My Top 10 favourites at the Toronto International Film Festival make for a rogue’s gallery of unique characters, from bantering CIA agents to double-talking sisters to a car-leaping Canuck.
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favourites → make → Canuck
Rather than repeat faves from previous fests — including “Fjord,” “Minotaur” and “The Dreamed Adventure” from Cannes and “Josephine” from Sundance — I’ve limited my picks here to films I discovered at TIFF ’26.
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I → include → TIFF
I’ve also included speculation on their awards chances, for Oscars and/or Canadian Screen Awards.
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I → include → Oscars
Expect most of these films to open in theatres (and later on streaming) before the end of the year.
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most → expect → year
Laugh while you gasp.
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you → laugh → ?
A South American revolution, the JFK assassination and assorted CIA skulduggery hardly sound like the makings of a riotous buddy comedy.
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revolution → sound → comedy
But Martin McDonagh has built a glorious career wringing chortles from the darkest circumstances and most combative of male pairings, from “In Bruges” to “The Banshees of Inisherin.”
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McDonagh → build → Inisherin
A bloody Chilean military coup is brewing, and squabbling CIA agents Chris (John Malkovich) and Lee (Sam Rockwell), longtime pals and habitual agents of mayhem, head to Rapa Nui to see “the giant heads,” a bucket-list wish for Chris.
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agents → brew → Chris
The trip has urgency: Chris is terminally ill and showing signs of cognitive decline.
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Chris → have → decline
Worse, he has become a gleeful blabbermouth about his part in some of history’s most notorious atrocities, including JFK’s assassination a decade earlier.
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he → become → assassination
His plans for a tell-all memoir have put the CIA’s South American chief, MJ (Steve Buscemi), on high alert.
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plans → tell → alert
It’s top-of-game work from everyone involved, especially Malkovich as the irrepressible Chris, casually voicing the sort of things the rest of us only have nightmares about.
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rest → ’ → nightmares
The Debut
Julianne Moore makes acting look like a matter of life and death, onstage and off, in Jesse Eisenberg’s terrific new comedy.
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acting → make → comedy
She gives an awards-worthy performance as Mona, a mousy suburbanite who, for reasons known only to herself, auditions for a small part in a corny community-theatre musical about life in a New York apartment building.
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who → give → building
Under the imperious eye of director Jerry (Paul Giamatti, never better), Mona goes from barely a squeak to the mouse that roared, with increasingly alarming Norma Desmond flashes along the way.
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that → go → way
Her “rent is due” showdown with Jerry is an audience-rousing scene for the ages.
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showdown → rouse → ages
South Korea’s Lee Chang-dong (“Burning”), an auteur of buried truths and slowly unfolding secrets, returns after eight years with a coldly funny, increasingly caustic drama of class anxiety and unlikely friendship.
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dong → burn → anxiety
Mi-ok (Jeon Do-yeon) and Ho-seok (Sul Kyung-gu), a blue-collar couple reeling from Ho-seok’s factory layoff, become close to the affluent Ye-ji (Cho Yeo-jeong, “Parasite”) and Sang-woo (Zo In-sung, “Hope”).
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ok → reel → Ye
Ye-ji, a documentarian making a film about workers facing layoffs and automation, insists that she is sincere: “I’m trying to love these people.”
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I → make → people
But cynical businessman Sang-woo congratulates her on her “great Method acting,” while Mi-ok cautions her against wearing expensive clothes around people struggling to make their mortgage payments.
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ok → congratulate → payments
As Ho-seok’s depression deepens, Mi-ok finds herself drawn to Sang-woo.
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herself → deepen → woo
Loosely inspired by “Thou Shalt Not Covet,” an episode of Krzysztof Kieślowski’s “Dekalog,” Lee’s exacting, increasingly uncomfortable film won three prizes at Venice, including the Silver Lion Grand Jury Prize.
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film → inspire → Prize
Movies about contract hit men who live solitary lives and kill without conscience are legion.
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who → live → conscience
What makes Bassam Tariq’s film special, beyond Mahershala Ali’s superb lead performance, is the centrality of family and faith.
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film → make → family
The two-time Oscar winner is a stoic bundle of contradictions as Latif, a lethal Texas bladesman and recently widowed, observant Muslim father of three — including a newborn who urgently needs breast milk.
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who → widow → milk
His efforts to feed his baby while keeping his children safe leads Latif into increasingly strange and dangerous territory, including confrontations with an Iraq War veteran (John Cho) who now commands a trigger-happy band of radical Christians.
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who → feed → Christians
We can never quite predict where the story is headed, but watching it unfold is consistently thrilling.
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it → predict → ?
Tender Loving Care
Cast members spontaneously sing the torch ballad “The Great Pretender,” but there’s nothing the least bit false about Mike Leigh’s latest and possibly last film (or so he says).
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he → sing → film
His compassionate eye and blue-collar instincts zero in on London social workers/BFFs Amy (Kate O’Flynn) and Rosie (Alice Bailey Johnson), who are struggling to stay positive while coping with difficult clients and useless boyfriends.
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who → zero → clients
Amy’s aging parents, Birdie (Marion Bailey) and Geoff (Paul Jesson), are sympathetic and helpful, but Geoff’s health has taken a turn for the worse.
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health → age → worse
The plot is lean but the acting is true and the epiphanies, albeit small, are completely earned.
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epiphanies → earn → ?
Leigh has been making films for decades, yet this one feels fresh enough to be his first; he’s never lost his fascination with the quotidian cares of the world.
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he → make → world
The Stunt Driver
Michael Dowse’s spirited and fact-based account of Canuck daredevil Ken Carter’s 1976 St. Lawrence River jump quest makes a cracking good yarn all by itself.
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account → base → itself
But it takes on added resonance in these times when a bellicose southern bully keeps trying to tell us what Canadians can’t do.
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Canadians → take → what
Jay Baruchel embodies Carter’s irrepressible optimism about leaping into danger, reminding me of Troy Hurtubise’s bear-rassling scheme in “Project Grizzly.”
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Baruchel → embody → Grizzly
Ed Helms is the MVP supporting star as Dick Keller, the concerned but committed designer of the rocket-powered Lincoln Continental customized to make a jump that daunts even legendary U.S. risktaker Evel Knievel (Ben Foster).
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that → support → Knievel
The film is a hilarious and harrowing reminder that the sky really is the limit when Canadians are put to the test.
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Canadians → put → test
The past informs the present in this coming-of-age stunner.
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past → inform → stunner
A group of French students travelling to Italy with their teacher (Antonia Buresi, “A Private Life”) set out to learn about the people of Pompeii vapourized by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius.
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group → travel → Vesuvius
Some 2,000 years later, they feel their own lives lack substance — especially the rebellious Toni (Colas Quignard).
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lives → feel → substance
…and 14 more, not listed.
The Aporia
