A thousand years ago, in July, we launched our virtual film platform, packed with everything you love about TIFF: New Releases, TIFF Cinematheque curated classics, restorations, and exclusive talks with some of the biggest names in film. Well, unearth your (or let us reset it), because digital TIFF Bell Lightbox is back, and it’s available across Canada.

"When you find community, you find yourself as well.”

“Because we wanted to make a film about young people, we wanted to make it with them.”

Chloé Zhao’s award–winning impressionistic drama casts real-life wrangler Brady Jandreau as a South Dakota cowboy struggling to chart a new course.

Supervised and approved by the master director himself, TIFF Cinematheque is proud to have a one-week exclusive Canadian video-on-demand premiere of this retrospective, thanks to Janus Films. Featuring a special extended cut of The Hand and new restorations of these classics from the original 35mm camera negatives:

From Cantopop covers to California Dreamin’ – listen to this playlist to get you in the mood for World of Wong Kar Wai.

Bad year, great movies. Here are TIFF selections for the 10 best Canadian features and shorts of 2020.

Mina Shum directs an all-star cast — including Cheng Pei Pei, Sandra Oh, Tzi Ma, and Don McKellar — in her 2017 feature, about a devoted wife and mother (Pei Pei) who is forced to reassess her reverence for her husband after she finds another woman’s thong in his laundry.

"I think it’s the most honest portrayal of the conflicts and complexities of one man. Only Scorsese could create such a portrait." —Bong Joon-ho on Raging Bull, released in theatres 40 years ago today

“This wig is almost like a suit of armour.”

We were wondering: could we use your couch? The TIFF Next Wave Film Festival runs online and across Canada from February 12–15. us for a free, live In Conversation With… Finn Wolfhard, a throwback Movie Marathon guaranteed to be A Trip, brand new films from around the world (free for anyone under 25), including:

TIFF presents Black Futures on Film on digital TIFF Bell Lightbox, a contemporary exploration of Black imagery on screen. Challenging commonly accepted ideas of what Black stories can be and expanding beyond the month’s singular focus on Black history, Black Futures on Film looks to explore what it means to be Black and on screen now and tomorrow.

"We're still working our way back to the point where a character like Ben, or an actor like Duane Jones, is just sort of casually the lead in a horror movie...The role is still groundbreaking for that reason. And representation in any form, even when there's no race discussed, even when it's not against the backdrop of huge social change like Night Of The Living Dead — it's still revolutionary to have that Black face, to have that Black alpha."

"[Love Jones] was so sexy and elegant, and it just was everything I wanted my life to be. Because that was before I wanted to be a filmmaker, and it just stuck with me, and I see it in all my films, in all my writing."

“My generation is so vocal. We just want truth, we want authenticity, and we don’t want bullshit.”

"Pound for pound, if there's one story out of every five years that actually speaks to something from this diverse culture that we live in in Canada — it's not enough for me."

"I want the audience to feel a little uncomfortable. I don't think we should have too privileged of a viewing of this person." —Kazik Radwanski

Author and scholar Imani Perry discusses the ongoing significance and relevance of Lorraine Hansberry’s most influential play, A Raisin in the Sun, and the lauded film adaptation of the same name.

“Afrobubblegum is fun, fierce, and frivolous African art because more often than not, Black joy is not celebrated and Afrobubblegum is an opportunity to celebrate Black joy through art.” 

Sound of Metal stars Riz Ahmed and Paul Raci and writer-director Darius Marder TIFF Artistic Director and Co-Head Cameron Bailey for an exclusive conversation about their trailblazing film. Since premiering at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival, Sound of Metal has gone on to be a top contender in this year’s awards season.

For Euzhan Palcy, making Sugar Cane Alley was “hell. Nobody wanted to touch it. Nobody was interested… it was Black, a period piece directed by an unknown and Black female director. And the movie nobody wanted to touch got 5 awards in Venice Film Festival.”

“I was obsessed with building this love story with equality and it got even more radical in the process.”

“How do we look at the experiences that we all can identify with but tell them through the gaze or the lens of somebody whose story hasn’t been told before.” —Amma Asante

“I’ve always been interested in the idea of women’s freedom, or lack of freedom and Firecrackers really looks at that in a very specific way and its all about power.” —Jasmin Mozaffari

"Everybody has a gift—so find the best in you and express it."

"You've got to go there with faith in your heart that you are going to discover something that you probably, you know it exists, but you may not have considered it."

“I didn’t learn about the Black Panther Party in high school and history books. Now we’re learning that the history books were blatant lies anyway. Movies and art is where...we get to tell our own stories, and we take a responsibility for telling history.” —Dominique Fishback

What makes an Edgar Wright movie an Edgar Wright movie?

“It’s imperative that more Asian filmmakers put our own stories out there and cast and show this wider range of Asian North American experience.” —Dr. Elaine Chang

"For Spirited Away, Chihiro feels like such a real little girl. He pays attention to all of those little details. I wanted to capture those details in Bao as well."

Actor Tamlyn Tomita breaks down why The Joy Luck Club was such a significant milestone for Asian American representation on film and celebrates the new wave of Asian American talent — both on- and off-screen — gaining traction in the industry after the watershed success of Crazy Rich Asians, the first film since The Joy Luck Club by a major Hollywood studio to feature a cast of majority Asian descent.

"His dedication to film is pure." —Yang Mi reflects on the talent and vision of director Ang Lee.

South Korea's most versatile writer-director, Bong Joon-ho, discusses how South Korean society has influenced their cinema.

"Sometimes you have to be a high-flying bitch."

During the 2018 Toronto International Film Festival, director Taika Waititi dropped by TIFF to discuss Marvel's success with choosing unexpected directors for their cinematic universe, and how his small relationship comedies prepared him to take on Thor: Ragnarok.

"With the Haida language, because with there being so few speakers left, the intensity of the responsibility to get it right was really strong." —Helen Haig-Brown