  L'Heure d'été
  Summer Hours is a 2008 French drama film directed by Olivier Assayas. It is the second in a series of films produced by Musée d'Orsay, after The Flight of the Red Balloon...
  
   directed by Olivier Assayas
  Olivier Assayas
  Olivier Assayas is a French film director and screenwriter.He made his debut in 1986, after directing some short films and writing for the influential film magazine Cahiers du cinéma.-Career:...
  
  
• Knitting
  Knitting (film)
  Knitting is a 2008 Chinese film directed by Yin Lichuan. Yin's second film as director, Knitting is a romantic drama. The film was adapted by Yin from the short story "The Story of Li Ai and Haihai" by author Amei....
  
   directed by Yin Lichuan
  Yin Lichuan
  Yin Lichuan is a Chinese writer, poet and filmmaker. A graduate of Peking University, Yin made her name writing novels and poetry, including A Little More Comfort and Fucker. She is known as a member of the "Lower Body Poets."...
  
  
• Linha de Passe
  Linha de Passe
  Linha de Passe is a 2008 Brazilian film directed by Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas. Written by Salles, Thomas and Bráulio Mantovani, the film stars Vinícius de Oliveira and Sandra Corveloni, who won the Best Actress Award at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival for her role, which was her first in a...
  
   directed Walter Salles
  Walter Salles
  Walter Moreira Salles, Jr. is a Brazilian filmmaker and film producer of international prominence.-Life and career:Salles was born in Rio de Janeiro. He is the son of Elizinha Goncalves and Walter Moreira Salles, a Brazilian banker and ambassador, and the brother of João Moreira Salles, also a...
  
   and Daniela Thomas
  Daniela Thomas
  Daniela Thomas is a Brazilian film director, screenwriter and editor.-Biography:Thomas, whose birthname is Daniela Gontijo Alves Pinto, is the daughter of the famous cartoonist Ziraldo Alves Pinto and the sister of Golden Globe Award-nominated film score composer Antonio Pinto.In 1994 she...
  
   (Brazil)
• Lion's Den directed by Pablo Trapero
  Pablo Trapero
  Pablo Trapero is an Argentine film producer, editor and director.His films are known for portraying the lives of ordinary people, and usually involving some form of social criticism to modern society, such as his movie Mundo Grúa , or the highly-acclaimed El...
  
  
• Lost Song
  Lost Song
  Lost Song is a 2008 film by Canadian director Rodrigue Jean, his third long feature after Full Blast and Yellowknife. It won the Best Canadian Film Award at the Toronto International Film Festival.-Plot:...
  
   directed by Rodrigue Jean
  Rodrigue Jean
  Rodrigue Jean is an award-winning Canadian film director of Acadian origin. He studied biology, sociology and literature. He was a dancer and choreographer in the 1980s. He then studied theatre and directing in London and Tokyo....
  
  
• Maman est chez le coiffeur directed by Lea Pool
  Léa Pool
  Léa Pool is a Swiss-Canadian filmmaker who has also taught film at UQAM. She is openly lesbian. Her 1986 film Anne Trister was entered into the 36th Berlin International Film Festival. Her 1999 film Emporte-moi was entered into the 49th Berlin International Film Festival where it won the Special...
  
   (Canada)
• Middle of Nowhere
  Middle of Nowhere (film)
  Middle of Nowhere is a 2008 coming-of-age comedy-drama film directed by John Stockwell, written by Michelle Morgan, and starring Susan Sarandon and her real-life daughter, Eva Amurri. It premiered at the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival...
  
   directed by John Stockwell
  John Stockwell (actor)
  John Stockwell is an American actor, director, producer, writer and former model.Stockwell was born John Stockwell Samuels IV in Galveston, Texas, the son of an attorney. His first feature film as an actor came in 1981's So Fine...
  
  
• Mothers & Daughters directed by Carl Bessai
• My Mother, My Bride and I directed by Hans Steinbichler
• The Narrows
  The Narrows (2008 film)
  The Narrows is an American 2008 independent film starring Kevin Zegers, Sophia Bush, Vincent D'Onofrio, Eddie Cahill and Monica Keena.-Plot:...
  
   directed by François Velle
• Patrik, Age 1.5 directed by Ella Lemhagen
• Pandora's Box directed by Yeşim Ustaoğlu
• Restless directed by Amos Kollek
  Amos Kollek
  Amos Kollek is an Israeli film director, writer and actor.-Biography:Amos Kollek was born in Jerusalem. He is the son of Teddy Kollek, the long-time mayor of Jerusalem. Kollek studied psychology and philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He became interested in film after working as a...
  
