Marriage Story
A selection of films from the 2019 edition of the Toronto International Film Festival has been unveiled, with new films by Pablo Larraín, Lou Ye, Noah Baumbach, the Safdie Brothers, and Marielle Heller.
SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS
Clifton Hill (Albert Shin): Following the death of her mother, a young woman returns home to Niagara Falls and becomes entangled in the memory of a kidnapping she claims to have witnessed as a child.
American Son (Kenny Leon): Kenny Leon's adaptation of Christopher Demos-Brown's play about an interracial couple whose 19-year-old son may have died at the hands of police.
Deerskin (Le Daim) (Quentin Dupieux): A man who becomes obsessed with owning the designer deerskin jacket of his dreams. This obsession will lead him to turn his back on his humdrum life in the suburbs, blow his life savings and even turn him to crime.
Dirt Music (Gregor Jordan): The story of a woman stranded in a relationship with a man she doesn’t love, in a small fishing village on the coast of Australia. An encounter with a local pariah results in an affair that dredges up secrets and changes all of their lives.
The Elder One (Moothon) (Geetu Mohandas): An unsparing yet inspiring vision of Mumbai through the story of two small-town siblings, each with their own reason for escaping to the big city.
Guns Akimbo (Jason Lei Howden): A nerdy video game developer becomes the next contestant in an illegal live-streamed death match.
Human Capital (Marc Meyers): The lives of two families become fatefully intertwined following an impulsive business deal and a tragic hit-and-run accident.
Jungleland (Max Winkler): A reluctant bareknuckle boxer and his brother must travel across the country for one last fight, but an unexpected travel companion exposes the cracks in their bond along the way.
Lucy in the Sky (Noah Hawley): After returning to earth, an obsessive astronaut begins to question her place in the universe — including her relationships with her gentle husband and her alluring crewmate.
Lyrebird (Dan Friedkin): A soldier and member of the Dutch resistance investigates stolen art in the wake of the Second World War, including a Vermeer sold to the Nazis by a flamboyant forger.
Mosul (Matthew Michael Carnahan): In 2016, in one of Mosul's especially decimated zones, Kawa has his life saved by the Nineveh SWAT and joins them in their fight against ISIS.
Seberg (Benedict Andrews): An ambitious young FBI agent is assigned to investigate iconic actress Jean Seberg when she becomes embroiled in the tumultuous civil rights movement in late 1960s Los Angeles.
Sibyl (Justine Triet): Sibyl, a psychotherapist, returns to her first passion: writing. But her newest patient Margot, a troubled up-and-coming actress, proves to be a source of inspiration that is far too tempting. Fascinated almost to the point of obsession, Sibyl becomes more and more involved in Margot’s life…
SYNCHRONIC (Aaron Moorhead, Justin Benson): New Orleans paramedics Steve and Dennis stumble upon a bizarre plot involving a series of drug-related deaths.
The Truth (La vérité) (Hirokazu Kore-eda): Hirokazu Kore-eda's first film made outside his native Japan stars Catherine Deneuve and Juliette Binoche as a mother and daughter in the film industry whose professional collaboration triggers long-buried resentments.
Wasp Network (Olivier Assayas): This political thriller from Olivier Assayas follows the increasingly complex lives of Cuban dissidents during the country’s 1990s post–Soviet Union economic collapse.
Waves (Trey Edward Shults): Cracks begin to show in the perfect façade of a young athlete’s life.
A Herdade (Tiago Guedes): Portuguese filmmaker Tiago Guedes looks at the political, economic, and social history of Portugal from the vantage point of a family line of wealthy homesteaders on a Tagus River estate.
Bad Education (Cory Finley): Based on screenwriter Mike Makowsky’s high school experience.
Coming Home Again (Wayne Wang): A Korean American man cares for his ailing mother while trying to master her traditional cooking.
