"American Fiction" is the People's Choice Winner at TIFF. That's usually an Oscar omen.

by Nathaniel R

American Fiction (coming from MGM)

Oscar-campaigning will probably look a lot different this season as Ben recently noted. With the strike ongoing and no resolution in sight there will be a glamour vacuum. Nature abhors a vaccuum so maybe the prestige of prizes from the Big Five festivals will gain yet more importance? Chronologically that's Sundance (A Thousand and One), Berlinale (On the Adamant -- a French documentary), Cannes (Anatomy of a Fall - France's Oscar submission finalist), and Venice (Yorgos Lanthimos' Poor Things), with Toronto as the capper.  TIFF '23 ends today (though if we know ever-prolific Cláudio, there's a few more posts coming). Toronto is not juried in the traditional way that it's predecessors on the calendar are so the People's Choice Winner is the big prize.

American Fiction, starring Jeffrey Wright, took that coveted honor for 2023. It will be released by MGM on November 3rd. The satire is about an author who writes an awful book in protest of the industries treatment of black authors that becomes a best-seller (to his horror). The majority of winners of this prize go on to Best Picture nominations. The full list of prizes is after the jump...

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TIFF '23: "The New Boy" and "Kidnapped"

by Cláudio Alves 

A boy contemplates Jesus on the cross, the figure's perpetual suffering a striking sight. Because he's not been raised Christian, the youth relates more to the depicted pain than the iconography's meaning. In a show of naïve empathy that others would read as sacrilegious, he frees Christ, ripping the nails out of the cross. Whether the son of god's body tumbles a wooden fall or walks away reborn depends on the film, but the basic premise of these scenes ties Warwick Thornton's The New Boy and Marco Bellocchio's Kidnapped together. 

Both films consider historical atrocities done in the name of good, unmoored children at the center of a religious storm. Thornton sees a fictional aboriginal boy as a synecdoche for his colonized people, while the Italian master dramatizes the real-life episode of a Jewish boy taken from his family…

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TIFF '23: Zar Amir Ebrahimi mesmerizes as "Shayda"

by Cláudio Alves

"Shayda" is coming to US theaters on December 1st from Sony Pictures Classics.

Though I've hardly been running after Oscar contenders while at TIFF – apologies if that's what you wanted out of this coverage – the Best International Film race remains at the forefront of my mind. With new daily announcements, the festival's an excellent opportunity to catch some titles that could be hard to track down later in the season. So, a lot of my scheduling has been built around productions that might end up in that race or have already been confirmed for the 96th Academy Awards. Not all of the experiences are positive, but  a few of them are revelatory.

Such is the case of Noora Niasari's feature debut, Shayda, representing Australia. If you thought Zar Amir Ebrahimi was remarkable in last year's Holy Spider, wait to see what she does here…

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What Does Oscar Campaigning Look Like During the Strikes?

By Ben Miller

The fall film festival season is upon us, but with a notable exception.  The usual lineup of Hollywood A-listers are (mostly) absent due to studio greed and the continuing SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes.  But so far, the date of the 96th Oscars haven't moved.  Unless the strikes are resolved more quickly than anyone believes they will be, the best films and performances will have to go toe-to-toe without the benefit of a robust campaign.

But what does an Oscar campaign look like if you aren't allowed to campaign?  

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International Oscar - French finalists and Chart updates

by Nathaniel R

Anatomy of a Fall

Oscar often shouted "Viva La France!" in the 20th century. They're still enthused in the 21st century but they're no longer broadcasting it as loudly. France hasn't won since 1992's Indochine 31 years ago. Still they've continued to collect frequent ominations. In fact, they're the most nominated country of all time by such a significant margin that it's difficult to imagine another country catching up (especially with closest rival in this regard, Italy, being less frequently nominated these days). This year France is choosing between five pictures, two of which (at least) would make formidable contenders if selected. The other three might, too, but their profiles are considerably lower at the moment. The finalists are... 

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