Perhaps it might be called the antigala. Ang Lee, the much-feted director of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, certainly seemed eager to avoid the usual film festival fanfare at the gala screening of his movie at Toronto's Roy Thomson Hall last night.
Before most of the media had assembled beside the red carpet, the private filmmaker emerged from a limousine early, stopping only to speak briefly to a television reporter before quietly making his way into the building. Latecomers asking for him were told: "He's come and gone."
Although initial critical reception of the new film from the director of The Ice Storm has been outstandingly positive -- the romance adventure was frequently described as simply "beautiful" -- his modest entrance set the tone for the evening.
A similarly quiet reception awaited Canadian director David Cronenberg, who is screening a short commissioned film on digital video during the festival. Mr. Cronenberg and his entourage ambled down the street before they were spotted by festival staff and ushered to the red carpet.
But the A-list was out in full force at Prego Della Pizza, where an evening downpour did little to drown the celebrity spirit for a party honouring Premiere magazine's sponsorship of the festival.
At the bash were actors Robert Duvall, Jeff Bridges, Willem Dafoe, Guy Pearce, Julie Walters and Molly Parker and director Kathryn Bigelow, all of whom have movies at the festival, plus famed fashion photographer Herb Ritts.
Holding court was Mr. Duvall, singing impromptu arias to a rapt audience and indulging in loud banter and horseplay with Ally McCoist, his co-star in A Shot At Glory. Mr. McCoist, a Scottish soccer star turned actor, enthused about how Mr. Duvall had long been his hero.
Why? In response, he simply quoted the famous Duvall lines from Apocalypse Now: "I love the smell of napalm in the morning."
Also at the party were A Shot At Glory director Michael Corrente and his wife, Libby Langdon, who not only produced the film but is acting in another festival offering, Al Pacino's Chinese Coffee. How was she able to multitask so easily?
"I'm the Martha Stewart of movies," she replied.
Mr. Duvall revealed that he will be returning to directing in January -- a film about dancing in the underworlds of New York and Buenos Aires.
There was glitz to be had earlier in the day at the Canadian Film Centre barbecue on the former E. P. Taylor estate in north Toronto. Waiters carrying heaping bowls of roasted red peppers, marinated mushrooms, poached mussels and smoked salmon.
The annual event has grown exponentially since its inception 13 years ago. As the centre's founder, director Norman Jewison, put it during his speech to the hungry hordes, the days when "300 [guests]. . . came up to the farm and scared the chickens" are gone.
The affair now brings a club-like atmosphere to the farm grounds. Models painted in gold and wearing angel wings hung about one of the sponsor's tents and bottles of Veuve Cliquot were discarded like so many cases of pop.
Invites are getting ever harder to come by and a phalanx of Saab cars and TTC buses was commandeered to take attendees away from civilization. Guests included Roots founder Michael Budman, actor Sonja Smits, actor and director Don McKellar, musician Lorraine Segato, Academy Award-winning documentarian Brigitte Berman, actor Tonya Lee Williams, festival co-founder Dusty Cohl, and film director Clement Virgo with Deborah Cox, the star of his movie Love Come Down. There was also a reported sighting of Renée Zellweger.
Mr. Cohl, his signature cowboy hat standing out from a distance, was taking in the spectacle from a quiet table on the sidelines. "The barbecue is one of the few times you get to spend some time with people," he said. "No one is trying to push their stars or sell anything. It's great, you send people out for food . . ."
Meanwhile, a lot of film critics are frustrated film directors, but few have the moxie to live out their fantasy. Rod Lurie is the exception. As recently as five years ago, he was penning movie reviews for Los Angeles magazine.
Mr. Lurie yesterday held a news conference plugging his second feature, The Contender, a backroom political thriller with a cast that includes two of the actors he used to praise lavishly during his stint as a mere scribbler -- Jeff Bridges (portraying a U.S. president) and Joan Allen (as his vice-presidential nominee with a skeleton in her closet).
However, the road from critic to director is not without its potholes -- thespians have awfully long memories. After singing the praises of the actors he managed to corral, Mr. Lurie paused to remember one who got away: "I was at a casting meeting with Kenneth Branagh, and started by saying, 'You know, I think you're one of the greatest actors there are.' To which he snapped back, 'No you don't,' and then quoted at length from my review of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein." Ah, the hazards of the trade. ... Full coverage of film festival. R5-6