On just the fifth day of the 10-day Toronto Film Festival, things already felt a bit like they were winding down. The streets weren't nearly as choked with traffic, the press screenings were noticeably easier to get into, and the star wattage had dimmed slightly from Brad Pitt bright to a Jude Law shimmer.
''I feel like it's really low key this year,'' said Maria Bello over the weekend, when she was in town to promote The Jane Austen Book Club and Alan Ball's Nothing Is Private. ''There aren't as many paparazzi and all that stuff as there were in previous years, which I really like. I find it a lot more mellow this year.'' Nevertheless, a few highlights stood out.
THE AUDIENCE BUZZ
One of the fest's most popular films so far, Atonement — the adaptation of Ian McEwan's WWII epic novel by Pride & Prejudice director Joe Wright, featuring stars Keira Knightley and James McAvoy — screened on Monday to great fanfare. As it turned out, it was a warm reception long in the making. While prepping the shoot, Wright had shown his actors old British movies from the '40s, like Brief Encounter and Rebecca, to help set a mood. Knightley, for one, was inspired; she loved Brief Encounter in particular. ''The opportunity to not only to watch those films but to be able to, in a funny way, feel like you were stepping inside them and creating something that could at least stand alongside those sort of things, was really amazing,'' the actress gushed.
Of course, Atonement — as well as the Monday premieres In the Valley of Elah (writer-director Paul Haggis' acclaimed follow-up to Crash, starring Tommy Lee Jones and Charlize Theron) and Sleuth (the remake of the 1972 thriller, with Jude Law and Michael Caine) — had already premiered at the Venice Film Festival. So, in fairness, it wasn't like festival goers were walking into those films blindly.
THE TOUGHEST TICKET
That certainly wasn't the case for the quirky drama Lars and the Real Girl, about an introverted man (Ryan Gosling) and the inflatable doll he calls his girlfriend. Nor could it be said about Across the Universe, the psychedelic musical set to tunes by the Beatles, from director Julie Taymor (Frida) and starring complete unknowns save for star Evan Rachel Wood. ''We didn't go to any other festivals,'' Taymor explained early Monday morning, ''because it's not a small movie. Toronto is very much for the audiences here. There's no competition; people just get to discover the film. There's not a whole lot out there about this movie, so today will be our first outing.'' While things went smoothly on the whole, there was one hitch: Bono (like Joe Cocker and Eddie Izzard, who had cameos in Across the Universe) had been scheduled to pop by Toronto to promote the film but was forced to cancel in order to attend the funeral of his good friend Luciano Pavarotti back in Italy. Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da. — Additional reporting by Gregory Kirschling
