Stephen Lan at TIFF: ; +1-416-923-6327

North American and International Press

Empty Nest (El Nido Vacio)

Directed by Daniel Burman

(Argentina/Spain/France/Italy, World premiere, 91 min., Special Presentation)

Cultured, prosperous, blessed with three children and many friends, Leonardo and Martha are a truly enviable example of the species “married couple.” Leonardo is an author of considerable repute; Martha, a hyperactive housewife with academic interests. Leonardo sits back and observes; Martha forges ahead and acts. An enviable couple? They both begin to question their happiness when Julia, their youngest, marries and leaves Buenos Aires. The house is empty, the children scattered all over the world. For Leonardo and Martha, there are no more excuses for not addressing all those little grievances and annoyances that have piled up over the years. Martha seeks release by going back to the university and surrounding herself with people. Leonardo takes refuge in fantasies that become so real that he can’t distinguish them from reality.

Argentine director and scriptwriter Daniel Burman (LOST EMBRACE) - one of Latin America’s best known filmmakers - takes a humorous and loving look at a fussy, self-absorbed, but lovable artist and his enterprising, down-to-earth wife. Starring Cecilia Roth (ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER).

Related Links:

• http://www.elnidovacio.com

Talent Attending:

• Director Daniel Burman, Sep. 9-12 (inclusive)
• Actor Oscar Martinez, Sep. 10-12 (inclusive)
• Actress Ines Efron, Sep. 10-12 (inclusive)

North American and International Press

Krabat

Directed by Marco Kreuzpaintner

(Germany, World premiere, 120 min., Family Zone programme)

The Thirty Years’ War has brought much death and destruction to central Europe, and has left 14-year-old Krabat an orphan. Lost and devastated, Krabat’s keen survival instincts lead him to a remote valley, where he finds a mysterious mill run by an ominous figure known as the Master. The lure of safe haven, hot meals and an apprenticeship under the Master is hard to resist… But gradually Krabat uncovers a horrifying secret: the mill is in fact a school of black magic and the Master is in league with satanic powers. While Krabat and his young colleagues revel in the teachings of the Master, they realize there is a price to pay: complete submission to the Master and even death. After Krabat witnesses Tonda, his closest friend at the Mill, perish at the Master’s hands, the fire of rebellion starts raging within the young boy. He realizes that the only way out is to defeat the Master in a duel. In the face of such adversity, Krabat is able to find strength through the lovely Kantorka. Armed with nothing but courage and their united love, together the young couple brave the Master and the arsenal of magical powers that make him nearly invincible. But can the power of love alone be enough to eradicate the power of black magic?

A dark yet uplifting fantasy based on Otfried Preussler’s novel of the same name, a best-seller that has sold over 1.8 million copies worldwide and translated into more than 30 languages. Directed by Marco Kreuzpaintner (SUMMER STORM, TRADE) and starring Daniel Brühl (GOODBYE, LENIN!, THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM, THE EDUKATORS).

Related Links:

• http://www.krabat-derfilm.de
• http://www.preussler.de

Talent Attending:

• Director Marco Kreuzpaintner, Sep. 4-8 (inclusive)
• Lead actor Daniel Brühl, Sep. 4-8 (inclusive)

North American and International Press

Pandora’s Box

Directed by Yesim Ustaoglu

(Turkey/France/Germany/Belgium, 112 min., World premiere, Contemporary World Cinema)

It’s the story of Nesrin, Guzin and Mehmet, three siblings who live significantly different lives in Istanbul. Nesrin and her husband have no money problems and actually achieved everything they ever dreamt of. But Murat, their only son, feels suffocated with Nesrin’s love. He is running away from his mother, seeking thrills in alcohol, light drugs, and petty theft. Guzin has become a successful editor-in-chief of a major newspaper but apart from some failed relationships her private life is a completely empty. Mehmet, the youngest, lives a life without any rules. With his nihilistic attitude he spends his days in total oblivion. And despite his painting talent, he mostly paints to buy a few bottles of wine and bare necessities. One day the three siblings set off to look for their mother who has disappeared. After they find her they take her to Istanbul. When they realize she suffers from Alzheimer it is like opening a Pandora’s box. Through their mother’s severe disease they gradually realize that none of them is happy with their lives. Being near their mother again forces all the siblings to come to terms with their own lives.

International press only

Pontypool

Directed by Bruce McDonald

(Canada, 95 min., World Premiere, Vanguard programme)

Headed to work on a particularly foul Valentine’s Day morning, caustic radio personality Grant Mazzy isn’t expecting anything different. He’ll update the weather, announce school closures, relay the obits and fight with his producer Sydney Briar about how a little controversy makes good radio. Mazzy was a big-shot star before he wound up working at The Beacon, a tiny station run out of the church basement in a little piece of nowhere called Pontypool. But today things don’t seem so run-of-the-mill. A distraught woman, straight from Herk Harvey’s Carnival of Souls, nearly runs into Mazzy as he’s heading to work. And the provincial police have a shootout with a group of people ice fishing – they may have all been drunk (including the cops), but the suspects were reportedly talking gibberish, running around naked and missing body parts. Then there’s the riot at the offices of Dr. Mendes.

