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Oh boy, George: Toronto society types head to the Four Seasons to toast George Pimentel

One of Pimentel's festival snaps (Image: George Pimentel)

The city might not be in the full throes of TIFF just yet (official celebrations begin tomorrow), but that didn’t stop the society types from fêting noted celeb photographer George Pimentel with a lavish party at the Four Seasons’ Avenue Bar. The room, though festooned with shots of such bigwigs as Robert De Niro and Scarlett Johansson, wasn’t packed with the Hollywood crowd, but Toronto royalty—Stacey Kimmel, Hello! magazine’s outgoing editor Ciara Hunt, Food TV’s Rocco DiSpirito, ASC PR honcho Alexandra Weston (preggers again) and Canada AM’s Seamus O’Regan—congregated to congratulate Pimentel on the exhibition of some of his most memorable festival photographs (see a slide show of the works here).

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

September 7, 2010 | 12:02 pm

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See celeb photographer George Pimentel’s favourite film fest shots

Toronto’s resident paparazzo George Pimentel knows all about the pleasures and perils of shooting Hollywood’s A-list. This evening, the celebrity shutterbug will debut a collection of his festival snaps at the Four Seasons’s Avenue Bar and Lounge. We sat down with Pimentel to get a sneak peak of the exhibit and the scoop behind his favourite shots. See the slide show now >>

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

September 1, 2010 | 4:11 pm

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TIFF Oscar buzz begins: Natalie Portman wins critics’ support in Black Swan

(Image: James Helmer)

The Oscar baiting of TIFF films has officially begun, with acclaim for Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan pouring in—with overwhelming praise for Natalie Portman’s starring performance—after its international premiere at the Venice Film Festival. The film, scheduled to screen in Toronto on September 13 at Roy Thomson Hall, follows Nina (Portman) as a spotlight-craving ballerina who becomes entangled in a pas de deux with a rival dancer played by Mila Kunis. Eventually Nina’s plight takes a Cronenberg-esque turn (hey, this is an Aronofsky flick), with her eyes discolouring and wings sprouting from her back as she becomes the swan she strives to portray onstage.

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

August 31, 2010 | 9:47 am

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Bedbug scare at the Scotiabank Theatre sets off pre-TIFF firestorm

Mothra jokes inevitable as rumours swirl of a bedbug infestation at the Scotiabank theatre (Image: Steve Harris)

Forget Oscar buzz. Rumours have it that TIFF theatres are featuring something so creepy, they’ll keep you up at night: bedbugs. TIFF co-director Cameron Bailey took to Twitter on Monday afternoon to calm the swelling panic after a moviegoer at Cineplex’s Richmond Street Scotiabank Theatre, identified as a 38-year-old anonymous female by the Toronto Star, complained of finding bites four hours after seeing a movie.

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The Hype

From the Print Edition

August 26, 2010 | 2:23 pm

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From the Archives: a look back on TIFF’s most memorable moments

Oh, Snap
This month, the Toronto International Film Festival celebrates its 35th year with a glossy new home in the Bell Lightbox. Much has changed since the inaugural year, when Hollywood studios turned up their noses at the fledging fest. Then again, much hasn’t. It’s still two weeks of celebrities and fans behaving badly. Here, a look back on TIFF’s most memorable moments, from the coke-fuelled ’70s to the paparazzi-riddled oughties.

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

August 24, 2010 | 12:26 pm

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Official TIFF guest list released: Jon Hamm, James Franco, Javier Bardem, Marion Cotillard, Will Ferrell and more

The young, the old and the fugly

Woot! Woot! The exhaustive official guest list for TIFF has been released (James Franco! Jon Hamm! Uma Thurman!), meaning we can finally provide a definitive stargazing guide to the fest. Here’s a quick primer. See the full list after the jump.

The acclaimed
Clint Eastwood, Robert Redford, Robert De Niro, Helen Mirren, Nicole Kidman, Bill Murray, Edward Norton, Woody Allen, Catherine Deneuve, Harvey Keitel, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Kevin Spacey, Martin Sheen, William H. Macy, Catherine Keener

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

July 28, 2010 | 9:15 am

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From Natalie Portman’s lesbian-ballet drama to Ben Affleck’s comeback, five TIFF films with major buzz

All right, now that we’re past the “OMG! Don Draper is coming to Toronto to find a new Betty!” stage after TIFF announced its lineup yesterday morning, let’s go through the five films the critics are keeping their eyes on.*

1. The Town
The stars: Jon Hamm, Ben Affleck, Blake Lively, Jeremy Renner, Rebecca Hall.
Plot: A career criminal (Affleck) falls in love with a bank manager, while an FBI agent (Hamm) is hot on his trail.
Buzz factor: The movie, which Affleck also directed and co-wrote, is based on Chuck Hogan’s Hammett Prize–winning crime novel Prince of Thieves, which Stephen King called one of the 10 best novels of 2004. Some critics are calling the film Affleck’s best shot at a comeback.

