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Festival coverage

Toronto International Film Festival

7 September – 17 September 2023

With a star studded selection of headliners and 37 world premières announced so far, the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival is the place to be if you want to get early sight of the coming year's big hitters. It opens with Kristoffer Borgli's Dream Scenario, which features Nicolas Cage, and includes work by Taika Waititi, Kaouther Ben Hania and Alice Rohrwacher.

The festival runs from 7 to 17 September.

Other years (4)

Box office and information

Latest reviews

  • The Teacher
    Review preview for The Teacher

    A Teacher is not the most finely crafted film, but it is a cri de cœur.

    Jennie Kermode · 3 out of 5
    A Palestinian schoolteacher struggles to reconcile his risky commitment to political resistance with the chance of a new relationship with volunteer-worker and his emotional support for one of his students.
  • Lee
    Review preview for Lee

    Winslet performance holds a powerful sway, embracing Lee’s abrasive and conflicted personality and viewing the horrors with an analytical eye and a sense of bravado as well as despair.

    Richard Mowe · 3 out of 5
    The story of photographer Elizabeth 'Lee' Miller, a fashion model who became an acclaimed war correspondent for Vogue magazine during the Second World War.
  • The Critic
    Review preview for The Critic

    In its early stages, the film stands up pretty well. It’s when it reaches the blackmail stage of the story that it falters.

    Jennie Kermode · 3 out of 5
    A theatre critic enlists a glamorous young actress in a desperate scheme.
  • Sing Sing
    Review preview for Sing Sing

    Using a mix of both professional and amateur actors the film reveals the intimate details and attitudes of these incarcerated individuals

    Richard Mowe · 4 out of 5
    A theatre group escapes the reality of incarceration through the creativity of staging a play, with a cast that includes actors who have been incarcerated.
  • Close To You
    Review preview for Close To You

    Rather than watching Sam from a distance, with curiosity, we are very much aligned with him, experiencing the world as he does, noticing the things that don’t make sense about other people.

    Jennie Kermode · 5 out of 5
    A young man happens to encounter with an old friend on his way back home to a dreaded family reunion that forces him to confront long-buried memories.
  • Widow Clicquot
    Review preview for Widow Clicquot

    Despite its many grand visual flourishes, this is a film which succeeds because of its attention to detail, especially in the performances.

    Jennie Kermode · 4 out of 5
    The story behind the Veuve Clicquot champagne family and business that began in the late 18th century.
  • Poolman
    Review preview for Poolman

    The only mystery is why anyone would stay to the end of Poolman.

    Donald Munro · 1 out of 5
    A hapless dreamer and would-be philosopher spends his days looking after the pool of the Tahitian Tiki apartment block in sunny LA. When he uncovers a water heist, he does what he can to protect the city.
  • Boy Kills World
    Review preview for Boy Kills World

    The film goes at it with all the manic intensity of an old Saturday morning kids TV show: Wacaday cruentus.

    Donald Munro · 3.5 out of 5
    A dystopian fever dream action film that follows Boy, a deaf mute with a vibrant imagination. When his family is murdered, he is trained by a mysterious shaman to repress his childish imagination and become an instrument of death.
  • The Dead Don't Hurt
    Review preview for The Dead Don't Hurt

    A small and human story in the sweep of a West both mythic and mundane.

    Andrew Robertson · 4 out of 5
    A fiercely independent French Canadian woman embarks on an affair with a Danish immigrant.
  • The End We Start From
    Review preview for The End We Start From

    If you take it for what it is rather than what it was marketed as, The End We Start From is an interesting watch.

    Donald Munro · 3 out of 5
    A woman who along with her newborn try to find their way home as environmental crisis that submerges London in flood waters and sees a young family torn apart in the chaos.

A–Z of Toronto International Film Festival 2023 reviews

Features

  • On her own
    Atom Egoyan on Seven Veils, Amanda Seyfried, Salome and Oscar Wilde
  • All or nothing
    Clair Titley on Nasubi, Denpa Shōnen and making The Contestant
  • Life in full colour
    Fawzia Mirza on intergenerational connection, Bollywood, queerness and The Queen Of My Dreams
  • Chuckle chuckle baby
    Janis Pugh on laughter, love and community in her comedy musical
  • 'I had to hire bodyguards'
    Director Agnieszka Holland on the backlash to Green Border and why film can be a powerful weapon
  • Bonello, the time traveller
    France’s maverick on sci-fi, loneliness, music and working with Léa Seydoux
  • Entering the dream
    Bertrand Bonello discusses Coma and The Beast
  • Insult and injury
    MH Murray, Mark Clennon and Nat Patricia Manuel on I Don’t Know Who You Are
  • In search of liberty
    Rodrigo Moreno on freedom and character development in The Delinquents
  • Now is now
    Wim Wenders on Yasujirō Ozu, Anselm Kiefer, Ingeborg Bachmann and Perfect Days
  • Unconscious symbolism
    Wendy Chuck on Alexander Payne’s multiple Golden Globe-winning The Holdovers
  • Warwick Thornton's practical magic
    The New Boy director on working with children, animals and just one camera
  • Taking flight
    Alexander Payne on WC Fields, Artie Shaw and The Holdovers composer Mark Orton
  • Layers of mystery
    llker Çatak in conversation on Oscar shortlisted The Teachers’ Lounge, Wim Wenders, and the films that inspired him
  • What’s in a name?
    Alexander Payne on Paul Giamatti, Carrie Preston, Westward The Women and The Holdovers
  • From the inside out
    Wendy Chuck on Alexander Payne’s multiple Golden Globe-nominated The Holdovers
  • Comedic bite
    Ariane Louis-Seize on injecting Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person with humour
  • Reclaiming roots
    Katja Gauriloff on making the first ever film in Skolt Sámi, Je’vida
  • Truth and nail
    Christos Nikou on technology, love and Eighties synthpop in Fingernails
  • Back to the Bo-Kaap
    More from John Barker, Bronté Snell and Shamilla Miller on The Umbrella Men: Escape From Robben Island
  • Bringing the stories home
    Suvi West and Anssi Kömi on the repatriation of artefacts from museums and making Homecoming
  • Charting the way forwards
    Lucy Tulugarjuk on life as an Inuit woman and Tautuktavuk
  • The women who get things done
    John Barker, Bronté Snell and Shamilla Miller on stunts, sharks and The Umbrella Men: Escape From Robben Island
  • An act of observance
    Atom Egoyan on interpreting Salome and making Seven Veils
  • Reckoning with the past
    Ian Gabriel, Noxolo Dlamini, Anthony Oseyemi, Irshaad Ally, S’Thandiwe Kgoroge and Inez Robertson on Death Of A Whistleblower
  • Winds of change
    Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir on depicting modern Mongolia and Shamanism onscreen in City Of Wind
  • Restoring history
    God Is A Woman director Andres Peyrot on bringing a film back to a community and engaging in dialogue about it
  • Rights and wrongs
    Amjad Al Rasheed on patriarchal structures and female empowerment in Inshallah A Boy