Directed by acclaimed maverick Bruce McDonald and based on a novel by Tony Burgess, Pontypool could be called a zombie movie, but the elements (like the incident with the ice fishers) do not quite tally up, genre-wise at least. For one thing, the virus is not spread by the traditional means, at least according to the aforementioned Mendes, who believes it’s airborne. Nor is Mazzy your average talk show blowhard. He may suggest Don Imus visually – right up to the beat-up cowboy hat – but he’s fond of quoting Norman Mailer and Roland Barthes, neither of whom is likely to show up on Imus’s reading list.

The film breaks with the gore-laden tradition of zombie movies. In fact, McDonald and company have dropped us into a far more disturbing world of metaphysics and linguistics. It is as if the makers of Dawn of the Dead decided to keep all the action in the television studio from that film’s beginning, but had the script rewritten by Umberto Eco, Noam Chomsky and Carlos Castaneda.

With last year’s THE TRACEY FRAGMENTS, McDonald united the hipster and more experimental elements of his work for the first time. Pontypool is an even more seamless and audacious step along the same road; an avant-garde genre movie that’s both thought-provoking and creepy.

Talent Attending:

• Director Bruce McDonald, Sep. 4-13 (inclusive)

US and International Press

Restless

Directed by Amos Kollek

(Israel/Germany/Canada/France/Belgium, 100 min., North American premiere, Contemporary World Cinema programme)

Twenty odd years ago, Moshe got fed up with Israel, his wife, and his life in general. Especially with his wife, who stopped taking the pill and got pregnant. Since the restless Moshe couldn’t see himself as a father, he left for New York – and never looked back. Never answered his wife’s letters. Never asked about his son Tzach. Moshe never really made it in New York either, and now, after 21 years in the Big Apple, he peddles junk on the sidewalk and still can’t pay his rent. All he has is his poetry, which he recites in a dingy Manhattan bar: biting, sarcastic, tender odes of love and hate to Israel and its people. Rays of light in his life are bartender Yolanda and her young son, who give him warmth and affection. Moshe’s own son Tzach, an elite soldier in the Israeli army, now becomes restless himself, since he’s forced to give up his military career. When he finds his father’s address, he decides to get in touch with him. Years of pent-up anger and resentment are released when the young ex-soldier meets his bohemian dad. Moshe’s world-weary, misanthropic view of life begins to crumble, and he realizes that what he is searching for in Yolanda and her son is nothing else than the wife and son he abandoned years ago. Moshe and Tzach are now on a collision course with destiny – and with one another…

A raw yet tender film about a father and his son, and about the elusive quest for redemption, directed by renowned, award-winning Israeli filmmaker Amos Kollek (FAST FOOD, FAST WOMEN; trilogy SUE, FIONA and BRIDGET).

Talent Attending:

• Director Amos Kollek, Sep. 8-11 (inclusive)

North American and International Press

Sexykiller

Directed by Miguel Marti

(Spain, Midnight Madness)

The term has started in one of the most prestigious schools of medicine in the country. Students from all over the world have fought for a place in this course. But Bárbara is interested in other things like, for example, scheduling her classes with the serial killings.

Bárbara is a true fashion victim. In her opinion, everyone should be trendy and have teeth as white as a Ken doll. If the lecture about the seven deadly sins turned mad the killer from Seven, imagine what a Cosmopolitan can do with the mind of a teenager… Bárbara hides beneath several layers of makeup and resentment. Unable to accept the truth that she will never be a covergirl, her only way of dealing with the frustration is murder. And, as we all know, some things are as enjoyable or even more enjoyable when we tell someone, and Bárbara is no stranger to this… she will try to share every crime with a camera and the public.

Very soon, the campus is full of bodies, students who’ve been assassinated in the most diverse ways and without any apparent motive. The police, at the orders of Inspector Villa, a workaholic sleuth, haven’t got a clue. There appears to be no connection between the victims.

A couple of killings later, things get a bit more complicated for Bárbara. Due to a series of misleading events, she is made to believe that a student who works at the faculty’s morgue, Tomás, is a natural born killer like her. But he, who wouldn’t hurt a fly, is completely in love with Bárbara, who he sees as an innocent and pure young lady. The comedy entanglement starts when these two characters start dating. Blinded by love, they are unable to see through the lips of the person they kiss so passionately. Like any worthy University series, the end of Sexykiller occurs during the end of term party. There, Bárbara will be surprised with something that will turn her blood even colder. Her victims will come back from the grave, vengeful and bloodthirsty and, if she wants to get out of there alive, she will have to kill them again. Will she be able to maintain her sexy and dazzling look in front of her naive boyfriend? Will she manage to keep her identity secret? Will love finally conquer death?...The answer is in Sexykiller.

Talent Attending:

• Director Miguel Martí, Sep. 9-13 (inclusive)
• Lead actress Macarena Gómez, Sep. 11-13 (inclusive)

North American and International Press

Singh is Kinng

Directed by Anees Basmee

(India, 134 min., Gala)

Written and directed by renowned Bollywood filmmaker Anees Bazmee, the anarchic action comedy SINGH IS KINNG is overflowing with intense set pieces and brilliant dance numbers that are lavishly high-concept and utterly transfixing.

