On Topic: The Summer Before the Fall

After a shaky blockbuster season, Tom Hall ventures to the Toronto Film Festival to kick off the fall moviegoing season

The summer of 2011 is behind us, and as far as Hollywood is concerned, autumn arrives as a mixed bag of competing concerns. As The New York Times recently reported, ticket revenues for the summer season were up slightly over 2010 ($4.38 billion, an increase of less than 1 percent) and admissions hit a 14-year low (roughly 543 million, the lowest since 1997's 540 million.) As the studios cling to the money generated by more expensive 3-D tickets, fewer and fewer Americans are willing or able to spend the money to visit (or, more likely, revisit) the characters and stories that are being served up alongside those heaping buckets of popcorn. In the process, the summer movie has become something of a take-it-or-leave-it proposition; with so many other delivery channels for movies and video entertainment, a stagnant economy provides more than enough justification for a laissez-faire approach to moviegoing.

While Hollywood licks its wounds and counts its money, the days grow shorter and the studios turn their attention to the pressing need for prestigious projects at which to throw awards. What other business changes its focus so completely, with such Gregorian precision? The box office grosses still matter, but suddenly, as if by magic, the movies that matter are all being rolled out slowly, city by city, screen by screen, building awards buzz and word of mouth. The economics of the small movie take center stage. As a cost proposition, it makes sense; Hollywood makes about 40 percent of its annual revenue in the summer quarter, when school is out and families need something to do. By September, the explosive premiere and 4,000-screen blockbuster launch is replaced by the film festival red carpet.

Film festivals have quickly learned their place in the landscape, knowing that a combination of critical recognition and word of mouth can make or break a movie's chances to find an audience and acclaim. No festival has been more important to that process than The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF)-opening each year on the Thursday after Labor Day, the festival's track record as a launching pad for prestige pictures might as easily be ascribed to its staggering scope as to its curatorial prominence. The festival is a juggernaut, featuring over 330 films from around the globe, most looking to find a way into the consciousness of North American audiences. Perhaps in spite of its scale, it has earned its reputation as a bellwether for the Academy Awards; Crash (TIFF 2005), No Country For Old Men (TIFF 2007), Slumdog Millionaire (TIFF 2008), The Hurt Locker (TIFF 2009) and The King's Speech (TIFF 2010) all had a premiere of one sort or another at Toronto, and each went on to win Best Picture.

This year's Toronto buzz features some familiar names. George Clooney stars in both the political drama The Ides of March (which he also directed) and The Descendants, a terrific tragicomedy from Alexander Payne (making his first feature film since Sideways in 2004) that carries plenty of awards season hope. Glenn Close has been drawing notice for her turn as a woman passing for a man in Albert Nobbs, while Tilda Swinton's role as the mother of a bad seed in We Need to Talk About Kevin may bring the film some deserved attention. But no film, regardless of its quality, can walk out of Toronto as a guaranteed success; there are months of festivals and audience building for these movies ahead. That's the promise of autumn.

Tom Hall is the artistic director of the Sarasota Film Festival and is a contributor to Hammer to Nail. He also writes The Back Row Manifesto blog for indieWIRE. Top Photo: Tom Hall