  
• Revanche directed by Götz Spielmann
  Götz Spielmann
  Götz Spielmann is an Austrian director and scriptwriter.Götz Spielmann grew up in Vienna. After High School, he lived in Paris for several months. From 1980 to 1987 he studied film direction and script-writing in Vienna at the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien...
  
  
• Skin directed by Anthony Fabian
• Teza directed by Haile Gerima
  Haile Gerima
  Haile Gerima is an Ethiopian filmmaker, who resides in the United States. He is a leading member of the L.A. Rebellion film movement, also known as the Los Angeles School of Black Filmmakers. His films have received wide international acclaim. Gerima has also been an influential film professor at...
  
  
• Three Wise Men directed by Mika Kaurismaki
  Mika Kaurismäki
  Mika Juhani Kaurismäki is a Finnish film director.He is the elder brother of Aki Kaurismäki, and the father of Maria Kaurismäki who graduated from Tampere School of Art and Media in 2008 with her movie Sideline.Mika Kaurismäki has lived in Brazil since approximately 1992 and has made several...
  
  
• Toronto Stories (four part anthology) directed by David Weaver, Sudz Sutherland
  Sudz Sutherland
  David "Sudz" Sutherland is a Canadian film director and screenwriter. His credits include the films Doomstown, Love, Sex and Eating the Bones and Guns, as well as episodes of Da Kink in My Hair, Degrassi: The Next Generation, Wild Roses and Jozi-H...
  
  , Aaron Woodley and Sook-Yin Lee
  Sook-Yin Lee
  Sook-Yin Lee is a Canadian musician, filmmaker, actress and media personality.-Background:Lee grew up in a Vancouver suburb, the second-oldest daughter of immigrants. She was raised as a devout Roman Catholic. Her father was a post-World War II orphan from Hong Kong, her mother an escapee from...
  
   (Canada)
• Two-Legged Horse directed by Samira Makhmalbaf
  Samira Makhmalbaf
  Samira Makhmalbaf is an internationally acclaimed Iranian filmmaker and script writer. She is the daughter of Mohsen Makhmalbaf, the film director and writer. Samira Makhmalbaf belongs to the New Wave movement within Iranian cinema...
  
  
• White Night Wedding
  White Night Wedding
  White Night Wedding is a 2008 Icelandic film directed by Baltasar Kormákur. The bittersweet comedy, about the never-ending search for love and happiness, takes place in Flatey, Breiðafjörður, western Iceland. The film is loosely based on the play Ivanov by Anton Chekhov.-Plot:The film opens with...
  
   directed by Baltasar Kormakur
  Baltasar Kormákur
  Baltasar Kormákur is an Icelandic actor, theater and film director, and film producer. He is best known for directing the films 101 Reykjavík, Hafið, A Little Trip to Heaven , and a film based on the book Mýrin by Arnaldur Indriðason...
  
  

The Real to Reel (docu program)

• Blind Loves directed by Juraj Lehotsky
• Examined Life
  Examined Life
  Examined Life is a 2008 documentary film directed by Astra Taylor. The film features eight influential contemporary philosophers walking around New York and other metropolises and discussing the practical application of their ideas in modern culture....
  
   directed by Astra Taylor
  Astra Taylor
  Astra Taylor is a Canadian-American documentary filmmaker and writer, best known for her 2005 film, Zizek!, about the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek, and for her 2008 film, Examined Life....
  
  
• La memoire des anges directed by Luc Bourdon
• Paris, Not France directed by Adria Petty
• The Real Shaolin
  The Real Shaolin
  The Real Shaolin is an award-winning 2008 documentary film directed by Alexander Sebastien Lee. The Real Shaolin follows the story of two Chinese and two Westerners who journey to the Shaolin Temple in China, inspired by the legends portrayed in Kung Fu movies with Bruce Lee and Jet Li...
  
   directed by Alexander Sebastien Lee
• Under Rich Earth directed by Malcolm Rogge
• 7915 KM directed by Nikolaus Geyrhalter

External links

• Full List of TIFF 08 Films & Schedules
• TIFFReviews.com - coverage of TIFF '08 with news, reviews, blogs, photos and videos
• Variety, Jul. 23, 2008, "Van Damme's JCVD to hit Toronto", (wavelengths, midnight madness, family fare)
• "TIFF slots 'Appaloosa,' 'Other Man'", Variety, By Michael Jones, July 17, 2008
• "Toronto Unveils Canadian selection" Variety, By Brendan Kelly July 15, 2008
• "Secret Life of Bees' stings Toronto" Variety, Jul. 10, 2008
• "Cannes winners trot to Toronto: Fest unveils first pics in slate" Variety, by Jennie Punter, Jun. 26, 2008