TIFF 2010: Toronto International Film Festival

Actor Colin Firth and Director Tom Hooper attending press conference for the movie "The King's Speech" during Toronto International Film Festival, September 11, 2010. (Alex Urosevic/QMI Agency)

Like the chocolate sauce on a sundae, the Toronto International Film Festival topped off an impressive festival with an exuberant awards ceremony on Sunday. Canadians dominated the celebration, including key wins by filmmakers Sturla Gunnarsson, Denis Villeneuve, Deborah Chow and Vincent Biron.

The ceremony may also provide a glimpse into the next race for Oscars, with British director Tom Hooper’s The King’s Speech singled out in the most significant category. The King’s Speech earned the Cadillac People’s Choice Award as the favourite film of the 2010 festival, with the work of another British director, Justin Chadwick’s The First Grader, earning runner-up status. Precious, last year’s People’s Choice winner, went on to compete in the Oscars, including as best picture. Slumdog Millionaire, the 2008 People’s Choice, went on to take the best picture Oscar in its year.

Hooper’s film, a co-production of the United Kingdom and Australia, tells the story of how George VI coped with assuming the throne of Britain after his older brother’s abdication in 1936. Colin Firth plays the new king. Hooper, who was not able to be in Toronto for the awards, will get a $15,000 cheque along with his award. He sent a message through Alliance Films executive Mark Slone, who reported that Hooper said: “Nothing beats knowing that the audience loves it,” making the People’s Choice Award “especially special.”

Most Canadians who won awards were on hand and most cracked wise after thanking TIFF for the chance to be screened in the festival. One exception was Toronto’s Gunnarsson. His remarkable documentary Force of Nature, an insight into the life and times of environmentalist David Suzuki, won the Cadillac People’s Choice Documentary Award. But Gunnarsson was oddly absent but with good reason, it turned out.

Gunnarsson’s wife, Judy Koonar, accepted the award and later revealed to The Toronto Sun that Gunnarsson is in hospital until Wednesday “with festival pneumonia.” Holding up the award, Koonar said in an interview: “I will take this to show him in hospital, and that will cheer him up.” From the podium, Koonar said her husband is enormously pleased. “He made the film to resonate with the public and it did.”

The runner-up in this category is Chilean filmmaker Patricio Guzman’s Nostalgia for the Light (Nostalgia de la Luz).

The third Cadillac People’s Choice Award category was for the Midnight Madness program. In this category, an American production, Jim Mickie’s Stake Land won top honours. Canadian Michael Dowse’s Fubar II was first runner-up.

In the all-Canadian categories, Chow’s debut film The High Cost of Living the Skyy Vodka Award for Best Canadian First Feature Film, along with $15,000. Chow was delighted. “I was happy just to get into the festival, much less win an award.” With the money that comes with it , Chow joked that it will “save me from working at Starbucks next week.”

Villeneuve’s Incendies took the City of Toronto Award for Best Canadian Feature Film. It comes with a $30,000 cheque. Villeneuve’s powerful drama was singled out “for its masterful telling of a complex story” because it sets an intensely personal family story set against a war-torn milieu in an unidentified country in the Middle East.

“This, of course, is a huge honour for me,” Villeneuve said. He also joked about how welcome the money is that comes with his award. “I don’t work at Starbucks,” he said, but income tax collectors from Revenue Canada “keep calling me” and the award money will help. “I thank TIFF because I won’t go to jail.”

One of the sweetest acceptance speeches came from Biron, who won the award for Best Canadian Short Film. Biron, whose film Les Fleurs de l’Age tells the story of a group of kids on a summer day, paid tribute to “all my little actors, who were only little height-wise.” Biron gets $10,000 with his award.

Two other prizes were handed out by the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI). An American film, Shawn Ku’s Beautiful Boy, won for the Discovery program while a French film, Pierre Thoretton’s L’Amour Fou, won in the Special Presentations section.

bruce.kirkland@sunmedia.ca