Dolemite Is My Name (Craig Brewer): The story of performer Rudy Ray Moore, who assumed the role of an iconic pimp named Dolemite during the 1970s
Ema (Pablo Larraín): A couple deals with the aftermath of an adoption that goes awry as their household falls apart.
Endings, Beginnings (Drake Doremus): An idealistic woman attempts to get her life on track financially and romantically, but gets caught in a love triangle with a free-spirited bad boy and his more stable, scholarly best friend.
Frankie (Ira Sachs): The story follows three generations of a family grappling with a life-changing experience during one day of a vacation in Sintra, Portugal, a historic town known for its dense gardens and fairy-tale villas and palaces.
The Friend (Gabriela Cowperthwaite)
Greed (Michael Winterbottom): Satire about the world of the super-rich.
Guest of Honour (Atom Egoyan): Explores the relationship between a father and his 20-something year old daughter who wants to remain in jail for a sexual assault she knows she’s been wrongfully indicted for. Father and daughter find themselves acting out of the bounds of good behavior as the past haunts them.
Heroic Losers (Sebastian Borensztein): When some neighbours in rural Argentina are swindled out of their savings by an unscrupulous lawyer and bank manager, they join forces to plan an elaborate heist and take back what’s theirs.
Honey Boy (Alma Har’el): A child actor works to mend the relationship with his hard-drinking, law-breaking father.
Hope Gap (William Nicholson): The plot centers on Grace and Edward, who have been married 29 years. When their son Jamie comes to visit for the weekend at their seaside home, Edward informs him that he plans to leave Grace — the next day.
How to Build a Girl (Coky Giedroyc): Teenager Johanna Morrigan reinvents herself as Dolly Wilde: fast-talking, lady sex-adventurer, moves to London, and gets a job as music critic in the hope of saving her poverty stricken family in Wolverhampton.
Jojo Rabbit (Taika Waititi): A young boy in Hitler’s army finds out his mother is hiding a Jewish boy in their home.
Judy (Rupert Goold): Legendary performer Judy Garland arrives in London in the winter of 1968 to perform a series of sold-out concerts.
Knives Out (Rian Johnson): A contemporary version of the locked door mansion murder mystery that will star Daniel Craig as a detective assigned to solve the crime.
La Belle Époque (Nicolas Bedos): Victor, a disillusioned sexagenarian, sees his life turned upside down on the day Antoine, a brilliant entrepreneur, offers him a new kind of attraction: mixing theatrical artifices and pageant, this company offers its customers to plunge into the time of their choice.
The Laundromat (Steven Soderbergh): Follows a group of journalists who take part in unearthing 11.5 million files, linking the world’s most powerful political figures to secret banking accounts to avoid taxes.
The Lighthouse (Robert Eggers): The story of an aging lighthouse keeper named Old who lives in early 20th-century Maine.
Marriage Story (Noah Baumbach): A stage director and his actor wife struggle through a gruelling, coast-to-coast divorce that pushes them to their personal and creative extremes.
Military Wives (Peter Cattaneo): With their partners away serving in Afghanistan, a group of women on the home front form a choir and quickly find themselves at the centre of a media sensation and global movement.
Motherless Brooklyn (Edward Norton): Motherless Brooklyn is about Lionel Essrog, a detective with Tourette’s Syndrome. When his mentor is murdered, he must go and find the killer.
No.7 Cherry Lane (Yonfan): Set in the politically charged Hong Kong of the 1960s, Yonfan’s animation debut is an atmospheric story of an English literature student who enters into a love triangle with the woman he is tutoring and her middle-aged mother.
The Other Lamb (Malgorzata Szumowska): The members of the Flock, all women and female children, live in a rural compound, being led by a man, Shepherd. Selah, a daughter, is given the great honor of participating in the sacred ritual of the birthing of the lambs where she has a shocking and otherworldly experience.
Pain and Glory (Pedro Almodóvar): A film director reflects on the choices he’s made in life as past and present come crashing down around him.
