Over the first four days of the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival, audiences have seen an array of movies: the opening-night attraction “Being Heumann” on Thursday, “The Julia Set” and “Everybody Wants to F*ck Me” on Friday, “I Play Rocky,” “Misty Green” and “Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother” on Saturday, “The Debut” on Sunday. They’ve loved them in that TIFF way in which the whole audience erupts into spontaneous applause and nobody times the standing ovations the way they do at fancier festivals.
So why is it that so many conversations have circled back around to Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s “You Can See Everything,” a movie that isn’t even playing here “on the shores of Lake Ontario,” as “I Play Rocky” director Peter Farrelly proudly described Toronto before his premiere?
That movie, a reportedly bonkers Elizabeth Holmes documentary (or semi-pseudo-documentary?) premiered in a secret screening at the Telluride Film Festival a week ago, but its absence in Toronto hasn’t stopped the buzz, whether in the form of enthusiasm, befuddlement, curiosity or skepticism.
So TIFF, the biggest of the fall festivals, missed out on the season’s buzziest flick and watched other festivals nab some of the top premieres: Martin McDonagh’s “Wild Horse Nine,” Lance Oppenheim’s “Primetime” and Florian Zeller’s “Bunker” to Venice, Jesse Eisenberg’s “The Debut,” Simon Stone’s “Elsinore” and Mike Leigh’s “Tender Loving Care” to Telluride, Tony Gilroy’s “Behemoth!” and Tom McCarthy’s “A Statement” to New York.
Several of those films went to TIFF after debuting elsewhere, while Toronto’s world premieres consisted of a lot of the kind of films it has specialized in in recent years: movies like “Being Heumann” and “I Play Rocky,” quintessential audience movies for the only festival whose top award is given out by the public, not by a jury.
That’s not to say that TIFF audience films can’t go on to make noise in awards circles: Recent People’s Choice winners “Hamnet,” “American Fiction,” “The Fabelmans” and “Belfast” were all Best Picture nominees, while 2019’s “Green Book” and 2020’s “Nomadland” pulled off rare TIFF People’s Choice Award/Best Picture Oscar double wins.
So far, though, the jury is out on the long-distance chances for TIFF’s top premieres. “Being Heumann,” which chronicles disability rights advocate Judith Heumann, prompted a joyous celebration both for the action on screen and for the fact that a movie like that was made with a cast of disabled actors; “I Play Rocky” found the audience bursting into applause throughout its story of the making of Sylvester Stallone’s 1976 classic “Rocky.” But both films sit in the 60s on Metacritic – and while “I Play Rocky” (score: 63) may make it into the Best Picture lineup, it’s less than a sure thing.
Eisenberg’s community-theater comedy “The Debut,” which had its international premiere at TIFF after launching at Telluride, is the closest thing to a critical and audience favorite to get a prime weekend berth in Toronto. Starring Julianne Moore as a New Jersey housewife cast in a community theater musical production which transforms her into a fierce method actor, it has a Metacritic score of 88 and went over like gangbusters at the Princess of Wales Theatre.
But it’s also one of a large number of TIFF films that may score best in the acting races. In fact, the first four days of the festival have delivered enough awards-worthy performances to fill up a couple of lead categories, with contenders including Anthony Ippolito in “I Play Rocky,” Andrew Scott in “Elsinore,” Scoot McNairy and Amanda Seyfried in “The Life and Deaths of Wilson Shedd,” Kate O’Flynn in “Tender Loving Care,” Rosalind Eleazar in “Misty Green,” Ruth Madeley in “Being Heumann,” Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz in “Bunker,” Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve in “Fjord,” Mahershala Ali in “Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother,” Cynthia Erivo in “Prima Facie” and Julianne Moore and Paul Giamatti in “The Debut,” unless Giamatti’s performance is one of those borderline roles that gets campaigned in the supporting category.
This doesn’t include films that will have their TIFF debuts on Monday or Tuesday after premiering in Venice, among them Danny Boyle’s “Ink,” with Guy Pearce and Jack O’Connell, and McDonagh’s “Wild Horse Nine,” with a performance by John Malkovich that might well be the Best Actor leader in the clubhouse at this point.
It’s not right to say that this is a weak year for movies in Toronto, but it’s weak for high-profile premieres, especially from major studios. But you could say the same thing about this year’s lineups at Cannes, Venice and Telluride, because big studios are sitting out the festival game more than ever these days.
Still, strong films have shown up in this festival by the lake. After seeing more than 50 of them (many at previous festivals or in private screenings pre-TIFF), I’m sticking with two personal favorites: Mike Leigh’s beautiful swan song, “Tender Loving Care,” and Tim Blake Nelson’s wrenching crime story, “The Life and Deaths of Wilson Shedd.” That’s one person’s opinion; there are lots more movies here for lots of other opinions.
But hey, have you heard about “You Can See Everything?”
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