For the very first time, Elements of Madness has boots on the ground for Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) with me, EoM Contributor Justin Waldman, handling coverage. As such, I’ve been asked to share the list of films I’m either hoping to see for myself, someone at EoM has already seen and reviewed, or think others should keep an eye out for in wider distribution.
**These recommendations are based on a mixture of films previously covered by EoM and intriguing film summaries.**
The 2024 Toronto International Film Festival takes place in Toronto, Canada, from September 5th – 15th, 2024.
Anora
Anora, a young sex worker from Brooklyn, gets her chance at a Cinderella story when she meets and impulsively marries the son of an oligarch. Once the news reaches Russia, her fairytale is threatened as the parents set out for New York to get the marriage annulled.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
The Assessment
In the future depicted in The Assessment, everyone gets to live a calm life but the government maintains a strict control of resources. As part of that, and to ensure the world doesn’t become overpopulated, it decides who can and can’t have children.
Mia (Elizabeth Olsen) and Aaryan (Himesh Patel) are nervous about their application to become parents, but they have everything going for them. They live in a peaceful, secluded home where Aaryan has a studio for his genetic research and Mia maintains a greenhouse as part of her work as a botanical scientist. The two are assigned an assessor named Virginia (Alicia Vikander), who comes to evaluate them in their home over seven days.
Virginia asks them invasive and awkward questions about everything from how they first met to how often they have sex. But this is just the beginning as Virginia puts Mia and Aaryan through simulations of the potential horrors children can inflict on their parents. As the tests become increasingly abstract and confounding, the right answers seem less obvious and the assessment foments a rift between the couple.
A scene from THE ASSESSMENT. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Babygirl
When Romy, the high-powered executive played by Nicole Kidman in the thrilling, sensual Babygirl, starts cheating on her urbane theatre director husband (Antonio Banderas), it’s not because their sex life has dried up. As the opening scene explicitly demonstrates, there’s still significant heat between them. But when he goes to sleep, Romy sneaks out of the room to finish, alone, what she clearly couldn’t achieve with him. Covering her mouth to stifle any noise, it’s made excessively clear that this is someone who struggles to articulate her desire.
A scene from BABYGIRL. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Bird
Andrea Arnold returns to the Festival with a story about a distracted father (Barry Keoghan) and his lonely and imaginative 12-year-old daughter, Bailey (Nykiya Adams), who must seek attention (and adventure) elsewhere.
Twelve-year-old Bailey (played by charismatic newcomer Nykiya Adams) lives with her father Bug (a devoted but emotionally chaotic Barry Keoghan) in a graffiti-strewn tenement. When Bug informs her that he’ll be marrying his new girlfriend soon, Bailey is furious and hurt, for what will become of her? Her mother lives with a violent, cruel man, and while Bug sports a ferocious love for his daughter, he can be oblivious to the needs of a fledgling teenage girl.
As she often does, Bailey retreats to the open fields on the outskirts of her hometown to seek comfort. It is here she is most herself, with an uncanny ability to communicate with animals and experience nature in a profound way. It is on one of these walks that Bailey has a mysterious, yet deeply meaningful, encounter that helps her when she must force a confrontation with her mother’s vicious partner.
A scene from BIRD. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Bring Them Down
Michael (Christopher Abbott) tends his family’s sheep business entirely on his own. His father (Colm Meaney) is disabled, and his mother died years ago in a car accident in which Michael was the driver. Michael has lived with guilt ever since — as well as a secret he hopes will never come to light.
Michael’s ex, Caroline (Nora-Jane Noone), was also in that car accident and has the scars to prove it. She wound up marrying Gary (Paul Ready), another sheep farmer. Near the start of Bring Them Down, Caroline and Gary’s son, Jack (Barry Keoghan, also at the Festival with Bird), claims that two of Michael’s prize rams were found dead on his family’s property. Michael’s suspicions are aroused, old wounds are opened, and the two families, with neither willing to stand down, find themselves on a perilous collision course.
