What to expect from this year’s Toronto International Film Festival

Hollywood may be mostly shut down, but festival season is still chugging along. The Venice International Film Festival, which winds down this week, saw its fair share of pro-union speeches, controversial guests and opinions, and, as always, buzzy premieres ready to hit wider distribution in the coming months. Now, film fanatics, Oscar voters, and Letterboxd users at large are turning their attention to the Toronto International Film Festival, which kicks off tonight with the North American premiere of Hayao Miyazaki’s 12th and final film, The Boy And The Heron. Here’s what to expect from one of the largest festivals in the world.

What’s on?

TIFF will be screening over 200 features this year, including many hotly anticipated and potentially Oscar-winning titles. As stated above, Miyazaki’s The Boy And The Heron, which was already released in Japan (without any promotion), will have its North American premiere on the festival’s opening night.

While most actors will not be allowed to promote their films on the red carpet per the rules of the SAG-AFTRA strike (more on that below), they are certainly having a moment behind the camera. The festival will premiere directorial debuts from Patricia Arquette (Gonzo Girl, starring Camila Morrone and Willem Dafoe), Chris Pine (Poolman, in which he also stars), Finn Wolfhard (Hell Of A Summer, which he co-directed), and Anna Kendrick (Woman Of The Hour), along with upcoming films from Viggo Mortensen (a Western called The Dead Don’t Hurt) and Ethan Hawke (Wildcat, which stars his daughter Maya Hawke as author Flannery O’Connor).

Music documentaries are also making a good showing, with films about Nickelback (Hate To Love: Nickelback), Paul Simon (In Restless Dreams: The Music Of Paul Simon), and Lil Nas X (Lil Nas X: Long Live Montero) all on the schedule. Other premieres include A24's first (and raunchiest) movie musical Dicks: The Musical, Taika Waititi’s soccer underdog story Next Goal Wins, GameStop stock squeeze tale Dumb Money, Dakota Johnson-starring Daddio, and Kitty Green directed The Royal Hotel. You can check out the full list of films here.

Who is attending?

As with Venice, some films produced by independent studios (a.k.a. those not under the scope of AMPTP) have been granted interim agreements by SAG-AFTRA to send their stars to the Canadian red carpet. Per Deadline, this roster includes Sean Penn and Dakota Johnson for Daddio, Finn Wolfhard for Hell Of A Summer, Viggo Mortensen for The Dead Don’t Hurt, and Maya Hawke and Laura Linney for Wildcat.

Deadline also reports that some films are still working to finalize their agreements, so their stars aren’t 100% confirmed yet. These maybes include Nicolas Cage for A24's Dream Scenario, Michael Keaton for Knox Goes Away, Kate Winslet for Lee, and Bobby Cannavale for Ezra. We’ll see if any of them actually show up, and if they do, how they use their precious time in front of the camera.