The 51st Toronto Film Festival on Monday revealed 64 titles across its Gala and Special Presentations sections, which include 30 premieres from such filmmakers as Anton Corbijn (A Talent for Murder), Shakespeare in Love‘s John Madden (Onwards and Sideways), Chris Rock (Misty Green), as well as the return of two-time Oscar winner Peter Farrelly with the anticipated Amazon MGM Studios Sylvester Stallone biopic I Play Rocky (opening in theaters November 6).
It was here at TIFF where Farrelly lit the wick on 2018’s Green Book, which after winning the festival’s Oscar bellwether People’s Choice Award went on to win three Oscars including Best Picture.
This year’s TIFF runs September 10-20 and kicks off with the recently announced Being Heumann from CODA‘s Siân Heder as the opening-night film.
A Talent for Murder, on which FilmNation reps international sales, stars Helen Mirren as Ripley author Patricia Highsmith. In the crime drama thriller, a mysterious young man from a New York publisher is sent to Switzerland to persuade her to pen one final installment of the Ripley anthology. Olivia Cooke, Alden Ehrenreich and Juliet Stevenson star.
Onwards and Sideways stars three-time Oscar nominee Laura Linney, Rhys Ifans and Rory Kinnear in a story about a man and woman who are battling Parkinson’s.
Mistry Green, repped by CAA Media Finance for domestic and Neon for foreign, stars Oscar winner Daniel Kaluuya, Anna Kendrick (doing double duty at this year’s TIFF), Adam Driver and Topher Grace, in pic about a gifted actress who struggles with vices hindering her career revival. A director with a perfect role presents a golden opportunity complicated by their turbulent history.
Chase Infiniti stars in Niki Byrne’s coming-of-age drama ‘The Julia Set’ about freshman of considerable talent who is drafted into a math competition, where she’s swept off her feet by a dashing young mathematician
There’s also the second feature directorial of Friends star Courteney Cox (the pizza bomber movie Evil Genius starring Oscar winner Patricia Arquette); Tim Blake Nelson’s Amanda Seyfried and Scott McNairy prison thriller The Life and Deaths of Wilson Shedd which is generating some pre-festival sales buzz; Chase Infiniti’s next feature after her breakout in One Battle After Another, The Julia Set; and the return of Rebel Wilson in the director’s chair with the Jennifer Coolidge-Randall Park comedy Girl Group following her 2024 TIFF world premiere The Deb.
Among the notable pics arriving at TIFF and premiering elsewhere is Jesse Eisenberg’s Julianne Moore and Paul Giamatti community theater dramedy The Debut, which is getting an international premiere; the Canadian premiere of Mike Leigh’s Tender Loving Care starring Kate O’Flynn, Marion Bailey and Paul Jesson; the North American premiere of Florian Zeller’s thriller Bunker starring Javier Bardem, Penélope Cruz, Stephen Graham, Paul Dano and Patrick Schwarzenegger; and Danny Boyle’s Ink, which was recently announced as the Venice opener.
There also are a number of Cannes’ greatest hits from back in May here at TIFF: Palme d’Or winner Fjord, as well as La Bola Negra, All of a Sudden, Bitter Christmas, Club Kid, Coward and Ira Sachs’ The Man I Love to name a few.
The closing-night film September 19 is Yan Lanouette Turgeon’s sports drama Villeneuve: The Rise of a Legend, about the early years of Canadian racing legend Gilles Villeneuve.
One of the pillars in the fall film festival troika alongside Venice and Telluride, TIFF is not only a place that’s prime to launch awards-season fare but also mainstream product given the cinephile sentiment of the city, i.e., Lauren Miller Rogen’s second movie as a feature director, Babies, starring hubby Seth Rogen, Anna Kendrick, Dan Stevens, Ed Helms, David Strathairn, Issa Rae, Ashely Park and Sharon Stone.
There’s a new film festival sales market launching with this year’s edition (it runs September 10–16 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre) that follows in the wake of the biggest acquisition at last year’s fest, Curry Barker’s $750,000 indie-financed Obsession, which played in the TIFF Midnight section, was snapped up by Focus Features for $15M for stateside and most foreign, and went on to gross $442.6M at the global box office. It was the most successful film festival acquisition at the box office, besting 1999’s Blair Witch Project.
Here are the lineups below.