A scene from BRING THEM DOWN. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Conclave
From director Edward Berger (All Quiet on the Western Front), Conclave follows one of the world’s most secretive and ancient events – selecting a new Pope. Cardinal Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes) is tasked with running this covert process after the unexpected death of the beloved Pope. Once the Catholic Church’s most powerful leaders have gathered from around the world and are locked together in the Vatican halls, Lawrence finds himself at the center of a conspiracy and discovers a secret that could shake the very foundation of The Church.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
Dead Mail
On a desolate, Midwestern county road, a bound man crawls towards a remote postal box, managing to slide a blood-stained plea-for-help message into the slot before a panicking figure closes in behind him. The note makes its way to the county post office and onto the desk of Jasper, a seasoned and skilled “dead letter” investigator, responsible for investigating lost mail and returning it to its sender. As he investigates further, Jasper meets Trent, a strange yet unassuming man who has taken up residence at the men’s home where Jasper lives. When Trent unexpectedly shows up at Jasper’s office, it becomes clear he has a vested interest in the note, and will stop at nothing to retrieve it…
Spoiler-free review from EoM Founder Douglas Davidson from SXSW 2024.
Eden
Based on historical events, this scintillating thriller from Oscar-winning director Ron Howard stars Jude Law (Vox Lux; Dom Hemingway) and Vanessa Kirby (Pieces of a Woman) as high-minded Europeans seeking a new life on a previously uninhabited island in the Galápagos archipelago. They and those who follow them believe they’ve found paradise — only to discover that hell is other people.
Dr. Friedrich Ritter (Law, also at the Festival in The Order) and his partner Dora Strauch (Kirby) flee their native Germany in 1929, repudiating the bourgeois values they believe are corroding mankind’s true nature. On the isle of Floreana, Friedrich can focus on writing his manifesto, while Dora resolves to cure her multiple sclerosis through meditation. Their hard-won solitude, however, is short lived.
Director Ron Howard on the set of EDEN. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Heretic
Test your faith.
Two young missionaries are forced to prove their faith when they knock on the wrong door and are greeted by a diabolical Mr. Reed (Hugh Grant), becoming ensnared in his deadly game of cat-and-mouse.
Hold Your Breath
In 1930s Oklahoma amid the region’s horrific dust storms, a woman (Sarah Paulson) is convinced that a sinister presence is threatening her family.
Ick
In Joseph Kahn’s breakneck sci-fi/horror satire, a high school science teacher (Brandon Routh) does battle with a parasitic alien entity, as well as the apathy of the small town it has been gradually absorbing.
A scene from ICK. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
The Last Showgirl
Shelley (Pamela Anderson) has been a Las Vegas showgirl for over 30 years, the feather and crystal–adorned centrepiece of Sin City’s last remaining traditional floor show. The stage and the women she shares it with are her loving, bickering, sequin-clad family. When the stage manager Eddie (Dave Bautista, an island of masculinity in a sea of women) announces the show will close permanently in two weeks, Shelley and her co-workers must make decisions for their future. But the future looks different when you are 50 rather than 20, and your sole job skill is dancing.
Emotionally floundering, Shelley tries to reconnect with a daughter she hardly knows, which proves just as difficult as losing the only job she has ever had. Bolstered by her best friend Annette (Jamie Lee Curtis), a brash cocktail waitress who laughs a little too loud and too often, Shelley must find her place in a world that she shut the (stage) door on years before.
A scene from THE LAST SHOWGIRL. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
The Life of Chuck
With The Life of Chuck, Mike Flanagan takes a detour from the macabre to explore one of Stephen King’s alternate sensibilities in an adaptation that carries the spirit of his most optimistic work. The world feels like it’s ending and everybody’s saying goodbye to Chuck. Wherever Marty (Chiwetel Ejiofor) goes, he can’t get away from Charles Krantz (Tom Hiddleston). His face is showing up on billboards, window signs — even TV commercials. What’s so special about this seemingly ordinary accountant and why does he warrant such a sendoff?
