In the Canada Free Press, Larry Anklewicz offers a few closing thoughts on the festival:

This is an exciting time to be in Toronto. The theatres are full and there is a buzz in the air. As an accredited member of the press, I had access to all the press conferences and all of the other events designed to get the word out about the individual films being screened at the Festival. There are also parties galore. Every night a different studio seems to be hosting an event of some kind.

To me, the films are the main story and as it is, I don’t have enough time to see as many films as I would like. So that’s the area upon which I try to focus my energy.

Dan Brown from CBC reports on the closing night film at the Toronto International Film Festival:

The name of Martin Short's new film is Jiminy Glick In Lalawood. It stars Short as the title character, an interviewer of celebrities who is as clueless as he is corpulent. But here's the thing about the title: it's a misnomer. That's because the film doesn't take place in Tinseltown; it takes place in Toronto during the Toronto International Film Festival.

"I love the shallowness of it all!" Glick gushes while on the red carpet trying to harvest sound bites from the famous. Although it may seem on the surface that lines like this mean we're supposed to laugh at Short's portly alter ego, the former SCTV star is really having a big chuckle at the expense of his fellow stars, as well as the journalists who make a living producing news about them.

In an article in the Toronto Globe and Mail, Rebecca Caldwell talks with local Chris Cooper, about the actor with the same name:

Where's the best place to catch Chris Cooper during the Toronto International Film Festival? Ensconced in the members-only Spoke Club? Holding court during press conferences at the Four Seasons? Checking out the late-night scene at the Drake Hotel?

Mr. Cooper says he's had to live with some teasing ever since the other Chris Cooper made their name such a marquee moniker.

Jim Atkins reports on the South African films in the festival:

David Isaacs is trying desperately to get to Toronto. The Cape Town actor/filmmaker is strapped for cash and this week was still in the process of obtaining a visa for Canada. He barely has enough for his airfare and still needs to nail down accommodation.

Isaacs is among the new breed of actors/filmmakers who are establishing a beachhead for South African movies on the world stage. His determination to rub shoulders with filmdom's movers-and-shakers in Toronto is indicative of the can-do spirit in the South African industry, according to Katherine Roberts, who teaches African film and is program director for the African and Creole Film Festival in Montreal.

John McKay and Megan Leach report on the opening night of the festival, for The National Post:

The latest edition of the Toronto International Film Festival, a "cultural jewel" and the largest and most prestigious film fest in the Western Hemisphere, is underway and bigger than ever.

Beatty was more than happy to take a step back and give his wife the spotlight. "You would never think that a human being would be able to do what this one does at home and still be what she is at work," he said of Bening.

Angela Baldassarre talks with Noah Cowan, Toronto International Film Festival director:

When the Toronto International Film Festival announced earlier this year that Noah Cowan would become the company's new co-director, there was a sigh of relief within the Toronto film community. Having worked with the festival, first as an intern and then as a programmer, since 1981, the boyish Cowan was the obvious successor to festival director Piers Handling. But when Cowan left the festival in 2001 to devote more attention to his film distribution company, Cowboy Pictures, there were no worthy contenders left for that position.

While at the festival Cowan co-founded the popular Midnight Madness programme, curated "India Now!" (with David Overbey), "New Beat of Japan" and the Kiyoshi Kurosawa Director's Spotlight. His influence at the festival is reverberating to this day. On a personal note, this scribe has been working with Cowan, the film writer and friend, since 1987, and has learned to value the man's knowledge and love of the media. Tandem talked to Noah Cowan about this year's festival and his new role as co-director.

Ho Anderson, in the Toronto Star:

Comprising 328 films, 21 screens and 10 days, the festival can sometimes seem unwieldy to people reared on the convenience of the suburban multiplex.

If you've ever felt intimidated by the process, relax - it makes you just like the rest of us. So you want to buy festival tickets. Where do you go? You have choices.

CBC News in Canada weighs in with a report from today's press conference in Toronto:

Almost a third of the films at the upcoming Toronto International Film Festival will be world premieres and the stars will be out to promote them, organizers boasted at the final pre-festival announcement ceremony at City Hall Tuesday.

"Filmmakers and distributors have just decided that we're the first place they want their films shown," Noah Cowan, co-director of the popular film festival, said at the outdoor announcement.

Canadian Press reports on the latest from Toronto:

Like a summer-long striptease, organizers of the Toronto International Film Festival have been unveiling tantalizing lists of titles to be screened at the 2004 edition of the fest next month. On Tuesday, a series of foreign films that will make their world or North American premieres was announced for three of the festival's thematic programs, Discovery, Visions and Wavelengths.