Under a new regime of shared programming duties, the Toronto International Film Festival on Wednesday unveiled 13 Asian titles for its September run that has the stamp of newly recruited Southeast Asian programmer Raymond Phathanavirangoon.

Phathanavirangoon, who curates Asian films for Toronto along with veteran programmer Giovanna Fulvi, has brought two potentially explosive Thai films: Phawat Panangkasiri’s In the Shadow of the Naga and Citizen Juling, an examination of the Islamic insurgency in southern Thailand.

Local Buddhist sensitivities could well be shaken by Shadow of the Naga, which features three robbers who ordain themselves as monks to dig up money that they earlier hid on the grounds of a newly built temple.

‘It’s a commercial film, but it has monks that commit violence and use guns that they point at the heads of people,’ Phathanavirangoon says of a movie he believes will be hard-pressed to receive a Thai theatrical release, given that country’s censorship laws against media content that disrespects monks and the monarchy.

Which brings us to Citizen Juling, a four-hour doc from Thai directors Ing K and Manit Sriwanichpoom that’s also unlikely to secure approval for screening back home.

The film recounts the murder of a young Buddhist woman who went to southern Thailand to teach art, only to be abducted and killed by local thugs in 2004.

Phathanavirangoon says the filmmakers at one point bring their camera to a 60th anniversary celebration of the Thai king’s coronation and dare to ask onlookers why they are on hand to honor the monarchy.

‘In Thailand, you don’t ask why you celebrate the coronation. You just do it. And this film does ask why,’ the programmer points out.

As Toronto ramps up its Asian film offerings, the festival also booked in the Special Presentations sidebar Yu Lik-wai’s Plastic City, a Brazil/China coproduced drama about a feared Japanese businessman in Sao Paulo that’s a rare collaboration between Asia and South America, and veteran Japanese master director Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Still Walking.

The Masters section has Takeshi Kitano’s Achilles and the Tortoise, while the Contemporary World Cinema sidebar booked from the Philippines Adolfo Alix Jr.’s Adela, Indian director Nandita Das’ Firaaq, the actress’ directorial debut, and So Yong Kim’s Treeless Mountain, from South Korea.

On the Spanish-language side, Toronto will give red carpet treatment at Roy Thomson Hall to Daniel Burman’s Empty Nest, a look at marital tensions that stars Cecilia Roth (All About My Mother) and Oscar Martinez, while the Contemporary World Cinema sidebar has slots for five films either from Spain or coproduced with a Spanish partner: Jose Luis Cuerda’s Blind Sunflowers gets an international premiere, while world premieres go to Juan Carlos Tablo’s Horn of Plenty, Carlos Sorin’s The Window, Leonardo de Armas’ Radio Love and Chus Gutierrez’s Return to Hansala.

The Toronto International Film Festival is set to run Sept. 4-13.