The Painted Bird (Václav Marhoul): A young Jewish boy in Poland seeks refuge in the forest during World War II where he encounters many different characters.
Parasite (Bong Joon-ho): All unemployed, Ki-taek’s family takes peculiar interest in the wealthy and glamorous Parks for their livelihood until they get entangled in an unexpected incident.
Pelican Blood (Katrin Gebbe): Wiebke, a woman horse trainer adopts little Melva. Soon she discovers the girl suffers from an attachment disorder and doesn’t build any feelings to relatives around. Melva starts putting others at risk, especially her older adoptive sister. After a visit to a neurologist a dilemma begins for Wiebke
The Personal History of David Copperfield (Armando Iannucci): A modern take on Charles Dickens’s classic tale of a young orphan who is able to triumph over many obstacles.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Céline Sciamma): On an isolated island in Bretagne at the end of the eighteenth century, a female painter is obliged to paint a wedding portrait of a young woman.
The Report (Scott Z. Burns): In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, CIA agents begin using extreme interrogation tactics on those they think were behind it.
Saturday Fiction (Lou Ye): Set in Shanghai in 1941, the film follows an actress who is working undercover gathering intelligence for the Allies, while starring in a new play. She discovers the Japanese plan to attack Pearl Harbor but chooses not to share the information.
The Two Popes (Fernando Meirelles): Explores the relationship and opposing visions between two of the most powerful leaders in the Catholic Church, both of whom must address their own pasts and the demands of the modern world in order to move the church forward.
Uncut Gems (Benny Safdie, Josh Safdie)
Weathering With You (Makoto Shinkai): Hodaka, a high school boy who moves from his isolated island home to the city of Tokyo. After finding work at a shady occult magazine, the sky rains every day until amidst the hustle and bustle of the big city, he meets a young woman called Hina, who has the power to stop the rain and clear the sky.
While at War (Alejandro Amenábar): Salamanca, Spain, 1936. Celebrated writer Miguel de Unamuno supports the military rebellion hoping it will solve the chaotic situation in the country. Meanwhile, General Franco adds his troops to the uprising, secretly aspiring to take command of the war.
Opening Night:
I Am Woman (Unjoo Moon): The story of 1970s musician and activist Helen Reddy.
Closing Night:
Radioactive (Marjane Satrapi): A story of the scientific and romantic passions of Marie and Pierre Curie, and the reverberation of their discoveries throughout the 20th century.
GALAS
The Aeronauts (Tom Harper): The Theory of Everything costars Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones reunite for Tom Harper's high-flying tale about a 19th-century scientist and hot-air balloonist making altitudinal and meteorological history.
The Burnt Orange Heresy (Giuseppe Capotondi): An ambitious art dealer steals a rare painting and becomes consumed by his own greed as the operation spins out of control.
A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood (Marielle Heller): The story of Fred Rogers, the host and creator of the popular children’s television program,Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood.
Abominable (Jill Culton): A magical Yeti must return to his family.
American Woman (Semi Chellas): Inspired by the headline-dominating kidnapping of heiress Patty Hearst in 1974, this atmospheric drama is a fictionalized reimagining of her time in hiding, from the perspective of Jenny, a political activist assigned to take care of her.
Blackbird (Roger Michell): A terminally ill mother invites her family to their country house for one final gathering, but tensions quickly boil over between her two daughters.
Clemency (Chinonye Chukwu): Years of carrying out death row executions have taken a toll on prison warden Bernadine Williams. As she prepares to execute another inmate, Bernadine must confront the psychological and emotional demons her job creates, ultimately connecting her to the man she is sanctioned to kill.
Ford v Ferrari (James Mangold): The true story of the battle between Ford and Ferrari to win Le Mans in 1966.
