News & Events

Starting tomorrow, the city of Toronto will become a hotbed of entertainment and Ryerson will be a big part of the action.

The 36th annual Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) is in town from Sept. 8 to 18, where more than 300 movies will screen including a few from Ryerson students and alumni. As well, almost 50 films will make their debut at the Ryerson Theatre.

This year, of the four movies made by students and alumni to premiere, one will also star alumna Liane Balaban. In addition, students Stephen Dunn and Dillon McManamy will get the opportunity to test their feature film idea The Marksman on a group of industry professionals during the Pitch This workshop. The program gives a select number of teams six minutes to pitch their films with the aim of winning $10,000 to further develop the project.

“The Toronto International Film Festival is a premier event for burgeoning and seasoned filmmakers to debut their new work. Our students and alumni have become an important part of TIFF, which provides local talent an international platform to showcase their art,” said Gerd Hauck, dean of the Faculty of Communication & Design. “It’s incredibly rewarding to see the creative efforts of our students and alumni come to life on the big screen.”

The biggest Ryerson name to appear at this year’s TIFF is alumnus Bruce McDonald. His feature film Hard Core Logo II is a sequel to his 1996 Canadian classic and follows the band Die Mannequin whose band leader claims to be channeling the spirit of deceased singer Joe Dick.

Alumni Jonathan M. Hodgson and Andrew Cividino produced and directed We Ate the Children Last, an apocalyptic tale of misadventure based on a Yann Martel short story. The 13-minute short has been selected for the prestigious Short Cuts Canada program. Hodgson and Cividino needed realistic riot footage for their film and took advantage of last year’s G20 summit in Toronto to get outstanding reels. The following article takes readers behind the scenes of the crew’s filming experience during the G20 violence.

Other Ryerson-connected films premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival are: student Kyle Anderson’s Lie Down and Die, about a cursed family suffering increasingly tragic and unfortunate deaths; and alumnus Simon Ennis’ Up in Cottage Country, where a man stumbles upon an elaborate torture machine operated by a defunct officer.

For a complete list of films, visit www.tiff.net/thefestival.