A still from the production of THE LIFE OF CHUCK. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
The Luckiest Man in America
This stranger-than-fiction drama resurrects a hugely popular 1980s game show and the “luckiest man in America” who broke it. Directed by Samir Oliveros (Bad Lucky Goat) and featuring performances from Paul Walter Hauser (Richard Jewell), Walton Goggins, and David Strathairn, The Luckiest Man in America illuminates a forgotten turning point in television history, when a network executive took a gamble and inadvertently made an obsessive eccentric into a folk hero.
A scene from THE LUCKIEST MAN IN AMERICA. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Matt and Mara
Struggling with a new baby and a distracted husband, an academic is more than happy to hang out with a college pal who crashes back into her life. But what sort of relationship are they resuming, precisely?
L-R: Matt Johnson as Matt and Deragh Campbell as Mara in MATT AND MARA. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Mr. K
Crispin Glover brings his best to Tallulah H Schwab’s delightfully Kafkaesque tale of a travelling magician who finds himself in a hotel full of unusual guests — with no way out.
Crispin Glover in MR. K. Photo credit: Kris Dewitte. Photo courtesy of Hook Publicity.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
Nightbitch
An overworked stay-at-home mom (Amy Adams) tries to catch a break, any break, while caring for her rambunctious toddler. Also, she might be turning into a dog.
On Swift Horses
Set in the 1950s, this gorgeous adaptation of Shannon Pufahl’s 2019 novel follows a seemingly sensible newlywed (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and her wayward brother-in-law (Priscilla’s Jacob Elordi) as they undertake parallel journeys of risk, romance, and self-discovery.
A scene from ON SWIFT HORSES. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
The Order
The year is 1983. A series of bank robberies and car heists plague the Pacific Northwest. Believing these crimes to be connected to a white supremacist organization, FBI Agent Husk (Jude Law) undertakes an investigation with the aid of an eager young small-town deputy (Tye Sheridan). Their search leads them to Robert Jay Mathews (Nicholas Hoult), a charismatic cult leader recruiting a small army to raise funds for an armed revolution. As their paths bring them into ever-closer proximity, Husk and Mathews’ powerful convictions will ensure only one of them will emerge from their inevitable confrontation.
A scene from THE ORDER. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Presence
A family moves into a suburban house and becomes convinced they’re not alone.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
Really Happy Someday
A rising musical-theatre star before his transition, Z (Breton Lalama) has to figure out how to sing in his new register in order to return to the thing he loves most — and, in the process, integrate his past and present selves.
A scene from REALLY HAPPY SOMEDAY. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
Saturday Night
They have 90 minutes to get their shit together.
At 11:30pm on October 11, 1975, a ferocious troupe of young comedians and writers changed television – and culture – forever. Directed by Jason Reitman and written by Gil Kenan & Reitman, Saturday Night is based on the true story of what happened behind the scenes in the 90 minutes leading up to the first broadcast of Saturday Night Live. Full of humor, chaos, and the magic of a revolution that almost wasn’t, we count down the minutes in real time until we hear those famous words…
Seeds
Imparting lessons of Kanienʼkehá:ka food sovereignty within a campy revenge thriller, Kaniehtiio Horn’s feature directorial debut takes viewers on a ride unlike any other. In Seeds, Horn (Alice, Darling) plays Ziggy, a Toronto-based bike courier and budding influencer. Just as she lands a new client, a seed and fertilizer company called Nature’s Oath, and starts making content for them, she’s called back to her community to house sit for her aunt.
Ziggy’s cousin, played by Dallas Goldtooth (Reservation Dogs), imparts a few nuggets of wisdom: to be wary of the seed company, and that creepy things happen around their aunt’s house. As a shadowy figure follows her, Ziggy must protect herself, and her aunt’s cache of seeds.
