Toronto Film Festival: Mike Leigh To Be Feted With Ebert Director Award

British filmmaker Mike Leigh will be feted at this year’s Toronto Film Festival with the TIFF Ebert Director Award for career achievement. The announcement was made this morning by TIFF head Cameron Bailey.

Leigh returns to TIFF this year for the World Premiere of his 23rd film, Hard Truths, screening as part of the Special Presentations programme. He reunites with Academy Award nominee Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Secrets & Lies) in the pic which is described as an “intimate study of modern family life.” Hard Truths will be distributed by Bleecker Street in the US and by Mongrel Media in Canada. Leigh has had eight films in Official Selection at the festival, including Another Year, Happy-Go-Lucky, and Mr. Turner. 

Named after legendary film critic Roger Ebert, previous recipients of the award include Martin Scorsese, Claire Denis, Ava DuVernay, Wim Wenders, and the late Agnès Varda. 

The Canadian festival further announced this morning that Canadian filmmaker Durga Chew-Bose will be feted with the TIFF Emerging Talent Award presented by Amazon MGM Studios. French songwriting and composing duo Camille Dalmais and Clément Ducol will also be presented with the TIFF Variety Artisan Award for composing the soundtrack for Jacques Audiard’s latest Emilia Pérez. 

Montreal-based Durga Chew-Bose is making her feature film debut as both director and screenwriter of Bonjour Tristesse, which will have its World Premiere in the Discovery programme. This contemporary adaptation of late French author Françoise Sagan’s 1954 novel of the same name stars Chloë Sevigny and Claes Bang. Bonjour Tristesse is distributed by Elevation Pictures in Canada. Previous recipients of the TIFF Emerging Talent Award presented by Amazon MGM Studios include Carolina Markowicz in 2023; Sally El Hosaini in 2022; Danis Goulet in 2021; Tracey Deer in 2020; and Mati Diop in 2019. 

Camille Dalmais (Corsage, TIFF ’22) and Clément Ducol (Little Tickles) are prominent figures in the French music scene. Their previous albums include Le Sac des Filles and Le Fil. Previous recipients of the TIFF Variety Artisan Award include Łukasz Żal in 2023; Hildur Guðnadóttir in 2022; Ari Wegner in 2021; Terence Blanchard in 2020; and Roger Deakins in 2019.  

“It’s a true honor to welcome Mike Leigh back to the Festival and present him with the TIFF Ebert Director Award,” said Bailey. 

“Leigh has long been acknowledged as one of cinema’s great artists; Roger Ebert himself praised Leigh’s ‘sympathy, penetrating observation, and instinct for human comedy.’ Hard Truths is both a summation of that work and a bold move forward.” 

TIFF runs from September 5 to 15.