Gala Presentations (in alphabetical order):
*previously announced
A Talent for Murder | Anton Corbijn | United Kingdom, Italy
World Premiere
All About Corinne | Marc Fitoussi | France
North American Premiere
Always Lalisa | Sue Kim | USA
World Premiere
Atonement | Reed Van Dyk | USA
North American Premiere
Babies | Lauren Miller Rogen | USA
World Premiere
*Being Heumann | Siân Heder | USA
World Premiere
Opening Night Film
Bunker | Florian Zeller | France, Spain
North American Premiere
Diary of a Mad Old Man | Wayne Wang | USA
World Premiere
Evil Genius | Courteney Cox | USA
World Premiere
Girl Group | Rebel Wilson | United Kingdom
World Premiere
Man in Motion: The Rick Hansen Story | Adrian Buitenhuis | Canada
World Premiere
Misty Green | Chris Rock | USA
World Premiere
Onwards and Sideways | John Madden | United Kingdom
World Premiere
Pretenders | Joss Crowley | United Kingdom
World Premiere
*Prima Facie | Susanna White | Australia, United Kingdom
World Premiere
Run Terry Run | Sean Menard | Canada
Spirit Guardians: The Last Secret of the First Emperor | Nguyen Phan Quang Binh | Vietnam
International Premiere
Tenzing | Jennifer Peedom | USA, Australia
Canadian Premiere
*The Assassin(s) | Hur Jin-ho | South Korea
World Premiere
The Life and Deaths of Wilson Shedd | Tim Blake Nelson | USA
World Premiere
The Only Living Pickpocket in New York | Noah Segan | USA
Canadian Premiere
Up Against It | Trudie Styler | United Kingdom
World Premiere
Villeneuve: The Rise of a Legend | Yan Lanouette Turgeon | Canada
World Premiere
Closing Night Film
Special Presentations (in alphabetical order):
*previously announced
A Long Winter | Andrew Haigh | Canada/United Kingdom
Canadian Premiere
All of a Sudden | Ryûsuke Hamaguchi | France/Japan/Germany/Belgium
North American Premiere
All That She Wants | Scarlett Bermingham, Andrew Rhymer | USA/Canada
World Premiere
*Alpha Gang | David Zellner, Nathan Zellner | USA
International Premiere
Bitter Christmas | Pedro Almodóvar | Spain
North American Premiere
Clarissa | Arie Esiri, Chuko Esiri | Nigeria/USA
North American Premiere
Club Kid | Jordan Firstman | USA
Canadian Premiere
Coward | Lukas Dhont | Belgium
North American Premiere
Elsinore | Simon Stone | United Kingdom
Canadian Premiere
Everest: The Other Side | Jimmy Chin, Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi | USA
Canadian Premiere
Everybody Wants To F*** Me | Jonathan Schey | United Kingdom, France, USA
World Premiere
Fjord | Cristian Mungiu | Romania, France, Norway, Sweden, Denmark
Canadian Premiere
Gentle Monster | Marie Kreutzer | Austria
Canadian Premiere
*Glaxo | Benjamín Naishtat | Argentina, Brazil
World Premiere
Growth of the Soil | Hans Petter Moland | Norway
World Premiere
Happily Ever After | Feng-I Fiona Roan | Taiwan
World Premiere
Hombre al agua | Gael García Bernal | Mexico
North American Premiere
Anthony Ippolito as a young Sylvester Stallone in ‘I Play Rocky’
Amazon MGM
I Play Rocky | Peter Farrelly | USA
World Premiere
In Alaska | Jaap van Heusden, Vinnie Karetak | Netherlands, Canada
World Premiere
Ink | Danny Boyle | United Kingdom, France, USA
Canadian Premiere
Josephine | Beth de Araújo | USA
Canadian Premiere
Penélope Cruz as Nené in ‘La Bola Negra’
Carla Oset/Netflix © 2026.
La Bola Negra | Javier Calvo, Javier Ambrossi | Spain, France
Canadian Premiere
Le Faux Soir | Michaël R. Roskam | Belgium
World Premiere
Look Back | Hirokazu Kore-eda | Japan
North American Premiere
*Love of Your Life | Rachel Morrison | USA
World Premiere
Minotaur | Andrey Zvyagintsev | France, Germany, Latvia
Canadian Premiere
Mr. Nelson, Did You Kill People? | Shinya Tsukamoto | Japan
North American Premiere
Paradise Lost | Yeon Sang-ho | South Korea
World Premiere
Phoolan | Richie Mehta | India
World Premiere
Possible Love | Lee Chang-dong | South Korea
North American Premiere
Tender Loving Care | Mike Leigh | United Kingdom
Canadian Premiere
The Age of Goodbyes | Edmund Yeo | Taiwan, Malaysia
World Premiere
The Beloved | Rodrigo Sorogoyen | Spain
North American Premiere
The Debut | Jesse Eisenberg | USA
International Premiere
*The Housewife | Ben Shirinian | USA
World Premiere
The Julia Set | Niki Byrne | USA
World Premiere
The Man I Love | Ira Sachs | USA
North American Premiere
The Stunt Driver | Michael Dowse | Canada
World Premiere
The Unknown | Arthur Harari | France
North American Premiere
Whatcha Want | Mina Shum | Canada
World Premiere
*Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother | Bassam Tariq | USA
World Premiere