There have been whispers about TIFF trying to one-up its impressive lineup of World Premieres slate from last year. For the last decade or so, it’s had to give up its glory days of the ‘90s and 00’s to competitive fests such as Venice and Telluride. However, last year there seemed to be a resurgence of World Premieres at the fest. Toronto’s WP slate was the most impressive it’s been in over a decade: Green Book, Widows, If Beale Street Could Talk and High Life (just to name a few) all premiered at the fest, bypassing Venice and Telluride.
It does look like TIFF is trying to continue the momentum of last year’s edition, which premiered eventual Best Picture Oscar winner “Green Book,” something that hasn’t happened since the late ‘90s for the festival. Was last year’s impressive lineup of films a way to end retiring Festival director Piers Handler’s two- decade tenure with a bang? Supposedly, it wasn’t. According to a source, this sudden burst of World Premieres has to do with TIFF implementing stricter rules on submitted films. Toronto and new head Cameron Bailey are now using “holds” on films, meaning a movie, such as what they are doing with Robert Eggers’ “The Lighthouse,” cannot be screened anywhere else in the world until it lands in Toronto. This has made it rather difficult for Venice and Telluride to lock-up world premieres.
With the success of “Green Book” at the Oscars, I would assume that some Hollywood studios are going to be using the same blueprint as Peter Farelly’s Oscar-winning film by premiering their contenders exclusively at Toronto. It remains to be seen if this will be a short-lived experiment or if it will become the norm in the years to come, but what we do know, is that we will get a clearer picture of it all when Toronto announces their lineup on July 24th.
Of course, we all know the rule: take these reactions with a grain of salt rather than treating them as gospel. Still, I will say that the film tested like gangbusters earlier this year, and Lionsgate clearly has confidence.