Cate Blanchett, Johnny Depp films added to Toronto Fest lineup

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Toronto International Film Festival keeps expanding its lineup, adding more than 100 new features and 50 new shorts on Tuesday to a slate that now tops 300 films, TheWrap reports.

Anna Kendrick, Sam Rockwell, Robert Redford, Cate Blanchett, Johnny Depp, Ben Mendelsohn, Shia LaBeouf, Kate Mara, Tom Hiddleston and Sandra Bullock are among the stars featured in the newly-added features, with Kendrick and Rockwell headlining the festival’s closing-night film, Paco Cabezas’ “Mr. Right.”

In the film, Kendrick plays a young woman who falls in love with a hitman played by Rockwell.

In addition to “Mr. Right,” the festival added four more galas: the world premiere of Catherine Hardwicke’s “Miss You Already,” with Toni Collette, Drew Barrymore and Dominic Cooper; Ryan Fleck’s Sundance debut “Mississippi Grind,” with Mendelsohn; and North American premieres of Alice Winocour’s “Disorder,” with Mattias Schoenaerts and Diane Kruger, and Dito Montiel’s “Man Down,” with LaBeouf and Mara.

New special screenings include a number of high-profile world premieres, among them James Vanderbilt’s “Truth,” the story of Dan Rather’s fall from grace starring Redford as the CBS newsman and Blanchett as his producer, Marla Mapes; Marc Abraham’s “I Saw the Light,” a biopic of singer Hank Williams starring Hiddleston; Matthew Cullen’s “London Fields,” a crime thriller starring Depp and Amber Heard; David Gordon Green’s Bolivia-set political drama “Our Brand Is Crisis,” starring Bullock and Billy Bob Thornton; Rob Reiner’s rehab drama “Being Charlie.”

TIFF’s “world premiere” designation is a tipoff that “Truth,” “I Saw the Light” and the other films will not appear at the Telluride Film Festival, which takes place just before Toronto and does not announce its lineup in advance.

Other special screenings include North American premieres of Drake Doremus’ “Equals” and two films that played at Cannes, Nanni Moretti’s well-received “Mia Madre” and Natalie Portman’s directorial debut “A Tale of Love and Darkness.”

The City to City program, which in the past has showcased the films of Tel Aviv, Istanbul, Buenos Aires, Mumbai, Athens and Seoul, will focus for the first time on an English-speaking city, London.

Of the eight London-based films in the section, a number of the films touch on music: “Kill Your Friends” is a drama about the British music business starring Nicholas Hoult, James Corden and Rosanna Arquette; “London Road” is an adaptation of the National Theatre musical starring Tom Hardy and Olivia Colman; “Northern Soul” features Steve Coogan in a drama about the 1970s musical movement; and “Urban Hymn,” a drama from “Rob Roy” director Michael Caton-Jones about a troubled teen whose singing voice may provide her escape from tough circumstances.

The Contemporary World Cinema section added 60 films from 38 countries, including Naomi Kawase’s “An,” Ciro Guerra’s “Embrace of the Serpent,” Oliver Hermanus’ “The Endless River,” Eric Khoo’s “In the Room,” Matthew Saville’s “A Month of Sundays,” Nabil Ayouch’s “Much Loved,” Radu Muntean’s “One Floor Below,” Alex van Warmerdam’s “Schneider vs. Bax,” Corneliu Porumboiu’s “The Treasure” and Sion Sono’s “The Whispering Star.”

Several of the films will include extended post-screening Q&As in which filmmakers and scholars will discuss the issues raised by the work.

The Wavelengths section, which highlights adventurous and challenging shorts, features and art installations, will include work by such celebrated auteurs as Miguel Gomes (the three-part “Arabian Nights,” which premiered in Cannes), Chantal Ackerman (“No Home Movie,” a portrait of the director’s mother), Sergei Loznitsa (the found-footage film “The Event”) Roberto Minervi (the Louisiana-set “The Other Side”) and Ben Rivers (the Paul Bowles’ adaptation “The Sky Trembles and the Earth Is Afraid and the Two Eyes Are Not Brothers”).

The festival also announced 38 short films in its Short Cuts program, representing 35 different countries. The selections include “(Otto),” a new film from three Dutch directors, one of whom, Joris Oprins, was nominated for an Oscar last year for the animated short “A Single Life.”

The 40th Toronto International Film Festival will take place from Sept. 10-20. Additional programs will be announced in the coming weeks.