The plot is suitably wild: Lucky Singh is a notorious criminal who rules the Australian underworld with the aid of his deadly associates. Together, they form the Gang of Punjab. Meanwhile, in a remote Indian village of Punjab – Lucky’s hometown, from which the gang takes its moniker – there is a man of even greater infamy. His name is Happy Singh (marvellously played by Bollywood star Akshay Kumar), and his entire community has become irritated with his disastrous, albeit well-intentioned antics. As a final act of desperation, the locals decide to send Happy on a journey to bring back the scandalous Lucky, whose unlawful behaviour abroad is spoiling the reputation of the village. Happy enthusiastically accepts his mission, and he and his friend Rangeela set out for Australia.

A mix-up with their boarding passes sends the two villagers to Egypt, where the eternally optimistic Happy encounters the stunningly gorgeous Sonia, and it is not long before he falls for her. Finally arriving in Australia, Happy finds friendship and a hot meal from a matronly woman. She helps him and Rangeela to locate Lucky, who is offended by their intent to take him back to Punjab. Soon after, an attempt on Lucky’s life is foiled by Happy, who, in addition to carrying him to safety, also manages to knock his head against every object in their path. As a result, he suffers a paralytic stroke, and his crew – mistaking Lucky’s indecipherable contempt as gratitude – elect Happy as the new Kinng. What follows is a series of scenarios involving the sweet old lady, her daughter (who just happens to be Sonia) and her groom, a group of gangsters posing as servants, a jealous brother and a madcap wedding ceremony.

From the film’s sumptuous locales and luxurious, eye-catching interiors to its lighthearted humour, memorable music (Snoop Dogg provides vocals for the film’s closing-credits number), fast-paced action and dazzling camera work, SINGH IS KINNG is a hypnotically energetic and enormously appealing one-of-a-kind cinematic experience.

Talent Attending:

• Lead actor Akshay Kumar, Sun. Sep. 7

North American and International Press

The Window (La Ventana)

Directed by Carlos Sorin

(Argentina/Spain, World premiere, 85 min., Contemporary World Cinema)

The last day in the life of Antonio, an 80-year-old writer awaiting the visit of his estranged son on his hacienda in northern Patagonia. As he takes stock and reminisces, he looks out the window at his fields, the sun, the buzzing life that beckons him even as it fades before his eyes.

He listens to the buzzing midday sun swirling the air outside his window. He hears the voices and noises of life inside the house. All is as it should be for Antonio on this last day of his life. The proud, pink hacienda overlooking endless Patagonian fields. The hushed sounds of the women who run the house and take care of him. The occasional visits: his trusted doctor, a worker, a piano tuner. Antonio knows it is a special day. After an absence of many years, his son is coming to visit. Everything must be perfect. There will be a toast with a very special bottle of champagne, an embrace, warm words that will finally bridge the gap between them. Returning to the window, he looks out and sees light and life, the past and the present, while sensing the future. Then, secretly, he leaves the house, unseen by his faithful caretakers, and takes one last walk in his fields, breathing the air, treading the earth, inhaling the scent of the land that had been his life. His son is coming, and for that he will live. At least long enough for that.

Distinguished Argentine filmmaker Carlos Sorin (BOMBON, EL PERRO; HISTORIAS MINIMAS) once again trains his camera on the small stories written by life, on the humanity behind human beings. By casting the great Uruguayan writer and scriptwriter Antonio Larreta in the lead role, Sorin establishes a link between fiction and reality that makes the protagonist´s fears, hopes and wishes even more palpable.

Talent Attending:

• Director Carlos Sorin, Sep. 7-10 (inclusive)

North American and International Press

Unspoken

Directed by Fien Troch

(Belgium, 95 min., World Premiere, Visions programme)

Five years ago, 14-year-old Lisa disappeared from the lives of her parents, Lukas and Grace. No clear reason, no goodbyes; she just disappeared. Any hopfe of her ever coming back is small.
Five years is a long time. Lukas and Grace seem to have managed to live a normal life again, where everything looks a bit boring and where there is no space for meaningful talks.

But then, by some strange coincidences, Lisa reappears in their lives. Lukas and Grace are confronted each in their own way with their daughter. Both parents have become so alienated form each other that none of them dares or wants to talk about it. Grace doesn’t tell Lukas about the girl she sometimes sees in the subway and Lukas doesn’t say a word about the strange telephone calls he gets.
They haven’t talked about Lisa in five years and now it seems even more impossible than before. Still, whether they want it or not, Lisa has crawled back in their heads and into their lives. Like a ghost, this whole event is eating away at the fragile connection that was left between Grace and Lukas, and their behaviour becomes increasingly weird.

Until the day when Lukas doesn’t return from work. Grace is left alone, abandoned by the only two people in her life.

Starring Emmanuelle Devos and Bruno Todeschini.

Related Links:

• http://www.unspoken.be

Talent Attending:

• Director Fien Troch, Sep. 4-8 (inclusive)