The Goldfinch (John Crowley): A boy in New York is taken in by a wealthy Upper East Side family after his mother is killed in a bombing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Harriet (Kasi Lemmons): The story of Harriet Tubman, who helped free hundreds of slaves from the South after escaping from slavery herself in 1849.
Hustlers (Lorene Scafaria): A crew of savvy former strip club employees band together and swindle thousands from mostly wealthy men through credit card scams.
Joker (Todd Phillips): The film will center on how the popular comic book villain known as The Joker came to be.
Just Mercy (Destin Daniel Cretton): Just Mercy shadows world-renowned civil rights defense attorney Bryan Stevenson as he recounts his experiences and details the case of condemned death row prisoner whom he fought to free.
Ordinary Love (Lisa Barros D’Sa, Glenn Leyburn): A long-married couple test their relationship and face an uncertain future when the wife is unexpectedly diagnosed with breast cancer.
The Sky Is Pink (Shonali Bose): The story of Aisha Chaudhary and her family.
The Song of Names (François Girard): A detective story spread over two continents and a half century.
True History of the Kelly Gang (Justin Kurzel): A fictionalized re-telling of the life and crimes of infamous 19th-century Australian outlaw Ned Kelly.
Western Stars (Thom Zimny, Bruce Springsteen): Bruce Springsteen performs his critically acclaimed latest album and muses on life, rock, and the American dream.
Opening Night:
Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band (Daniel Roher): Tells the story of a group that went from backing up Bob Dylan to become one of the most influential groups of its era.
SPECIAL EVENTS
David Foster: Off the Record (Barry Avrich)
One Day in the Life of Noah Piugattuk (Zacharias Kunuk)
MASTERS
Jordan River Anderson, The Messenger (Alanis Obomsawin)
A Hidden Life (Terrence Malick)
About Endlessness (Roy Andersson)
Devil Between the Legs (El Diablo entre las Piernas) (Arturo Ripstein)
I Was at Home, But... (Ich war zuhause, aber...) (Angela Schanelec)
It Must Be Heaven (Elia Suleiman)
Sorry We Missed You (Ken Loach)
To the Ends of the Earth (Tabi no Owari Sekai no Hajimari) (Kiyoshi Kurosawa)
The Traitor (Marco Bellocchio)
The Whistlers (Corneliu Porumboiu)
Zombi Child (Bertrand Bonello)
TIFF DOCS
And We Go Green (Fisher Stevens, Malcolm Venville)
The Australian Dream (Daniel Gordon)
Bikram: Yogi, Guru, Predator (Eva Orner)
The Capote Tapes (Ebs Burnough)
The Cave (Feras Fayyad)
Citizen K (Alex Gibney)
Collective (Colectiv) (Alexander Nanau)
Coppers (Alan Zweig)
The Cordillera of Dreams (La Cordillera de los Sueños) (Patricio Guzmán)
Cunningham (Alla Kovgan)
Dads (Bryce Dallas Howard)
Desert One (Barbara Kopple)
I Am Not Alone (Garin Hovannisian)
Ibrahim: A Fate to Define (Lina Al Abed)
The Kingmaker (Lauren Greenfield)
Letter to the Editor (Alan Berliner)
Love Child (Eva Mulvad)
My English Cousin (Karim Sayad)
