The Toronto International Film Festival starts tonight; my first screening starts at 6 pm. From Friday the 7th to Saturday the 16th, it’s five (or in one case, six) movies a day, every day. New readers of this blog are hereby advised that until Monday the 18th, this blog is all about the fest. If you’re not interested in movies, especially the kind that play the festival circuit, you may until then wish to avert your horrified gaze.

Unlike years past, in deference to the increasing speed of everything, I’ve decided to include my capsule reviews of the films in the daily wrap-ups. However I won’t be missing any additional sleep in order to finish a review, so they may appear with a day’s delay, as scheduling dictates. Then, when it’s all over, I’ll recompile the capsule reviews for the traditional round-up, arranged in order of preference, from masterpieces to duds. Assuming that there are any films that fit into either category. Which there generally are.

My assessments of films always changes over the week, as previous faves are jostled aside by new entries, and other fare has time to steep in my movie-addled brain. I might give something four stars in its first appearance, then downgrade it to merely average on further reflection. Or vice versa.

Similarly, not all of the films I was once feverishly anticipating wound up on my final list. Stuart Gordon’s Stuck, for example, has Canadian distribution in place. With another chance to see it down the road, I opted for other choices in its slots.

As always my picks lean toward Asia, particularly Japan, Hong Kong, and South Korea. Usually I complete my choices with a lingering sense of documentary guilt, having allowed fiction films to knock the docs out of consideration. This time, due to vagaries of timing and venue location, I wound up picking more docs than usual. Many of them are arts docs, as chance would have it.

Once again we prevailed in the lottery; I got first choices for every slot but one. Valerie scored her kit and kaboodle in its entirety. Since the screening I didn’t get a ticket for is in the midday on a Thursday in a fairly big house, and it’s arriving in Toronto in search of a distribution deal, my guess is that the producers have reserved an overly large block of seats so that buyers can see it in the company of a civilian audience. Mildly irksome.

Blog entries will be written on the Palm while standing in line or waiting for screenings to start. I promise typos galore. Comments are as welcome as ever, but I won’t be here to read them. Replies will be perfunctory if extant at all.

If you’re in town and want to check out a flick or two, the Best Bets page lists screenings with good ticket availability. For the first time, some of the short films are viewable on-line, but only for the duration of the event.

The snacks are piled on the table. I have my hard copy of my schedule, and my Palm Pilot copy. I’m mentally reviewing the little secrets that make the ordeal logistically possible: the jacket goes in your bag, not on the back of the seat. When in the Ryerson or Elgin theaters, move your wallet from your back pocket to your front pocket, because it has a tendency to fall out onto the floor.

Concentrating on work will be hard today.

Tags: cinema hut, toronto international film festival

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