With just one screening left before the awards are handed out this afternoon, it feels safe to say the Toronto film festival is wrapping up … or that mine is, at the very least.

Since the awards are the big deal today, it seems logical to direct you to my latest Sympatico/MSN TIFF gallery — a completely uninformed bluffer’s guide to the films I suspect will be in contention for the People’s Choice, Discovery and Toronto-City awards. Just keeping the conversation going.

Oh, and speaking of conversations: Guess who pops up in the Globe and Mail today, discussing the dubious legacy of TIFF’s closing-night galas …

It’s fun to be prominent!

The second weekend of the Toronto film festival is a time for quiet reflection and measured down-shifting — most of the publicists and virtually all of the talent leaves town by Thursday evening, and the screenings ramp down to virtually nothing.

Today, for example, I have but one film to see — “The Lucky Ones”, which opens at the end of the month — and it’s really more about the convenience of catching it today so I can turn the review around at my leisure rather than rushing to meet my deadline after some Monday morning screening.

Yup, it’s pretty much over. Except for “The Wrestler”, which I’ll see tomorrow morning, and the awards, which will be announced tomorrow afternoon. But that’s tomorrow.

Today, over in the real world, there are a whole bunch of new movies to see — specifically:

“Burn After Reading”: The Coens follow “No Country for Old Men” with a goofier project in which many actors — including George Clooney, Frances McDormand, John Malkovich and, yes, Brad Pitt — chase each other around Washington in the name of wacky mayhem. I have the feeling it plays a lot funnier to them than it does to us. Jason is on the same page.

“Righteous Kill“: Pacino and De Niro, together again — and boy, does the crappy vehicle reuniting them serve as a sad reality check. It ain’t 1995, this ain’t “Heat”, and Pacino and De Niro ain’t Pacino and De Niro any more. And Jon Avnet sure ain’t no Michael Mann.

“The Women”: I wasn’t able to catch Diane English’s long-in-the-works remake of George Cukor’s 1939 studio classic … oh, wait, that’s because the trailer almost physically pushed me away from the auditorium. Also, it just seemed like a better fit for Susan.

Oh, and “Tyler Perry’s The Family That Preys” opens without the benefit of press screenings. Was anyone else disappointed that it’s another one of his moralizing comedies, and not an uncredited reimagining of “The Hills Have Eyes”? Or is that just me?

I’m still short on blogging time, but with very good reason: The French are in town!

It’s a banner year for French cinema, and TIFF is benefiting from it on almost every level.

Yeah, New York snagged “Entre les Murs” for its opening night, which effectively disappeared it from the TIFF schedule — seriously, just try to find any mention of it originally being included in the Special Presentations series back in July — but we still have strong new work from Arnaud Desplechin, Amos Gitai, Olivier Assayas and Agnes Varda, among others.

And I’m meeting Varda — one of the last surviving Nouvelle Vague directors, and the one who remains the most giddy and inventive — in about half an hour, so I have to run.

A la prochaine …

After his triumphant Cannes debut, my cousin Mark Peranson is poised to conquer Toronto with his sly comic performance as Joseph, Father of Jeebus in Albert Serra’s “El Cant dels Ocells“. Every review I’ve read has taken pains to spotlight his appearance in the film, and to explain his elaborate history as a key player on the Canadian cinematic scene.

It’s an easy way to make an obscure Spanish production stand out from the pack, obviously, but it also speaks to the goodwill people have for Mark as the editor of Cinema Scope — which has, over the past nine years, become arguably the most important English-language film journal — and as a person in general.

Also, he’s very, very funny in the movie.

Tonight, “El Cant des Ocells” has its North American premiere — and as it was in Cannes, so shall it be in Toronto, with the screening taking place at 5 pm local time on a Tuesday in a relatively out-of-the-way venue. (In this case, it’s the AMC at Yonge and Dundas, if you feel like going for a rush seat.)

I expect the reception will be just as rapturous, too. And if there’s a party, I shall avoid the Catalan reds like the plague.

… because I’m going to be on CTV Newsnet in about forty minutes. Specifically, at or around 1:15 PM EDT. In Toronto, you can find it on Rogers cable 62.

If you’re curious to see what five days of festivaling looks like, tune in!

(Spoiler alert: It looks awful.)

… sorry, it’s just that chasing down Danny Boyle and Ricky Gervais and Greg Kinnear and Steve McQueen leaves one with very little personal time.

(I am not complaining, though.)

Anyway, as I rush hither and thither, here’s my latest Sympatico/MSN TIFF gallery, a collection of movies that have been discovered at Toronto, along with a couple of possible contenders from the current crop.

And I’m off again …

Exactly one year ago today, I was sitting in the Varsity watching Michael Moore’s movie “Captain Mike Across America“, a special presentation at TIFF ’07 that followed Moore’s quest to elect John Kerry in 2004 by embarking on a 62-city tour, culminating in an election-night concert bash.

Didn’t love it. Nor did anyone else, which is one reason it remains undistributed and unreleased a year later.

But wait! There’s news! Moore’s just announced that he’ll be releasing his latest film, “Slacker Uprising”, directly to the internet later this month. On September 23rd, he’ll be making it available for download to anyone in North America; a DVD will follow on October 7th.

From the press release:

“Slacker Uprising” traces Michael Moore’s 62-city tour of the swing states during the 2004 Presidential election and records the thrilling — and frightening — response he received across the country.

Sooo … um … it’s the same movie. Or a recut version, anyway. Thus: Whee.

Anyway, if you’re curious you can sign up to be notified when the download goes live at the movie’s website. Don’t worry if you aren’t feeling the urgency yet; September 23rd is six months from now in TIFF time …

TIFF ’08 kicks off today, and my carefully balanced schedule of screenings and interviews has already gone to hell; long story, not worth telling right now, busy busy busy.

Instead, I direct your attention to the latest issue of NOW, which features all the festival coverage you can eat, including dozens of movie capsules (46 or 47 of which are mine, if you can believe that), my Cannes chat with Julianne Moore and Don McKellar and a conversation between myself, Susan and Barrett, moderated by Glenn, about how we define our jobs and ourselves.

I mean, if you’re interested.

FIPRESCI, the international critics’ organization to which I belong, has announced its annual Grand Prix. This year’s winner is Paul Thomas Anderson’s “There Will Be Blood”. Go, Team Plainview!

It was my honor to be asked to review the film for the site; you can find it here. But what’s also pretty nifty is the Spanish translation of that review; it’s the first time I’ve ever been reprinted in another language, and it’s kinda awesome — I can’t stop giggling over the way my description of Daniel Day-Lewis as the bastard son of John Huston in “Chinatown” and Mr. Burns from “The Simpsons” reads en Espanol.

The Grand Prix will be presented to Anderson at the San Sebastian film festival later this month. Felicitations, P.T.!

How slow was last weekend, release-wise? Just about the only thing we could come up with for my Sympatico/MSN movies column was a rundown of the history of the scattershot parody.

It tied in to “Disaster Movie”, you see. It was either that or something on French science-fiction for “Babylon A.D.”, and there really isn’t much beyond “Fantastic Planet”, “Le Dernier Combat” and “The Fifth Element” …

… well, there’s “Eden Log“, but trust me, it ain’t worth the time.