The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) unveiled the full lineup for its competitive Platform programme for its 49th edition, where Toronto-based Sook-Yin Lee’s (Octavio is Dead!) feature Paying For It will compete amongst nine other films.

Canadian director Atom Egoyan (The Sweet Hereafter) has been tapped to serve as jury head for this year’s competition. Joining Egoyan as part of the Platform jury are South Korean filmmaker Hur Jin-ho (A Normal Family) and American filmmaker and essayist Jane Schoenbrun (A Self-Induced Hallucination).

Lee’s Paying For It (pictured) is the sole Canadian entry this year in the Platform programme, which sees all 10 films compete as world premieres. The film brings together Canadian underground artists and innovative cross-generational musicians in this live-action adaptation of Chester Brown’s autobiographical 2011 graphic novel of the same name.

Paying for It is produced by Matt Code of Wildling Pictures and Sonya Di Rienzo and Aeschylus Poulos of Hawkeye Pictures. Wildling’s Natalie Urquhart is a co-producer alongside Lee. U.S. writer and actor John Cameron Mitchell and star Daniel Beirne serve as executive producers. The film stars Emily Lê and Andrea Werhun alongside Beirne.

The film was made with the participation of Telefilm Canada, Ontario Creates and in association with Bell Media’s Crave and CBC Films. The producers are handling Canadian rights. An international sales agent was not attached at press time.

The international films competing as part of TIFF’s Platform lineup include Nacho Vigalondo’s Daniela Forever (Spain/Belgium), Huang Xi’s Daughter’s Daughter (Taiwan), Tallulah H. Schwab’s Mr. K (Netherlands/Belgium/Norway), Rodrigo Prieto’s Pedro Páramo (Mexico), Gabrielle Brady’s The Wolves Always Come at Night (Australia/Mongolia/Germany), Carlos Marqués-Marcet’s They Will Be Dust (Spain/Italy/Switzerland), Petar Valchanov and Kristina Grozeva’s Triumph (Bulgaria/Greece), Olivier Sarbil’s Viktor (Ukraine/USA), and Koya Kamura’s Winter in Sokcho (France).

TIFF runs from Sept. 5 to 15.

Photo by Gayle Ye