Chandler Levack’s Mile End Kicks will have its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), opening its Special Presentations section.

The film is produced by Matthew Miller for Toronto’s Zapruder Films, Pat Kiely for Montreal-based Banner House Productions and Julie Groleau. It represents Levack’s sophomore feature following I Like Movies, which world premiered in TIFF’s 2022 Discovery section.

Mile End Kicks (pictured) follows a young woman in the summer of 2011 who moves to Montreal to write a book about Alanis Morissette’s 1995 album Jagged Little Pill. It is set in Montreal’s titular Mile End neighbourhood which has been home to acts such as Grimes, Mac DeMarco and Arcade Fire.

The film stars Barbie Ferreira (Euphoria) and Stanley Simons (The Iron Claw) alongside Canadian actors Devon Bostick (Oppenheimer), Juliette Gariépy (Deux femmes en or) and Jay Baruchel (BlackBerry).

Mile End Kicks – supported by Telefilm Canada and SODEC – is distributed in Quebec by Montreal’s Entract Films and in the rest of Canada by Toronto’s Elevation Pictures. L.A.’s XYZ Films is the international sales agent and is financing the film in conjunction with the Finland-based investment firm IPR.VC.

Production began in Toronto on Aug. 19, 2024 and wrapped on Sept. 29 in Montreal.

The film joins four other Special Presentation world premieres announced Thursday (June 26) for TIFF’s 50th edition. They include Nia DaCosta’s U.S. feature Hedda, Good News from South Korea’s Byun Sung-hyun, Steven Soderbergh’s U.K. project The Christophers and Alejandro Amenábar’s Spain/Italy copro The Captive.

Earlier in June, TIFF announced that the festival will open with Colin Hanks’ documentary feature John Candy: I Like Me. The film is produced by Ryan Reynolds, George Dewey and Johnny Pariseau through Reynolds’ U.S. banner Maximum Effort; Company Name’s Hanks and Sean Stewart; Zipper Bros Films’ Glen Zipper; and Shane Reid. The Amazon MGM title acts as a tribute for the Canadian actor and comedian who died in 1994 at the age of 43.

TIFF’s 50th edition runs from Sept. 4 to 14. Its Industry Conference runs from Sept. 5 to 9.

Image courtesy of Elevation Pictures