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TIFF can be the most exhausting event of the year—10 days of near constant drinking, schmoozing and stargazing, all, ostensibly, in the name of movies. Choosing the best parties requires insider intelligence and expert planning. Here, a highly discerning look at the festival’s hottest hot spots.
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(Image: screen grab from Century 21 website)
Like another storied Toronto hotel, the recently shuttered Sutton Place will soon be a condo tower. This weekend, Lanterra unveiled its redevelopment plans for the historic hotel at Bay and Wellesley, and the renderings have architecture aficionados upset (though probably not as upset as the hotel’s temporarily displaced tenants). First built in 1967 in the concrete-loving brutalist style of the times, the 33-storey structure is set to grow by 10 floors, and its 375 hotel rooms will become 600 condo units. Critics say the design ignores the architectural merits of the building, focusing on tinted glass instead of concrete—but then, brutalism isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. We’re still hung up on the name change; we hope when the building becomes the ”The Britt Condos,” the memories of Michael Jackson, Sophia Loren, Liberace and other legendary visitors don’t disappear as well. [Urban Toronto]
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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Fashion icon Tom Ford has a thing for Mr. Darcy, just like everyone else (Photo by Karon Liu)
Hoping to get a glimpse of fashion icon Tom Ford, we visited The Sutton Place Hotel, where he was holding a press conference to discuss his directorial debut, A Single Man, which stars Colin Firth and Julianne Moore and premiered at TIFF. Ford is best known for being the creative head of Gucci and starting his own line of men’s clothes under his own name. Much to our chagrin, however, he was hesitant to answer questions about fashion, making sure to repeat ad nauseam, “fashion and film are two separate types of expression. Fashion is a commercially creative outlet, whereas film is purely impressionistic.” The costumes, he said, were “to serve these characters. It wasn’t a costume parade for me.” When a reporter asked him what he was wearing, he scoffed, “Oh, we’re wearing… clothes.”
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George Clooney and Jason Reitman joke during the press conference for Up in the Air (Photo by Karon Liu)
Up in the Air landed smoothly at TIFF over the weekend and the cast, including two Jasons and a George, talked about the film with the press on Saturday. Check out our pictures below.
Lifesavers: the duty bound men of BlackBerry (Photo by Karon Liu)
Never say TIFF is all society, no humanity. Escalating to the press and industry floor at the Sutton Place, we were instantly compelled by a new addition to the festival: an emergency station manned by two square-jawed, uniformed rescue experts. They are here to provide life-support—or rather, technical support—for one’s life-support. It’s a BlackBerry tech-help desk. One of the reps told us that while BlackBerry missions have been present at other film fests, like Cannes, this is the first year they’ve touched down at TIFF.
“You’re going to save a lot of people here,” gushed a festival staffer to the handsome technicians-without-borders. One of them just nodded, seriously.
The foreign press descends on to Toronto today, specifically the TIFF press office on the second floor of Sutton Place, creating a United Nations of sorts with the common goal of snapping a photo of George Clooney. The real frenzy starts this evening at the opening gala so for now we’re knocking back free sandwiches at the press lounge and noticing that reporters, showing off their photo IDs hanging from green lanyards and toting a TIFF gift bag (which contains a Metropass!), all fall within six categories:
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Attire: They are impeccably dressed at 9 a.m. For women, it’s flower-printed sundresses and blister-inducing espadrilles. For men, it’s the slightly more comfortable blazer and jeans combo.
Attachés: BlackBerry, small shoulder bag or purse.
Behaviour: Constant texting and phone calls to segment producer.
Posse: Middle-aged camera crew carrying all the heavy stuff.
Celebrity goal: An encounter with camera-friendly George Clooney so that five-second, self-congratulating clip can be replayed over and over again in promo clips until TIFF 2010.
Oh yeah! Kool-Aid is put to use pickling cucumbers (Photo by Andre Torrez)
• Just as Smoke’s Poutinerie and Poutini are doing in Toronto, Québécois chefs in New York are adding twists to the cheese-and-gravy standard. T Poutine has such toppings as “Asian” (carrots, peppers, onions, mushrooms, cheddar, soy-ginger sauce) and “breakfast” (scrambled eggs, bacon, cheddar sauce). New York, however, doesn’t sound too happy about the arrival of the Canuck delicacy, deploying that hackneyed headline “Blame Canada.” [New York]
• A Mississippi delicacy—extra-concentrated Kool-Aid used as pickle brine—is moving north, largely in the form of tartar sauce and waffle accompaniments. By the time it hits Toronto, we predict it will be used as a poutine topping. [New York Times]
• It’s time to play another round of “foreigners pay attention to Toronto.” The Washington Post published a mini-guide to Toronto, listing Frank, C5 and a St. Lawrence Market sandwich counter as its top dining picks. Efficiency (or perhaps laziness) is paramount, apparently, considering all three are inside other attractions. [Washington Post]
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