David Fear
Contact David Fear on X View all posts by David Fear September 6, 2026
TIFF, 4 Something old, something new, several things that are borrowed, and more than a few films that will leave you feeling blue — the Toronto International Film Festival is about to roar back to life, and its 51st edition sticks to the tried-and-true formula that’s established it as a fall-fest favorite. There are a handful of revivals, including a preview of a new, restored cut of Ken Russell’s The Devils. You’ll get the best of several other festivals, including many of the big titles from Cannes (All of a Sudden, Fjord, Club Kid, The Beloved) and recent premieres from Venice (Ink, Wild Horse Nine, Possible Love) and Telluride (Tender Loving Care, The Debut). And, of course, you’ll get your very first looks at a number of titles that use TIFF as a launch pad for potential awards-season glory.
And naturally, this year’s festival has more than its fair share of “midnight madness” genre flicks, arthouse movies from virtually every corner of the globe, and a strong selection of documentaries; the music-doc lineup is particularly varied this time out, with portraits of everybody from an up-and-coming Americana trio to drumming god Neil Peart. We’ve selected 22 films that have our interest piqued, from a Japanese spin on Bad Lieutenant to an intimate year in the life of Lisa from Blackpink. Here’s what we’re itching to see at TIFF 2026.
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‘Alpha Gang’
When the inevitable alien invasion of Earth happens — you know it will, people! — our cosmic overlords will not look like little, bug-eyed green men. They will apparently resemble a 1950s biker gang modeled after Marlon Brando from The Wild One. That’s the basic premise of David and Nathan Zellner’s satirical sci-fi opus about of group of extraterrestrials who take a very, shall we say, retro attempt to blend in. The longer these would-be conquerors of humanity spend among us noble, flawed Homo sapiens, however, the more they began to realize that maybe the planet has more perks than they’d imagined. Dig this cast, daddy-o: Cate Blanchett, Lea Seydoux, Chris Pine, Dave Batista, Riley Keough, Lily-Rose Depp, Kelvin Harrison Jr., and Bae Doona.
