LaBute, Hüller, Hawke, Turturro, Mangiu, Almodovar, Huppert - seven of dozens of reasons to attend this year's WIFF

This week's Windsor International Film Festival (WIFF) (Oct. 29 – Nov. 8) press conference was also the official kickoff to ticket sales. Another can't-wait-for event is on tap. There will be 232 films shown (one more than last year!), 47 shorts and more than 300 screenings, 181 from world festivals, 128 in pre-theatrical release and 51 per cent Canadian programming (in a festival that shows more francophone films than any other!) and of course slates of local films in a festival that pays true tribute to its community. But, quipped always ebullient ex director Vincent Georgie, “there’s no 51st state."

So here are a handful of the 50 films I’ve selected and the reasons why:

I’m always interested in what director Neil LaBute puts out and his Murderous quirky psychological thriller looks enticing. You can’t find a better actress today on the world stage (or should that be celluloid or digital) than Germany’s Sandra Hüller so I’m expecting a knockout performance in this gender-obscuring 18th century tale, Rose, by Markus Schleinzer. John Turturro is one of those actors I’d see in anything and so here in Noah Segan’s The Only Living Pickpocket in New York. Likewise Ethan Hawke, and with Russell Crowe in Padraic McKinley’s The Weight, you’re getting a double-whammy. How could I resist a documentary about 1960s Brit Invasion musical artist Peter Asher of Peter and Gordon fame in Peter Asher: Everywhere Man (Dayna Goldfine, Daniel Geller)? Maigret and The Dead Lover (Pascal Bonitzer) seems a smart French drawing-room thriller. Once Upon a Time in Harlem (William & David Greaves) looks back on NYC’s Black “Renaissance” artistic elite. Another doc, Captain Newfoundland (Mike Feehan, Jamie Miller) is about the Newfie businessman and eccentric Geoff Sterling, who one time ran a

radio station in Windsor. Another doc, Draw Me a Bridge (Jean-Daniel Lafond) is all about the symbolism of the Gordie Howe Intl Bridge to Windsor and Detroit – how can I resist? La Bola Negra (Javier Ambrossi, Javier Calvo) is the most talked about film this festival and won People’s Choice in Toronto. It’s also Spanish, a country that makes great films. Fjord, by interesting Romanian director Cristian Mungiu, takes aim at the hypocrisy of political correctness, a rare take in the film world. I’ve always been fascinated in the spousal novelist of contemporary US author Paul Auster, sadly now deceased, so can’t wait to see her in Sabine Lidl’s Siri Hustvedt – Dance Around the Self. Sender (Russell Goldman) seems like the perfect midnight offbeat surreal thriller. Of course, I will go see Spanish master Pedro Almodovar’s latest Bitter Christmas. And not least, my perennial French crush Isabelle Huppert in Asghar Farhadi’s Parallel Tales......Check out the full festival lineup at www.windsorfilmfestival.com