Paris Stalingrad (Hind Meddeb)
Ready for War (Andrew Renzi)
Red Penguins (Gabe Polsky)
Sing Me A Song (Thomas Balmès)
There’s Something in the Water (Ellen Page, Ian Daniel)
This Is Not a Movie (Yung Chang)
Women Make Film: A New Road Movie Through Cinema (Mark Cousins)
DISCOVERY
Black Conflux (Nicole Dorsey)
Easy Land (Sanja Zivkovic)
Kuessipan (Myriam Verreault)
Murmur (Heather Young)
Raf (Harry Cepka)
The Rest of Us (Aisling Chin-Yee)
1982 (Oualid Mouaness)
AFRICA (Oren Gerner)
The Antenna (Bina) (Orçun Behram)
The Audition (Das Vorspiel) (Ina Weisse)
August (Agosto) (Armando Capó)
Bring Me Home (Kim Seung-woo)
A Bump Along The Way (Shelly Love)
Calm With Horses (Nick Rowland)
Certified Mail (Bi Elm El Wossul) (Hisham Saqr)
Comets (Tamar Shavgulidze)
Disco (Jorunn Myklebust Syversen)
Entwined (Minos Nikolakakis)
The Giant (David Raboy)
The Good Intentions (Las Buenas Intenciones) (Ana García Blaya)
Hearts and Bones (Ben Lawrence)
Hope (Håp) (Maria Sødahl)
Lina from Lima (María Paz González)
The Lost Okoroshi (Abba Makama)
Love Me Tender (Klaudia Reynicke)
My Life as a Comedian (En komikers uppväxt) (Rojda Sekersöz)
Noura’s Dream (Hinde Boujemaa)
The Obituary of Tunde Johnson (Ali LeRoi)
Pompei (Anna Falguères, John Shank)
Raf (Harry Cepka)
Sea Fever (Neasa Hardiman)
Simple Women (Chiara Malta)
Sole (Carlo Sironi)
Son-Mother (Pesar-Madar) (Mahnaz Mohammadi)
Stories From The Chestnut Woods (Zgodbe iz kostanjevih gozdov) (Gregor Božič)
Sweetness in the Belly (Zeresenay Berhane Mehari)
Two of Us (Deux) (Filippo Meneghetti)
ZANA (Antoneta Kastrati)
CONTEMPORARY WORLD CINEMA
And the Birds Rained Down (Louise Archambault)
Antigone (Sophie Deraspe)
The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open (Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers and Kathleen Hepburn)
Castle in the Ground (Joey Klein)
The Last Porno Show (Kire Paputts)
Tammy’s Always Dying (Amy Jo Johnson)
White Lie (Calvin Thomas and Yonah Lewis)
37 Seconds (Hikari)
Adam (Maryam Touzani)
Arab Blues (Un Divan à Tunis) (Manele Labidi)
Atlantics: A Ghost Love Story (Mati Diop)
Atlantis (Valentyn Vasyanovych)
Bacurau (Kleber Mendonça Filho, Juliano Dornelles)
Balloon (Qi Qiu) (Pema Tseden)
The Barefoot Emperor (Jessica Woodworth, Peter Brosens)
Beanpole (Dylda) (Kantemir Balagov)
Beneath the Blue Suburban Skies (Edward Burns)
Blow the Man Down (Danielle Krudy, Bridget Savage Cole)
Bombay Rose (Gitanjali Rao)
Chicuarotes (Gael García Bernal)
The Climb (Michael Angelo Covino)
Corpus Christi (Boze Cialo) (Jan Komasa)
The County (Héraðið) (Grímur Hákonarson)
Dogs Don’t Wear Pants (Koirat eivät käytä housuja) (J-P Valkeapää)
The Father (Bashtata) (Petar Valchanov, Kristina Grozeva)
Flatland (Jenna Bass)
A Girl Missing (Yokogao) (Koji Fukada)
Hala (Minhal Baig)
Henry Glassie: Field Work (Pat Collins)
Incitement (Yaron Zilberman)
Instinct (Halina Reijn)
The Invisible Life of Eurídice Gusmão (A Vida Invisível de Eurídice Gusmão) (Karim Aïnouz)
Jallikattu (Lijo Jose Pellissery)
