For Canadian film distributors and producers, the best way to secure foreign sales and media attention for their films at TIFF (Sept. 8-17) is to have them seen in the fest’s opening days.

Industry attendees may grumble, but the biggest cinematic draws at TIFF – star-driven Oscar candidates – are loaded into the fest’s opening days. Film buyers and journalists plan their schedules accordingly, meaning they end up darting from screen to screen on the first Friday or Saturday (Sept. 9-10 this year), to scope out any indie fare with breakout potential.

So, Canadian distributors must do their best to get their marketing messages out to decision-makers at TIFF before major players have shaken hands on deals and flown home by Tuesday.

Michael Mosca, SVP and COO at Equinoxe Films, warns about leaving it too late in Toronto: ‘It’s like waiting until 2 a.m. to pick someone up [at a bar]. Whatever is there suddenly looks good.’

Jeff Sackman, president and CEO of ThinkFilm, secured a prized opening-Saturday-night slot for Clement Virgo’s saucy sex drama Lie with Me (see story, p. 23) and is looking to create buzz with its explicit content.

‘Look at [British director] Michael Winterbottom’s 9 Songs. It got a ton of press from around the world. We’d welcome that kind of attention,’ Sackman says.

Equinoxe, meanwhile, is also looking for impact and a positive impression for the Australian film Little Fish, a drama about heroin addiction that has a Sunday slot at TIFF.

‘It’s a festival film and needs a festival push,’ Mosca says.

However, the film’s star, Academy Award winner Cate Blanchett, will be acting in September alongside George Clooney in Steven Soderbergh’s The Good German, and can manage only a fly-by visit to TIFF to help tout the film.

‘[Blanchett] won’t stay long. She’ll fly in Saturday, do interviews on Sunday, say hello at the Sunday afternoon screening and fly back to London,’ Mosca says.

Equinoxe is also hoping TIFF talk will help position Shooting Dogs, a drama about the Rwandan genocide helmed by Michael Caton-Jones, as more than another Hotel Rwanda. ‘This is a different story, with a different point of view,’ Mosca says.

The Canadian release date has not been nailed down, as BBC Films, the film’s producer, is looking to line up a U.S. distributor and a North American-wide theatrical release.

Star power is a double-edged sword when it comes to generating buzz in Toronto.

‘Toronto is a very well-oiled PR machine, and if you’re bringing the star power, they do their best to showcase the film,’ says Victor Rego, VP of marketing at Seville Pictures.

The rub is, the larger and more illustrious the film’s cast, the greater the challenge in getting the stars to Toronto to help launch the picture.

A case in point is Thom Fitzgerald’s AIDS ensemble drama, Three Needles, which stars Chloe Sevigny, Sandra Oh, Olympia Dukakis, Stockard Channing and Lucy Liu.

‘Two of the four key people that we were hoping to have in Toronto are committed elsewhere. We’re working to get them loosened up,’ Rego says.

Another drawback to star power is that it can be so compelling that it becomes difficult to convince reporters to bank stories until a film’s theatrical release – which distribs want in terms of promotional timing – after they’ve interviewed a big-name director or actor.

‘Terry Gilliam is such a huge personality. It can get away from you,’ Capri Releasing president Tony Cianciotta says of the Monty Python alum and director of Tideland, the U.K./Canada copro slated to open in Canada in spring 2006 following its TIFF bow.

Conversely, Cianciotta is looking to orchestrate maximum TIFF hype for the North American premiere of Australian director John Hillcoat’s The Proposition – a family epic penned by songsmith Nick Cave, which stars Guy Pearce and Emily Watson – so he can release the film theatrically this fall.

‘In this case, the festival is a good friend. It will be Toronto that positions the film, and I want to open it as soon as I can afterwards,’ Cianciotta explains.

Of course, it was Mongrel Media that hit the jackpot this year by snagging TIFF’s opening-night slot for Deepa Mehta’s Water (see story, p. 19).

‘Toronto is the start of our campaign in Canada in terms of positioning the movie as an important and prestigious film,’ says Tom Alexander, Mongrel’s manager of theatrical sales and marketing.

Even before moviegoers hear about Water’s Nov. 4 theatrical release across Canada, Toronto is helping to generate interest. At TIFF, Mongrel will look to leverage Mehta’s artistic stature among film critics and buyers.

‘Deepa was chosen ahead of [David] Cronenberg’s and [Atom] Egoyan’s films. She’s the first woman of color to open TIFF. That gives her a really strong position individually as a Canadian filmmaker,’ Alexander notes.

The Toronto launching pad is particularly crucial for Water, as the movie has yet to land a U.S. distributor and could lose out on the potential spillover marketing from a North American-wide theatrical release.

‘Our film is living and dying by the Canadian release. Even if a U.S. distributor picks Water up, I doubt they will have enough time to launch it south of the border around our Canadian release,’ Alexander says.