|
The "brave" celebs are ignoring the SARS and power
blackout-induced slowdown. Anthony Hopkins, Ian McKellen,
Sean Penn, Robert Downey Jr., Val Kilmer, Cate Blanchett,
Tim Robbins, Isabella Rossellini and Omar Sharif were
also confirmed to attend.
And Ridley Scott will present his director's cut of
science fiction classic "Alien", complete with never
before seen footage.
Unveiling the final lineup for the Sept 4-13 event,
organizers said the recent SARS outbreak failed to
scare off stars or filmmakers and ticket sales were
already ahead of last year's record levels.
"The fact they're here is obviously for us a great
sigh of relief ... their presence at the festival
is going to electrify this city", Toronto festival
director Piers Handling told reporters.
"I think it's just a recognition of how important
the festival has become in the eyes of the international
industry".
Francis Ford Coppola will also attend to show and
discuss his 1982 film, "One from the Heart".
This year's festival will present 336 films from 55
countries, including 252 features, about 60 percent
of which are in a language other than English.
The event will be a much welcomed injection of tourism
and business for a city hit hard by the SARS outbreak,
which ran from mid-March until early May in Toronto.
The city remains the only place outside Asia where
people have died from the disease.
Organizers said they had no fears about further power
outages during the festival even as Ontario remained
under the threat of power blackouts on Tuesday. Supplies
remain low in the province five days after the worst
outage in North American history, even though U.S.
cities were fully recovered.
"We've been through some pretty major crises over
the last little while as a festival. Air strikes and
postal strikes and projectionist strikes and we went
through 9/11 in the middle of our festival. I think
we'll roll with the punches", Handling said.
Organizers said they will close off this year's festival
with "Danny Deckchair", an Australian film about a
man whose life changes after he takes flight in a
deck chair tied to balloons.
Other gala films announced on Tuesday included "Girl
With a Pearl Earring", based on the popular novel,
Richard Linklater 's "The School of Rock", with comedian
Jack Black and Joan Cusack, Ireland's "The Boys from
County Clare" and "Nathalie" and "Bon Voyage" from
France.
|
