‘Festivals don’t get everything they’re asking for,’ says Piers Handling, CEO of the Toronto International Film Festival Group. ‘It’s all about positioning,’ he explains, ‘and in some cases it can be about talent and availability. Sometimes it’s just impossible for them to make our dates.’

Handling is talking about the highly sought-after Hollywood star vehicles and the multitude of factors that determine which films and stars – the key to TIFF’s glamour – actually make it to Toronto.

The festival’s 33rd edition (Sept. 4-13) is ripe with both American stars and international talent, from both sides of the camera. Hollywood royalty such as Brad Pitt, Frances McDormand, John Malkovich, Tilda Swinton and the brothers Coen (Ethan and Joel) are all confirmed to attend the gala screening at TIFF with their latest comedy, Burn After Reading.

And the dates that Handling refers to add up to that pre-Oscar niche that TIFF has etched out for itself on the world’s film festival circuit. ‘Just look at the star power that comes to Toronto,’ he says.

The staggering list of American and international talent coming to this year’s event includes Edward Norton and Colin Farrell (Pride and Glory); Benicio del Toro and Steven Soderbergh (Che); Spike Lee (Miracle at St. Anna); Julianne Moore and Mark Ruffalo (Blindness); Keira Knightley (The Dutchess); Kate Beckinsale (Nothing but the Truth); Renée Zellweger, Viggo Mortensen, Jeremy Irons and Ed Harris (Appaloosa); and Anne Hathaway and Jonathan Demme (Rachel Getting Married) – all set to attend their red-carpet screenings in Toronto.

And with more than 1,000 accredited media, the festival’s timing is ideal for studios and boutique operations (aka minimajors) to use the event for press junkets.

‘For the North American industry, Toronto is now perfectly positioned as a launch for the awards season,’ says Handling, ‘meaning the Golden Globes and the Oscars. It tees off the fall season for the more serious films after the popcorn-tentpole films of the summer.

‘The North American press corps is here; the Foreign Press Association – the Golden Globe people – are here. It’s a phenomenal opportunity, yet sometimes that means they will shy away for a whole bunch of reasons, and sometimes they embrace it; it depends on the marketing strategy [for each individual film].’

So why do Canadian filmmakers care if big movie stars grace this film extravaganza?

Handling argues that TIFF now provides Canada’s film industry with a stage on which to shine in the international spotlight with the very best from around the world.

‘I think when you’re putting Canadian films and talent on the same platform as key international films and talent, they’re being perceived as equals,’ says Handling. ‘It sends all kinds of signals…that we value our own domestic production – that it can play shoulder-to-shoulder, toe-to-toe with the international counterparts.’

Handling also underlines that it’s vital to program the Canadian films among seven of TIFF’s categories.

‘It’s important that they’re not in sidebar cinemas with nobody attending,’ says Handling. ‘They are at packed screenings, with flashbulbs popping and the whole red-carpet thing, as well as the adulation of large enthusiastic audiences. It’s also important that they feel a part of the international industry.’

The festival is attracting record numbers of Canadian productions banging down the door to get in, despite the annual criticism that Canucks can get lost in the glitz, glamour and sheer magnitude that has become TIFF.

This year alone, the Canadian programmers screened a whopping 250-plus Canadian feature films submitted for consideration, while only a little more than 10% of those hopefuls – 29 Canadian features and copros – made the cut.

‘Putting Paul [Gross] or Atom [Egoyan] or Deepa [Mehta] out there at the same level as Soderbergh, Jonathan Demme or the Coen brothers says that they don’t belong in a ghetto,’ explains Handling.

For the second year in a row, TIFF has four Canadian films in the prestigious gala category, with Paul Gross’ First World War epic Passchendaele (see story, p.T4) and Charles Martin Smith’s Stone of Destiny (p.T6) as opening- and closing-night bookends.

It’s TIFF tradition to open with a Canadian film, but not necessarily to close with one. Yet Stone of Destiny, a Canada/U.K. copro, ‘was chosen because it’s a lot of fun,’ says TIFF’s new co-director, Cameron Bailey. ‘It’s a great caper comedy with a national-pride theme running through it.’

In a programming twist, sophomore filmmaker Michael McGowan’s One Week (p.T8) ranked a gala, while, among premier established directors, Atom Egoyan’s Adoration (p.T15) and Deepa Mehta’s Heaven and Earth (p.T6) got special presentations.

Yet Handling insists these two categories are virtually interchangeable in terms of prestige, noting that virtually the same number of ‘Oscar nominees’ have come out of the Elgin theater (which hosts special presentations) and Roy Thomson Hall (home of the galas).

Among dark-horse Canadian films, Bailey singles out the world premier of C’est pas moi, je le jure! (It’s Not Me I Swear, p.T13), by award-winning director Philippe Falardeau. Bailey hails Falardeau as part of ‘the next generation’ of Canadian filmmakers.

And finally, Kari Skogland’s Fifty Dead Men Walking is sure to draw attention, as its highly controversial subject, IRA informant Martin McGartland, on whose autobiography the film is based, was still threatening an injunction against the fest screening at press time (p.T8).