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20 items

‘Sorry/Not Sorry’

For years, Louis C.K. was dogged by allegations of sexual harassing a number women in and around the greater comedy community. He dismissed the accusations as nothing but rumors and refused to comment on them, until a bombshell New York Times piece forced him to admit that yes, he’d engaged in some unsavory behavior. Caroline […]

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‘Knox Goes Away’

We’ve seen movies about people dealing with the mental decline associated with dementia, and we’ve seen movies about hit man doing one last job before they retire — Michael Keaton’s directorial debut may be the only film that manages to combine both of those narratives together in one movie. Suffering from a rare disease that’s […]

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‘Silver Dollar Road’

Raoul Peck (I Am Not Your Negro, Exterminate All Brutes) returns to TIFF with this look at a North Carolina waterfront property that’s been passed down from one generation of family members to another for decades. Then real estate developers tried to buy the place out in the 1970s, and kicked off a long, protracted […]

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‘The Royal Hotel’

Director Kitty Green reunites with her lead from The Assistant, Julia Garner, for what sounds like a harrowing story of two women (Garner and Glass Onion‘s Jessica Henwick) backpacking through the Australian outback. In need of cash, they take temporary jobs at a rowdy bar where the men prove to be very friendly. Too friendly. […]

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‘Poolman’

In the future, every movie star will direct at least one movie for 15 minutes, and it’s now Chris Pine’s turn at bat. The Hell and High Water actor also plays the lead, a would-be social activist in Los Angeles who believes that real change starts with keeping his pool pristine. Then he stumbles across […]

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‘Les Indésirables’

French writer-director Ladj Ly’s follow-up to the incendiary Les Misérables (2019) once again takes a bird’s-eyes view of contemporary France, with a special attention to the places where those that have bump up against those that have not. When the mayor of Paris dies of a heart attack at a public ceremony, a doctor (Alexis […]

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‘Lil Nas X: Long Live Montero’

Do you remember the first time you heard “Old Town Road”? It was easy to recognize that this singular hybrid of hip-hop and country had the potential to be a big hit right out of the gate — the fact that it then stayed at the top of the Billboard Top 100 chart for 19 […]

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‘Together 99’

Swedish filmmaker Lukas Moodysson returns to the scene of what’s arguably still his greatest work — the funny, touching, supremely bittersweet comedy Together (2000) — with this sequel, which catches up with its socialist experiment in communal living circa 1975 some 24 years later. (Which, if you consider that Moodysson filmed the first movie in […]

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‘Lee’

Living in Paris in the 1930s, Lee Miller was something of a muse to artists like Man Ray — until war comes once again to Europe, at which point she decides she wants to be the one behind the camera. Teaming up with fellow combat photographer David E. Scherman, Miller jumps into the fray with […]

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‘In Restless Dreams: The Music of Paul Simon’

Speaking of rock docs: The always prolific Alex Gibney adds Rhymin’ Paul Simon to his list of music-related subjects (see also: his deep dives on James Brown, Frank Sinatra, and the very publication you’re reading right now) with this three-and-a-half look back at the singer-songwriter’s career from Garfunkel to Graceland and beyond. It also captures […]

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‘Hate to Love: Nickelback’

Look, we admittedly never made it as a wise man, but we know enough to recognize that a.) Nickelback is one of the biggest rock groups to ever come out of Canada and b.) most people either love them or really, really, really dislike them. Filmmaker Leigh Brooks’ documentary — or, if you will, “rockumentary” […]

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‘Gonzo Girl’

A young woman (Camila Morrone) with dreams of literary glory gets what seems to be a once-in-a-lifetime gig: to be the personal assistant of a infamously wild ‘n’ crazy writer named Walker Reade (Willem Dafoe). Should the maniacal gent with the bucket caps and cigarette holders seem somewhat familiar, that’s not coincidental: Patricia Arquette’s directorial […]

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‘The End We Start From’

When London is hit with some apocalyptic levels of flooding, a new mom (Jodie Comer) and her baby’s father (Joel Fry) head to the countryside, with the hopes of waiting out the disaster in his parents’ rural home. The problem with that plan of action, however, is that the social breakdown that accompanies such end-of-days–type […]

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‘Wildcat’

We’re big fans of Blaze, actor-director-Renaissance man Ethan Hawke’s biopic of outlaw-country singer and songwriter Blaze Foley — so we’re very curious about his latest behind-the-camera endeavor, which focuses on the life and work of writer Flannery O’Connor. Plus it’s a family affair: His kid, a.k.a. Stranger Things‘ Maya Hawke, plays the author behind such […]

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‘Woman of the Hour’

Anna Kendrick makes her directorial debut with this look back at an infamous episode of everyone’s favorite 1970s cringetastic game show, The Dating Game. What makes this particular half hour of TV worth a whole feature film, you ask? One of the contestants was Rodney Alcala (Daniel Zovatto), who would often pretend to be a […]

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‘Next Goal Wins’

Taika Waititi returns to the festival with the world premiere of this sports-underdog tale, about a Dutch soccer coach (Michael Fassbender) who’s hired to whip the American Samoa squad into shape. Let’s just say that the veteran footballer initially has his work cut out for him, given the nature of this ragtag bunch. If you […]

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‘Dicks: The Musical’

Two identical twins (played by cowriters Aaron Jackson and Josh Sharp, adapting their own stage show) discover they were raised apart by their respective divorced parents. They decide to pull a fast one and swap places in order to reunite Mom (Megan Mullally) and Dad (Nathan Lane). So far, so very Parent Trap redux — […]

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‘The Dead Don’t Hurt’

Viggo Mortensen’s revisionist Western chronicles the frontier romance between a Danish soldier (Mortensen) and a French-Canadian florist (Vicky Krieps) in 1860s Nevada. When he goes off to fight for the Union during the Civil War, she’s left alone on their homestead to fend for herself — and fend off the unsolicited attention of a thuggish […]

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‘The Contestant’

In 1998, aspiring stand-up comic Tomoaki “Nasabi” Hamatsu entered a room in a TV studio. He thought he was coming in to audition for a new project. Instead, he was asked to strip naked and fill out magazine coupons, which would help him earn enough money to “win” back his clothes. He also needed to […]

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‘The Boy and the Heron’

In what is apparently Hayao Miyazaki’s final film, a boy relocates to the Japanese countryside in the middle of World War II, with his widower father and new stepmother. A gray heron keeps leading him to a mysterious tower, which was built by a great uncle who went missing a long time ago. It may […]

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