69: TIFF 2018 Preview

According to the Toronto Star’s preview this year’s Toronto International Film Festival features 21 world premieres, seven international premieres, eight North American premieres and 11 Canadian premieres, including 13 features directed by women. It all kicks off with Netflix’s own Outlaw King starring Chris Pine that is sure to make waves across the industry. Mehek Seyid joins us this week to go over the most anticipated TIFF films and what ones she plans on seeing in advance of this year’s awards season.

Podcast: Download (Duration: 34:58 — 16.0MB)

Here is a list of films discussed on this week’s episode were trailers can be found on their IMDb page.

• First Man- Directed by Damien Chazelle tells the story of Neil Armstrong’s walk on the moon. 
• The Old Man & the Gun- Directed by David Lowery has Robert Redford in his final film playing an aging bank robber.
• High Life- Directed by Claire Denis in her English language debut about a group of criminals sent into deep space.
• Shoplifters- Directed by Hirokazu Koreeda about a family of small time crooks. 
• Everybody Knows- Directed by Asghar Farhadi starring real life married couple Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem as they travel to Spain to go to a wedding and dark secrets are revealed.
• Roma- Directed by Alfonso Cuarón about an intimate story of a single family over the course of a year in Mexico City in the 1970’s.
• The Predator- Directed by Shane Black reboots the 80’s action/horror franchise where an alien hunter kills a lot of people.
• Assassination Nation- Directed by Sam Levinson is about how a hacking of personal info in Salem turns everyone in the town crazy.
• The Man Who Feels No Pain- Directed by Vasan Bala is a Bollywood film about a young boy who can feel no pain so he decides to take down local criminals.
• Can You Ever Forgive Me?- Directed by Marielle Heller in a dramedy about a struggling writer played by Melissa McCarthy who turns to forging letters to make money.
• A Star is Born- Directed by Bradley Cooper starring himself and Lady Gaga in the lead roles of this oft-remade film about an aging singer and his young protégé. 
• Boy Erased- Directed by Joel Edgerton starring Lucas Hedges, Russell Crowe and Nicole Kidman in a film about a young man you is sent to gay conversion therapy by his minister parents. 
• Beautiful Boy- Directed by Felix Van Groeningen starring Steve Carell and Timothée Chalamet about a family that overcomes addiction issues.

Mehek’s 3 Must See Films

• If Beale Street Could Talk
• Widows
• Halloween

Something new I’ll be asking people to do is to rate and review Contra Zoom on Podchaser, a site that aims to be the IMDb of podcasts. Please rate 5 stars and if possible leave a short review to help grow this show.

Also if you have never given the show a rating on iTunes, that also helps tremendously. Every bit of exposure helps grow the show.

Follow the show @ContraZoomPod, Mehek @whatthemehek and Dakota @Dgapa on Twitter.