Toronto 2024: War and Politics

The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) might be a contained bubble of world premieres, celebrity sightings, and industry business but this week, festival organizers – perhaps to their dismay – were reminded that privileged walls often cannot hold back real-world concerns.

A group of Ukrainian activists put pressure on the festival to cancel further screenings – albeit temporarily – of the documentary title, Russians at War which the group labeled as “Russian propaganda”.

Directed by Anastasia Trofimova, a Russian-Canadian cinematographer who spent seven months embedded with Russian troops near the front line in Ukraine, the documentary portrays Russian soldiers and medics fighting in Ukraine. They are there for different reasons that they eventually begin to grapple with as they speak directly to the camera and come to express their disillusionment with the human toll of the war.

Trofimova insists she did not ask permission from the Russian government before filming and as such put her life at risk to make the film. She told Reuters: “I understand that emotions are high, but come see the film.” “I did not come here with the intention of being part of a war… I’ve seen enough of wars.”

A French-Canadian coproduction, Russians at War was supported financially by a non-profit, Canada Media Fund that receives grant monies from the government thus giving protesters a moral edge. After standing by the film and rallying for the right to free expression, TIFF’s leadership put a pause on further screenings citing public safety concerns. This decision, described as “unprecedented” in an official statement by the festival was only temporary though as screenings were announced to be resumed at the festival’s Lightbox headquarters on Tuesday, 17th September.

This wasn’t the only controversial title at TIFF. Protesters comprising artists and anti-Zionist Jewish activists briefly interrupted the premiere of the sole Israeli title at the festival, the Centerpiece selection, Bliss (Hemda). Their grouse was the film’s ties to the Israeli state as its funders include the Israeli Film Council and the Ministry of Sport and Culture. The protesters also hoped to draw attention to the Israeli attacks in Gaza and the Occupied West Bank. This war has so far resulted in the deaths of over 40,000 people since Hamas’s October 7 attack.

Directed by novelist and filmmaker Shemi Zarhin, Bliss (Hemda) is a poignant, mildly amusing drama that centers an older married couple (Sasson Gabay and Assi Levy) as they confront some difficult truths about their family. Tensions come to a boil when two new characters are introduced. Zarhin told The Hollywood Reporter about the challenges of navigating the festival landscape while the conflict at home rages on, “They don’t want us anymore and this (TIFF invite) could break the curse.”

The reception that greeted both Russians at War and Bliss (Hemda) in Toronto highlights the active responsibility that is now expected of festivals and cultural institutions. It might no longer be enough to remain neutral bystanders promoting as moral conflicts continue to claim lives and decimate communities that are sources of the diverse stories that power the films that make up the festivals.

In this vein, two high-profile world premieres at TIFF carry themes that grapple with the nature of conflict albeit in different ways. The gripping The Return, directed by Uberto Pasolini features the onscreen reunion of The English Patient stars Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche 28 years later. The Return adapts the final sections of Homer’s Odyssey and contains the epic story to a single set Greek island to better realize Pasolini’s vision.

More than 20 years after abandoning home to fight the Trojan war, Odysseus (Fiennes) – diminished and unrecognizable – washes onto the shores of Ithaca to find his kingdom near-desolate. In his absence, his wife Penelope (Binoche) has waited for his return, refusing to crown a new king by marrying one of the desperate suitors circling her. Their son Telemachus finds his existence increasingly threatening to his mother’s suitors. To reclaim his throne, Odysseus must pass a now-famous test while reluctantly committing to shedding blood once again.

Shot in a classic, old-fashioned style, The Return is a delicious acting showcase for the considerable talents of both stars. Fiennes’ Odysseus is a war veteran who is deeply traumatized by his past and has come to resent the bloodthirsty days of his youth. The film visually and thematically telegraphs ways in which war brings out the worst in human beings. Pasolini advocates for a different kind of solution to human conflicts even as the final act delivers the bloodbath that will keep audiences engaged and his character tormented.

Angelina Jolie’s fifth directorial effort, Without Blood delivers the action goods early on as well before settling for a faux intellectual rumination on war, trauma and revenge between its two stars Salma Hayek and Demián Bichir.

It is clear to see how the Hollywood superstar would be drawn to adapt Alessandro Baricco’s book of the same title. The material is in keeping with her established interests in war and peace, themes she has returned to in previous directorial efforts, In the Land of Blood and Honey and First They Killed My Father. Despite filming in Rome’s famed Cinecittà studios, Jolie moves the setting from Italy to an unnamed frontier-era Spanish-speaking country fractured by conflict.

A promising opening scene in which a group of men on horseback mete out violence on a victim quickly gives way to a first act that tries to open up the source material’s stage play limitations. Jolie’s directing here is perfunctory and the sequence soon outlasts its welcome. She then moves to the film’s centerpiece, an intimate back-and-forth conversation between Hayek and Bichir that may read well on paper but doesn’t translate as effectively on screen. Both actors are fine, but Jolie’s uninspired direction cannot sell the material. The actors are thus stranded in a dramatically inert ship, forced to read clunky lines and deliver hammy performances in a film that never quite comes to life.