Knuckle City (Jahmil X.T. Qubeka)
La Llorona (Jayro Bustamante)
Les Misérables (Ladj Ly)
The Long Walk (Bor Mi Vanh Chark) (Mattie Do)
Made in Bangladesh (Rubaiyat Hossain)
Mariam (Sharipa Urazbayeva)
Maria’s Paradise (Marian paratiisi) (Zaida Bergroth)
Nobadi (Karl Markovics)
Our Lady of the Nile (Notre-Dame du Nil) (Atiq Rahimi)
The Perfect Candidate (Haifaa Al-Mansour)
Red Fields (Mami) (Keren Yedaya)
Resin (Harpiks) (Daniel Joseph Borgman)
So Long, My Son (Di Jiu Tian Chang) (Wang Xiaoshuai)
Spider (Araña) (Andrés Wood)
A Sun (Yang Guang Pu Zhao) (Chung Mong-Hong)
Synonyms (Synonymes) (Nadav Lapid)
Terminal Sud (South Terminal) (Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche)
Three Summers (Três Verões) (Sandra Kogut)
Verdict (Raymund Ribay Gutierrez)
A White, White Day (Hvítur, Hvítur Dagur) (Hlynur Pálmason)
The Wild Goose Lake (Nan Fang Che Zhan De Ju Hui) (Diao Yinan)
You Will Die at Twenty (Amjad Abu Alala)
MIDNIGHT MADNESS
Blood Quantum (Jeff Barnaby)
Color Out of Space (Richard Stanley)
Crazy World (Isaac Nabwana)
First Love (Hatsukoi) (Takashi Miike)
Gundala (Joko Anwar)
The Platform (El Hoyo) (Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia)
Saint Maud (Rose Glass)
The Twentieth Century (Matthew Rankin)
The Vast of Night (Andrew Patterson)
The Vigil (Keith Thomas)
WAVELENGTHS
Wavelengths 1: WLS19
Austrian Pavilion (Philipp Fleischmann)
SaF05 (Charlotte Prodger)
Slow Volumes (Mike Gibisser)
The Bite (A Mordida) (Pedro Neves Marques)
Wavelengths 2: Sun Rave
2008 (Blake Williams)
Amusement Ride (Tomonari Nishikawa)
Black Sun (Sol Negro) (Maureen Fazendeiro)
A Topography of Memory (Burak Çevik)
Sun Rave (Lafhat Shams) (Roy Samaha)
(tourism studies) (Joshua Gen Solondz)
Wavelengths 3: Look Around
2minutes40seconds (Han Ok-hee)
Hrvoji, Look at You From the Tower (Ryan Ferko)
Circumplector (Gastón Solnicki)
Cézanne (Luke Fowler)
Second Generation (Miryam Charles)
Transcript (Lín Mó) (Erica Sheu)
Who's Afraid of Ideology? Part 2 (Marwa Arsanios)
Wavelengths 4: Lives of Performers
Billy (Zachary Epcar)
Remembrance: A Portrait Study (Edward Owens)
Vever (for Barbara) (Deborah Stratman)
Book of Hours (Annie MacDonell)
We Still Have to Close Our Eyes (John Torres)
This Action Lies (Cest Action Gist) (James N. Kienitz Wilkins)
PAIRINGS
Those That, at a Distance, Resemble Another (Jessica Sarah Rinland) preceded by Heavy Metal Detox (Josef Dabernig)
Seven Years in May (Sete Anos em Maio) (Affonso Uchôa) and My Skin, Luminous (Mi Piel, Luminosa) (Gabino Rodríguez, Nicolás Pereda)
FEATURES
143 Sahara Street (143 rue du désert) (Hassen Ferhani)
Endless Night (Longa noite) (Eloy Enciso)
The Fever (A Febre) (Maya Da-Rin)
Fire Will Come (O que arde) (Oliver Laxe)
Heimat is a Space in Time (Heimat ist ein Raum aus Zeit) (Thomas Heise)
Krabi, 2562 (Anocha Suwichakornpong, Ben Rivers)
Liberté (Albert Serra)
State Funeral (Sergei Loznitsa)
Un Film Dramatique (Éric Baudelaire)
Vitalina Varela (Pedro Costa)