Moving beyond its 50-year milestone, the Toronto International Film Festival is celebrating its 51st edition (10-20 September 2026) with the birth of its long-gestating film market (‘The Market’) alongside its annual programming. What began as a modest, audience-centred film festival promising the so-called cream of European tastemaking in cinema has, since the late 1990s, transformed into one giant focus group servicing the US film awards season. In fact, this evolution was the clearest sign of TIFF’s aspiration to attain the stature of Europe’s international film industry hubs across the Atlantic. The Market now formalises those ambitions, developing another arena—like the more established film markets in Europe and Asia—for international film business to be conducted. But there is irony in the timing. Since early 2025, Canada has largely boycotted American consumer products and curtailed inbound tourism in response to the US’s ongoing illegal trade war against its two continental neighbours. Yet at TIFF, American film and its institutions—essentially, a major branch of US soft power—will be immune from the same snubbing, even though soft power is precisely where a boycott of the US could be most effective.
Indeed, what would have made it difficult for TIFF to align with national sentiment was a structural change announced in May by the US’s Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). Beginning with this year’s Platform Prize, the winning feature will automatically be eligible for consideration in the 2027 Best International Feature Film Oscar category—provided it is predominantly in a language other than English. Previously, films seeking consideration in this category had to be selected by their countries’ official nominating bodies. A TIFF-winning film can now bypass that domestic process—and the politics and competition that come with it—while its country can still formally submit a separate nominee. Thus, TIFF joins an exclusive quintet of festivals—Berlin, Busan, Cannes, Sundance and Venice—whose annual top feature-film prizes will now benefit from AMPAS’s inclusive embrace. In the lead-up to Parasite’s (2019) historic run at the 2020 Oscars, Bong Joon-ho had noted: “The Oscars are not an international film festival. They’re very local.” However, alongside its efforts since 2016 to include more international members, AMPAS’s latest move suggests it wants the Oscars to become more international.
In raw numbers, this year’s Asian film selections appear to be more evenly spread across the East Asian nations, while since 2024 those from Southeast Asia are starting to show a semblance of consistency across key countries—though their numbers have historically been overshadowed by their northern neighbours, often appearing as singles or pairs, if at all. One exception this year is Singapore, which boasts a record three titles: feature debuts by Ang Geck Geck Priscilla and by Ervin Han & Raúl García will screen alongside TIFF-regular Anthony Chen’s latest feature—the third in his trilogy of Singapore-set films. Elsewhere, the unusually high number of six entries from the US similarly reflects a broad mix of East Asian stories. Notable titles here include Diary of a Mad Old Man, veteran Wayne Wang’s latest adaptation of Tanizaki Junichiro’s 1961 novel of the same name, and Drifter, Sung Kang’s directorial debut, which apparently fuses drama with the motorsport of drifting. Also worth remarking on is the absence of two sleeper hits among the respectable handful of Mainland Chinese titles in this year’s lineup: Lan Hongchun’s Dear You (theatrically released in Canada last week) and Wen Muye’s Once Upon a Time in the Middle East.
In TIFF Classics, two East Asian titles will be touring the international festival circuit as 4K restoration revivals: Fei Mu’s Spring in a Small Town (1948), a drama set in the aftermath of the Second Sino-Japanese War and frequently cited in the Sinosphere as one of China’s greatest films, as well as Ichikawa Kon’s dark comedy Ten Dark Women (1961), about a man whose bevy of flings plot to kill him. Finally, as is typical, Korean talent will feature prominently in the festival’s tributes and industry programming this year. Director Lee Chang-dong, last at TIFF in 2018 with the critically acclaimed Burning, is here to present his latest feature Possible Love and will be one of five honourees at TIFF’s Tribute Awards this year. Hallyu actor and singer Lee Min-ho, here to represent Hur Jin-ho’s period political thriller The Assassin(s) about the second failed assassination attempt on President Park Chung-hee in 1974, will be one of two Koreans featured in TIFF’s In Conversation With… series for the sixth consecutive year. The other is breakout Canadian star Hudson Williams. Both Lee and Williams first soared to popularity on television dramas: Lee in the 2009 hit K-drama Boys Over Flowers, and Williams in 2025’s Canadian hockey skin flick Heated Rivalry.
