TIFF opens today, and for the first time I’m entering the Festival with 8 vouchers out of the 30 tickets I purchased, which means I’ll be adding some films as I go out of those that are still on sale.

Today I’m picking up my tickets and hoping to make use of a few of the vouchers over the next few days.

I’m scheduled to see Blue is the Warmest Colour tonight, winner of the Palme D’Or at Cannes and panned by a number of columnists in the paper today. It’s a long one, coming in at just under 3 hours. Tomorrow evening, I looking forward to seeing the Jason Reitman live read of Boogie NIghts.

Films I’m hoping to pick up:

Friday: either Southcliffe, a four part series made for television in the UK, or Tim’s Veneer, a Penn & Teller doc looking into the methods of Vermeer.

Saturday: either Therese, an adaptation of the novel by Zola, or Ilo Ilo, the story of a Singaporean family during the Asian financial crisis.

On Sunday morning,  I’m seeing a members-only screening of Philomena, courtesty of TIFF. It stars Judi Dench as an Irish-Catholic woman who is looking for the child she was forced to give up. Later in the day I’m seeing September and Le Week-End.

I’m going stag for most of the Festival, so if you’ll be at a screening I’m at, let me know and we can meet up!

Finally, a special shout-out to Mike Rudolph, TIFF customer service, who assisted me when there were difficulties with the online ticket fulfillment process. He’s the son of a friend, and saw my pleas for assistance on the TIFF twitter feed. He gave me a call and did my ticketing over the phone.

Related articles

• A guide to the stars coming north for TIFF (globalnews.ca)
• TIFF unites stars, audiences for celebration of film (cbc.ca)
• TIFF 2013: A survival guide (macleans.ca)
• How to TIFF like the pros (properpour.wordpress.com)