This year’s bumper crop of Canadian movies at TIFF will send people to their basements in search of old program books to see if there has ever been a comparable lineup in the festival’s 32-year history. But they won’t find one quite like it, because this is the year our film industry comes of age.

Not only are there around 30 Canuck features (including copros) spread across the Gala, Special Presentation, Contemporary World Cinema and Canada First! sections, but domestic films – Jeremy Podeswa’s Fugitive Pieces and Paolo Barzman’s Emotional Arithemetic – will, respectively, open and close the festivities. (That hasn’t happened since the Léolo/Twist combo in 1992.)

‘In terms of features, it’s one of the largest contingents we’ve had,’ notes Steve Gravestock, TIFF’s director of Canadian programming. ‘And certainly in terms of prominence, it’s up there.’

Both big guns and familiar faces are here, including David Cronenberg, Denys Arcand and François Girard. Toronto-based Clement Virgo’s Poor Boy’s Game is in the Special Presentation program along with Guy Maddin’s My Winnipeg, while Bruce McDonald’s experimental The Tracey Fragments will screen in the Visions showcase.

But what will mark this year as a watershed point in the evolution of our national film industry is the incredible range of work, and an unprecedented trend toward genre pictures with commercial potential at home and abroad.

Gravestock sees the evidence in what he calls one of the better programs he’s put together for Canada First!, for emerging filmmakers.

‘This is less an overtly auteur-based program,’ he says. ‘People are playing with genre in a different kind of way – certainly in the case of [Martin Gero’s romantic comedy] Young People Fucking or [Chaz Thorne’s black comedy] Just Buried, which is very sharp.’

Gravestock observes that Canadian filmmakers are personalizing genre in a way that he’s never seen before, making them more audience-friendly.

‘They all seem very contemporary – plugged into what’s going on now,’ he says. ‘One of the problems with genre is the story doesn’t necessarily change from one decade to the next. [This crop] plays with it, and feels very much about the way we live.’

Telefilm Canada head Wayne Clarkson agrees that there has never been more diversity in homegrown fare, from the eight first features to the no less than five films based on Canadian literary works. He also clearly sees why.

‘It’s the changing nature of the business,’ he says. ‘I think what’s reflected here is the degree of international involvement in Canadian films.’

Clarkson is right on the money. The world is increasingly interested in coproducing with Canuck partners or obtaining foreign rights. Arcand’s L’âge des ténèbres (Days of Darkness), Girard’s Silk, Cronenberg’s Eastern Promises and Fugitive Pieces are all copros, while Poor Boy’s Game has already sold to more than 40 countries based on only one market screening in Berlin. Clarkson sees this as just the beginning.

‘It’s not an aberration,’ he maintains. ‘If you want to put together projects of a certain budget size, the significant way to do it is international coproductions.’

The Telefilm chief – and former head of the Toronto fest – also notes that it’s a sure sign of the maturing of an industry, one that needs to be able to compete in the world market in order to sustain its growth.