This year’s Asian and Asian-interest feature films are:
Canada
Ba’s Book (Ashley Duong, Canada 2026) – TIFF Docs
Still Night, Burning House (Carol Nguyen, Canada 2026) – TIFF Docs
Whatcha Want (Mina Shum, Canada 2026) – Special Presentations
China
Arrested Memory (Sabu, Taiwan/Japan 2026) – Midnight Madness
A Girl Unknown (Zou Jing, China 2026) – Centrepiece
Happily Ever After (Feng-I Fiona Roan, Taiwan 2026) – Special Presentations
Intermission (Yonfan, Hong Kong 2026) – Centrepiece
It’s My Time (Bai Xue, China 2026) – Gala Presentations
Light Pillar (Xu Zao, China 2026) – Centrepiece
The Road Not Taken (Peter Ho-Sun Chan, China 2026) – Special Presentations
Spring in a Small Town (Fei Mu, China 1948) – TIFF Classics
We Are Born Good (Yeung Leung Chuen, Hong Kong 2026) – Discovery
France
In Waves (Phuong Mai Nguyen, France/Belgium 2026) – Discovery
Muyi (Julien Chheng, France 2026) – Centrepiece
Indonesia
Four Seasons in Java (Kamila Andini, Indonesia/France/Netherlands/Norway/Poland/Saudi Arabia/Singapore 2026) – Centrepiece
Japan
All of a Sudden (Hamaguchi Ryusuke, Japan/Belgium/France/Germany 2026) – Special Presentations
Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo (Miike Takashi, Japan/UK/USA 2026) – Special Presentations
Children Untold (Nishikawa Miwa, Japan 2026) – Platform
Look Back (Kore-eda Hirokazu, Japan 2026) – Special Presentations
Mr. Nelson, Did You Kill People? (Tsukamoto Shinya, Japan 2026) – Special Presentations
Ten Dark Women (Ichikawa Kon, Japan 1961) – TIFF Classics
Malaysia
The Age of Goodbyes (Edmund Yeo, Malaysia/Taiwan 2026) – Special Presentations
Philippines
The Remotes (John Torres, Philippines 2026) – Wavelengths
Silenced Nights (Lawrence Fajardo, Philippines 2026) – Platform
Singapore
Ah Girl (Ang Geck Geck Priscilla, Singapore 2026) – Centrepiece
The Violinist (Ervin Han & Raúl García, Singapore/Italy/Spain 2026) – Centrepiece
We Are All Strangers (Anthony Chen, Singapore 2026) – Centrepiece
South Korea
The Assassin(s) (Hur Jin-ho, South Korea 2026) – Gala Presentations
Long Long Night (Youm Kyu-bock, South Korea 2026) – Centrepiece
Paradise Lost (Yeon Sang-ho, South Korea 2026) – Special Presentations
Possible Love (Lee Chang-dong, South Korea 2026) – Special Presentations
The World Before (Yoon Dan-bi, South Korea 2026) – Platform
Thailand
Inherit (Banjong Pisanthanakun, Thailand 2026) – Centrepiece
USA
Always Lalisa (Sue Kim, USA 2026) – Gala Presentations
Bedford Park (Stephanie Ahn, USA 2026) – Discovery
Diary of a Mad Old Man (Wayne Wang, USA 2026) – Gala Presentations
Drifter (Sung Kang, USA 2026) – Discovery
Ha-Chan, Shake Your Booty! (Josef Kubota Wladyka, USA 2026) – Centrepiece
Vintage Violence (Eugene Kotlyarenko, USA/Japan 2026) – Midnight Madness
Vietnam
Spirit Guardians: The Last Secret of the First Emperor (Nguyễn Phan Quang Bình, Vietnam 2026) – Gala Presentations
Brandon Wee