Every year, the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) welcomes film lovers and moviegoers worldwide to share their love of cinema.
Various films spanning different genres are shown on big screens at various TIFF venues, including Roy Thomson Hall, the Princess of Wales Theatre, the Royal Alexandra Theatre, TIFF Lightbox, and, of course, Scotiabank Theatre (which features everyone’s favourite escalator).
This year, these theatres will host TIFF’s wonderful documentary selections. Covering a broad range of topics, each doc that will be screened as part of TIFF this year is worth a watch if you can get your hands on some tickets. If you can’t, be sure to look out for these movies when they are released.
It was extremely tough keeping my list to only five selections from TIFF’s comprehensive doc list, but check out my top five showcased below!
Blue Road – The Edna O’Brien Story
Having its world premiere at TIFF, the Sinéad O’Shea directed doc, focuses on the life and work of celebrated Irish author, Edna O’Brien. The film doesn’t shy away from O’Brien’s adventurous life and provocative writing (which was taboo at the time) to give a profound picture of O’Brien’s life – including her difficult beginnings, oppressive marriage, rubbing elbows with various celebrities, and much more.
Ernest Cole: Lost and Found
Unpublished images by South African photographer Ernest Cole are the basis of Raoul Peck’s documentary. Exiled from South Africa to the USA and Europe, he witnessed other forms of systemic racism, suffered from homelessness and passed away in 1990 from cancer. Cole’s images depicted life under Apartheid and showed those who would otherwise purposely go unseen.
Mistress Dispeller
Directed by Elizabeth Lo, Mistress Dispeller follows the unconventional work of Wang Zhenxi. Wang’s work is to repair marriages mired by infidelity where she finds ways to meet with the husband and mistress, with the goal being to dispel the mistress. A definite conversation starter, this is one of the docs you don’t want to miss.
No Other Land
Previously screened at the Berlin International Film Festival where it won the Panorama Audience Award for Best Documentary and the Berlinale Documentary Award, the film focuses on life under Israel’s military occupation. Basel Adra has been documenting the expulsion and destruction of his community in Masafer Yaffa in the West Bank since he was a child. No Other Land is one of the most important films released this year, and one of the most important screening at TIFF.
The Last of the Sea Women
For centuries, a group of fisherwomen called the haenyeo has thrived off the coast of South Korea’s Jeju Island. With a job this dangerous, they do not qualify for health insurance, but that does not stop them. Filmmaker Sue Kim gives audiences an in-depth look at these incredible women and how changing ocean temperatures, the constant increase of garbage and waste, and water contamination threaten their existence.
Muses of Media 
Leave a comment