Traditionally among TIFF's first wave of announcements are titles that premiered at Cannes and Berlin and are solid enough to merit a North American preem in Toronto. Of the first 26 titles announced, nineteen of them were first shown on the Croisette.
With no run away, break out titles as in the previous years (Babel, Volver, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, NCFOM, Silent Light, The Class, Gomorrah, Synecdoche, New York, Waltz with Bashir) Cannes 2009 might not have been a bust, but it was disappointing to see so many mediocre films make it into the main comp.
Cannes launched their new website and a spanking brand new poster hours before the anticipated announcement of the films that will make up the 2009 edition. This year's one sheet (a banner that will litter the entire Croisette) is an homage to last year's dearly departed Michelangelo Antonioni and his masterwork l’Avventura.
Besides finding out that Michael Haneke's next will be presented in b&w, Variety's article of the titles that we should see announced in one week's time is a basic re-dotting of the i's and recrossing of the t's. The only speculation worth mentioning comes in the shape of the special screening and/or midnight slot status which may include Werner Herzog's "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans" and Sam Raimi's "Drag Me to Hell".
Some post Berlin pieces from Screen Daily and The Hollywood Reporter offer lists of shoe-in selections for the main comp and out of comp categories on the Croisette this coming May. Von Trier, Tarantino, Campion, Loach, Almodovar, Jarmusch, Akin, Haneke, Tanovic, Michael Moore and Claire Denis should be making the trek down, but I'm surprised to see that both pieces fail to mention the likes of Woody Allen and Terrence Malick as possible attendees.