Shekhar Kapur's "What's Love Got to Do With It?", the director's first fiction feature in a decade and a half, will premiere at the 47th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) scheduled from September 8 to 18.
The title, one of 18 Gala Presentations, was announced on Thursday morning by TIFF CEO Cameron Bailey. "What's Love Got to Do With It?" is a British rom-com co-produced and scripted by Jemima Khan.
“'What's Love Got to Do With It?' is a super fun film, a romantic comedy in the great tradition of the genre. Set in the United Kingdom and Pakistan, it is a smart film about a cross-cultural romance,” says Bailey on phone from Toronto.
Kapur's last fiction feature was 2007's "Elizabeth: The Golden Age," which also screened at TIFF.
"What's Love Got to Do With It?" has Lily James, Emma Thompson. Sajal Ali (who played Sridevi's daughter in the Bollywood film 'Mom'), Shazad Latif and Shabana Azmi in key roles.
Another Indian entry figures in the TIFF 2022 Gala Presentations selection – first-time director Shubham Yogi's "Kachchey Limbu," a sports film starring Radhika Madan and debutant Ayush Mehra.
“In the announcements that we will make in the coming weeks, there will be more films from India,” says Bailey.
Sections for which films are yet to be announced are Discovery, Contemporary World Cinema and TIFF's competitive Platform.
Back as an in-person film festival after two severely curtailed editions in 2020 and 2021, TIFF 2022 will screen a total of 200 feature films, down from the 2019 number of 260.
“With a significantly tighter line-up, we have made a conscious decision to make TIFF a walkable festival. All the major venues are going to be within walking distance, making it a more convenient festival to navigate for everyone,” says Bailey.
This year, TIFF has added the historic Royal Alexandra Theatre, a few steps away from the festival's Bell Lightbox headquarters, to its list of venues. In operation since 1907, the 'Royal Alex' is the oldest continuously operating theatre in North America.
“The main learning from the past two years,” says Bailey, “is that we cannot duplicate the experience of people watching films together in a theatre with the filmmakers present.”
“The electricity and anticipation of people waiting to see the premieres and filmmakers waiting nervously for the lights to go down and the magic to begin – that is something that wanted to come back to,” he adds.
Among the TIFF 2020 Gala Presentations is "Squid Game" star Lee Jung-jae's "Hunt", which premiered at Cannes this year as part of the festivals' Midnight Screenings.
Also in the Galas selection are world premieres of Rodrigo Garcia's Raymond and Ray, starring Ewan McGregor and Ethan Hawke; Paul Weitz's "Moving On", featuring Jane Fonda, Malcolm McDowell and Lily Tomlin; English actress Mary Nighy's directorial debut and Anna Kendrick-starrer "Alice, Darling"; and Peter Farrelly's war drama "The Greatest Beer Run Ever" with Zac Efron, Russell Crowe and Bill Murray.
On Thursday, TIFF also announced 45 Special Presentations titles, including several that will be unveiled for the first time. Among these are Richard Eyre's Allelujah and German director Edward Berger's "All Quiet on the Western Front", adapted from Erich Maria Remarque's anti-war novel of the same name.
Among the TIFF titles announced earlier are Steven Spielberg's "The Fabelmans" and Rian Johnson's "Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery".
The world premiere of a Spielberg film is a first for TIFF. Says Bailey: 'The Fabelmans' is a beautiful, powerful film and unlike anything he has done before.”
"The Fabelmans" and the "Knives Out" sequel are both part of TIFF Special Presentations. The section also includes "Another Round" writer Tobias Lindholm's "Good Nurse", a true crime thriller starring Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne, and Stephen Frears' "The Lost King", a British comedy-drama inspired by real events.