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The Hype

TIFF Talk

July 27, 2010 | 1:00 pm

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TIFF announces 50 films starring awesome famous people who might come to Toronto

The-Private-Lives-of-Pippa-Lee_JamesHelmer_006-386x386

Robin Wright, shown here at TIFF last year, stars in Robert Redford's The Conspirator (Image: James Helmer)

Today’s edition of TIFF celebrity stalking is a little meatier, as co-directors Piers Handling and Cameron Bailey announced 50 films (15 galas, 35 special presentations, including 25 world premieres) and the whackitude of celebrities associated with them. We’ve got two Friends (Lisa Kudrow and David Schwimmer), the Gilmore Girls (Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel), the Mad Men man himself (Jon Hamm), Office favourite Rainn Wilson, the ever-intriguing Winona Ryder, plus Robert Redford, Woody Allen, Helen Mirren, Natalie Portman, Javier Bardem and more. This year might just top 2009’s Oprah-Clooney juggernaut appearances. Too lazy to go through the list? The lowdown, after the jump.

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Toronto International Film Festival 2009

September 20, 2009 | 11:48 am

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RED CARPET INTERVIEW: Natalie Portman, Lisa Kudrow, Scott Cohen and Don Roos at the premiere of Love and Other Impossible Pursuits

Toronto International Film Festival 2009

September 18, 2009 | 10:43 am

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Rickshaws and Lisa Ray at Cooking with Stella premiere

Don McKellar and Lisa Ray arrive at the gala for Cooking with Stella (Photos by Karon Liu)

Yesterday’s Cooking with Stella red carpet was much like the Chloe premiere: most of the fans lining up were actually waiting for the next premiere (in this case, Love and Other Impossible Pursuits starring Natalie Portman and Lisa Kudrow). Still, people’s celeb hunger was insatiable, and most lingerers wanted a glimpse of those on the red carpet, even though they had no idea who they were—or, as a heavily accented older woman cruelly put it, even though they were “not populars.”

Director Dilip Metha arrived first, not in the black Cadillacs to which we’ve grown accustomed, but in a rickshaw decorated with streamers. Next up was star Lisa Ray, in a sexy purple number, who arrived on rickshaw with co-star Don McKellar.

: Don McKellar and Lisa ray arrive at the gala for Cooking with Stella

Toronto International Film Festival 2009

September 17, 2009 | 3:00 pm

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Natalie Portman is hyper aware of cameras, Lisa Kudrow loves playing horrible people

Natalie Portman shouldn’t fear cameras. Just look at her (Photo by Karon Liu)

When photographers snap 10 frames per second, more than half of the shots contain images of celebrities with their mouth open or their eyes opening unevenly. No one is more aware of this than Natalie Portman. (OK, perhaps with the exception of Paris Hilton.)

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Toronto International Film Festival 2009

September 17, 2009 | 11:45 am

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Michael Cera dishes on the status of the Arrested Development movie to a press conference with a paltry attendance of 10

Future Dillinger: Michael Cera declares range wider than awkward teens (Photo by Karon Liu)

“This is brutal,” said a film critic as we sit in the largely empty media room at Sutton Place. There were only five minutes left before the arrival of the cast and crew of the new Michael Cera awkward-teen rom-com (is there any other kind?), Youth In Revolt. Aside from us, there were four photographers and five reporters. The low turnout must have been due to TIFF burnout and the fact that most of the cast members—Justin Long, Ray Liotta, Steve Buscemi—didn’t show up.

The emptiness got so bad that organizers had to pull in the guys working at the BlackBerry booth outside to be seat fillers. And since all TIFF press conferences last 40 minutes, we all (including the BlackBerry guys) got together to brainstorm as many questions as we could to fill up the time.

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Toronto International Film Festival 2009

September 17, 2009 | 10:28 am

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PHOTO GALLERY: Love and Other Impossible Pursuits premiere with Natalie Portman and Lisa Kudrow

Natalie Portman at the gala of Love and Other Impossible Pursuits at Roy Thomson Hall during the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival. (Photo by James Helmer) Last night was the gala premiere of director Don Roos’s Love and Other Impossible Pursuits at Roy Thomson Hall. We snapped these red carpet photos of Roos along with stars Natalie Portman and Lisa Kudrow.

Toronto International Film Festival 2009

August 20, 2009 | 12:47 pm

1 Comment

Celeb spotting warm-up 5: The full list of celeb guests is out, and Oprah and Clooney are on it

He's a-coming (Photo by Attit Patel)

The much-anticipated official list of celebrities scheduled to attend TIFF arrived in our in-boxes this morning. We’re happy to report that two of the biggest names rumoured to be heading our way, George Clooney and Oprah, are definitely coming.

A lot of our other favourites have also confirmed: Big Love’s Amanda Seyfried, a reformed David Duchovny, Demi Moore, Drew Barrymore (perhaps we’ll spot her making eyes at locals at Sweaty Betty’s again), two of our three favourite Jennifers (Garner and Connelly; Aniston is a no-show), many Michaels (Caine, Cera, Douglas, Moore), the always lovely Natalie Portman, Nicolas Cage, Penélope Cruz, Ricky Gervais, Sarah Polley, Tilda Swinton, Tom Ford, Viggo Mortensen and so many more.

See the full list of guests after the jump.

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Toronto International Film Festival 2009

August 13, 2009 | 5:02 pm

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Celeb spotting warm-up 4: Ewan, Demi, Weisz, Viggo and, yes, even more Clooney

Where Demi goes, can Ashton be far behind? (Photo by TechCrunch50-2008)

In today’s lineup of galas and special presentations we have Ewan McGregor and Clooney chasing government conspiracies, Natalie Portman playing a stepmom (in non-Julia Roberts fashion) and Demi Moore and David Duchovny at war with their neighbours. Learn about all of these, plus the directorial debut of designer Tom Ford and many other screenings, after the jump.

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