Postcard from Toronto
Many past winners of the Toronto International Film Festival's People's Choice Award have gone on to Academy Award glory - think last year's and 2012's - so Oscar watchers will have taken note of Morten Tyldum's , the audience favourite at North America's largest film festival this year.
Starring Benedict Cumberbatch as British code-breaker Alan Turing, the biographical drama-thriller proved illuminating in its depiction of the real-life hero who made a huge contribution in the Allied defeat of Germany during the second world war. A nerd and misfit with a condition bordering on Asperger's, Turing (who was also gay) nonetheless was dogged in his quest to build a machine which could intercept the intricate codes set up by the Nazis.
If there were a prize for most popular actor, Bill Murray would have won it. Instead, the festival expressed its love by hosting a Bill Murray Day which coincided with the world premiere in Toronto of his latest movie. Comedy never rates in the Oscars - and only came third in Toronto's audience awards - but Theodore Melfi's film has a role that fits Murray like a glove: he plays a curmudgeonly loner who is forced by his neighbour (Melissa McCarthy) to babysit her undersized 12-year-old son (Jaeden Lieberher) after school.
Naomi Watts - who also tickled the funny bone in Noah Baumbach's - is hilarious as a pregnant Russian prostitute, and this odd group forms a dysfunctional family in what turns into a heartwarming, funny yarn.
The commercial hit of the festival was also a comedy - and Chris Rock could hardly believe his lucky stars that his third feature as a writer-director, , sold to Paramount Pictures for US$12.5 million for worldwide rights after a fierce bidding war. Made for little more than US$10 million, the movie stars Rock as a comedian whose reality TV star fiancée talks him into broadcasting their wedding on her show.
Mainland director Ning Hao admitted he brought his new comedy to Toronto rather than the Venice festival because the TIFF was a better marketplace to launch his highly commercial film. The story of a man reeling from his divorce and travelling across China reflects the experience of Xu Zheng, his collaborator and close friend who wrote the screenplay.
The other Asian film that made a huge splash in Toronto this year was miles apart from in tone. A tense, cynical thriller about human trafficking, South Korean film is the debut directorial effort of Shim Sung-bo, best known as the screenwriting partner of Bong Joon-ho (who produced and co-wrote this work).
On the leading actress front: Reese Witherspoon was gaining momentum for her role in , based on Cheryl Strayed's bestselling memoir, and Julianne Moore emerged as one of the big festival surprises with her performance as a woman with early onset Alzheimer's in . The Cannes best actress winner for David Cronenberg's , which also screened in this year's TIFF, has never won a best actress Oscar after four nominations but 2015 may be her year.
Generally, eye-catching roles were rare for women at Toronto - with male-dominated films such as , starring Robert Downey Jnr and Robert Duvall, more the rule. However, Jane Fonda took the ball and ran with it in family comedy , playing the hilarious yet feisty matriarch and stealing the film from her on-screen children, Jason Bateman and Tina Fey.
Felicity Jones garnered praise too for her portrayal as Stephen Hawking's first wife Jane in
A strong selection of French films screened this year and none was more commercial than the big-budget ( ), with Jean Dujardin as a real-life Marseilles magistrate who brought down the region's drug kingpin in the 1970s. was a solid follow-up from the team of Olivier Nakashe and Eric Toledano who made 2011 French box office sensation And Francois Ozon was on form with starring Romain Duris.
The critics' favourite among the European films was German writer-director Christian Petzold's starring his usual collaborator and star, the mesmerising Nina Hoss. Look out for an Oscar nomination in 2015 for it as well.