A scene from SEEDS. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
Shell
In this dark comedy and body horror about society’s obsession with youth and good looks, an actress (Elisabeth Moss) challenges a beauty firm CEO (Kate Hudson) over her company’s questionable science.
A scene from SHELL. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Sketch
When a young girl’s peculiar drawings come to life, leaving a wake of chaos and crayon dust, a grieving family has to band together to fight them off in this feature debut reminiscent of classics like Gremlins, Jumanji, and The Goonies.
A scene from SKETCH. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
The Substance
Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself?
You. Only better in every way.
You’ve got to try this product: The Substance.
It changed my life.
Demi Moore gives a career best performance as Elisabeth Sparkle, a former A-lister past her prime and suddenly fired from her fitness TV show by repellent studio head Harvey (Dennis Quaid). She is then drawn to the opportunity presented by a mysterious new drug: THE SUBSTANCE. All it takes is one injection and she is reborn – temporarily – as the gorgeous, twenty-something Sue (Margaret Qualley). The only rule? Time needs to be split: exactly one week in one body, then one week in the other. No exceptions. A perfect balance. What could go wrong?
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
The End
Best known for his groundbreaking documentary, The Act of Killing (TIFF ’12), Joshua Oppenheimer makes his fiction feature debut with The End. It’s a story about what seems to be the last remaining human family on earth, as they hide in an ornate bunker built deep inside a salt mine after environmental collapse has destroyed society. Oh, and it’s also a sombre musical.
George MacKay plays the naive young man who was born in this bunker. In his 20 years of life, he has only heard stories of the outside world. He spends his days working on a dubious book with his father (Michael Shannon), a former energy tycoon, while his mother (Tilda Swinton, also at this year’s Festival in The Room Next Door) frets over the upkeep of the many priceless paintings and artworks adorning their walls. It’s the semblance of a normal (albeit affluent) life. But when a woman (Moses Ingram) from the outside arrives at their doorstep seeking refuge, the family’s delicate dynamic begins to crumble.
A scene from THE END. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
You Are Not Alone
In Montreal, twentysomething Léo (Pier-Luc Funk) delivers pizza and gets drunk, and that’s pretty much it. He’s alone and he’s sad, and doing nothing about it … until he meets Rita (Marianne Fortier), a sweet-natured musician who thinks he might be a keeper. The thing is, Léo is already taken; he’s just been targeted by an alien (François Papineau) who preys on Montreal’s lonely and alienated men and doesn’t much care if Léo’s luck has turned.
Spoiler-free review available from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
Young Werther
Werther, played by Douglas Booth (Shoshana), is making a brief pit stop to retrieve a statue before departing on a European adventure with his best friend, but a chance encounter with Charlotte (Alison Pill, All My Puny Sorrows), puts those plans on hold until he can win her over. He falls more in love with her as they spend time together. She’s introverted, loves to read, and has been the main caretaker of her siblings since the deaths of their parents. A small snag to their union, however, is that Charlotte is engaged to successful lawyer Albert (Patrick J. Adams, The Swearing Jar).
Hurdles continue to pile up against Werther, not the least of which is that Albert is so darn likeable to everyone, including our protagonist. But while he suffers in comically escalating situations in his dogged pursuit of romance, the object of his affection might be having misgivings about her upcoming nuptials. Charlotte, supported by friends played by Amrit Kaur (The Queen of My Dreams) and Iris Apatow (Funny People), finds herself drawn to the fun that Werther has brought into her life. But will she be swayed?
A scene from YOUNG WERTHER. Photo courtesy of TIFF 2024.
Spoiler-free review from EoM Contributor Justin Waldman.
About Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival returns September 5 – 15, 2024 for its 49th edition — 11 days of Canadian and international cinema; special events and talks with some of the biggest names in film; and TIFF’s Industry Conference: a place to connect with film professionals and explore the art and business of cinema.
The 49th edition of the Toronto International Film Festival is presented by Rogers.
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