TIFF22 Wraps with Awards
by Thom Ernst -Film Correspondent
(September 18m 2022 – Toronto, ON) TIFF22 has signed off for another year but not before handing out awards to the best of the festival.
Here are the Canadian winners:
IMDBPro Short Cuts Award for Best Canadian Film:
Director Aziz Soromba receives the IMDBPro Short Cuts Award for Best Canadian Film for SIMO. About the film, the Jury writes, “Featuring convincing, natural performances and tight direction, the film astutely plays off of narrative conventions to deliver an unexpectedly tender take on growing up in an all-male immigrant family.”
Honourable Mention goes to director Lloyd Lee Choi for Same Old.
Canada Goose Amplify Voices Awards:
Director Nisha Pahuja’s To Kill a Tiger wins the Amplify Voices Award for Best Canadian Feature Film. To Kill a Tiger is Pahuja’s first film to be screened at TIFF—So she has that in common with Steven Spielberg. The jury statement reads, “It’s not easy to film love. In Nisha Pahuja’s To Kill a Tiger, a father defends his daughter, and together they change a village, a country, and, maybe, the world.”
Special Mention for Best Canadian Feature Film is Stephane Lafleur’s Viking.
Special Mention for Best Feature from an Emerging BIPOC Filmmaker is Madison Thomas for the film, Buffy-Sainte-Marie: Carry it On.
Shawn Mendes Foundation Changemaker Award:
Director Luis De Fillippis receives the Changemaker Award for Something You Said Last Night. The director released this statement, “It is an honour to have Something You Said Last Night be acknowledged by the next generation of filmmakers. Thank you to the Next Wave Committee for seeing this story. I am excited to watch you lead our industry in the coming years.”
Platform Prize:
Anthony Shim wins the Platform Prize for Riceboy Sleeps. In their statement, the Platform Prize jury remarks on Shim’s “deeply moving story and precisely-observed characters as they navigate racism, dislocation, family, and love…Plus, it’s very funny.”
TIFF22 PEOPLE’S CHOICE DOCUMENTARY AWARD:
Director Hubert Davis wins for his documentary Black Ice.
Director Babak Payami’s 752 is not a Number is second runner-up.
TIFF22 People’s Choice Awards:
Steven Spielberg’s won the TIFF 2022 People’s Choice Awards for his film The Fabelmans (his first film to be screened at TIFF—so now he has something in common with Nisha Pahuja). But our hearts are still with director Sarah Polley whose film Women Talking is the first runner-up.
And a special shout-out to Brendan Fraser, star of The Whale, for winning the TIFF Tribute Award for Performance presented by IMDbPro. The Whale might be American, but Fraser is still a Canadian.
Thom Ernst is a Toronto based film critic and writer and an active member of the (TFCA) Toronto Film Critics’ Association. His work has appeared in various publications including Playback Magazine, The Toronto Star, and The National Post. He is known to CBC Radio listeners for his lively contributions to Fresh Air, Metro Morning, and CBC Syndication as well as appearing on-air for CTV News Channel and The Agenda with Steve Paikin. He was host, interviewer and producer of televisions’ longest running movie program Saturday Night at the Movies. Currently he can be heard interviewing Canadian filmmakers on the Kingston Canadian Film Festival podcast, Rewind, Fast-Forward.
