The Toronto festival kicked off in commercial style, opening with Looper and On the Road. for the more awards-minded, and particularly those for whom English is not a first language, attention was on making announcements of nominees for the subtitle Oscar.
Toronto offers an opportunity to promote to the Academy off the back of festival presence. The jockeying for attention is particularly strong in the Academy’s foreign language category, since Toronto is really the last major festival of the year, falls within the nomination period, gets strong coverage from the US trades and is attended by a reasonable number of Americans visiting the locations of their favourite TV shows.