TIFF 2011: The Descendants, Anonymous, Rampart and 50/50

The 2011 Toronto International Film Festival began on Thursday, and it's a measure of how busy this place has been that I've only now had time to sit and blog, on the fourth night of being here. I've always thought of myself as being a European festival guy, preferring the hustle of Cannes and Venice to what I imagined to be a somewhat cold and joyless festival, but how wrong I was. TIFF deserves its place as one of the top-tier festivals on the circuit: as well as the superb programming, which gathers up previously seen hits from Cannes, Venice and Sundance and adds several dozen significant world premieres of its own, the festival runs like clockwork with an easy-to-follow programme, spacious cinemas and a band of amazing volunteers. The effect is like a big-budget Sundance with the added glamour of Cannes. Unlike Venice, which is becoming more and more like a revolving door for Hollywood celebrities, filmmakers do mingle with the mortals; and unlike Cannes and Venice there is respect for every attendee, no matter what size website or publication.

But the main thing about TIFF is its ability to kick-start major awards season movies. Last year it was The King's Speech, and this year's great white hope is undoubtedly Alexander Payne's The Descendants, which arrived with great reviews out of the festival at Telluride. At first I wasn't sure how this was going to go, since the start is slow and there's lots of unnecessary (and somewhat unconvincing) voiceover. The star of the show is George Clooney, who plays Hawaiian lawyer Matt King. His wife is in hospital, having suffered a severe head injury after a motorboat crash, and so King is forced to come to terms with his family life, which involves two daughters that he hasn't connected with much and a marriage that has fallen even further into neglect. On top of that, King is involved in a massive property deal that will make millions for him and his cousins if he accepts one of many bids to transform the family plot from a rural idyll into a commercial holiday resort.

There are shades of About Schmidt in this bittersweet comedy, as King finds himself thrown, blinking, out into the headlights of the world. But this is a much warmer and human movie, thanks to some touching supporting performances from the two girls playing his daughters. It would be a spoiler to reveal what brings them together, but the gradual thawing of ice is exceptionally well handled, and what starts out as quite a mannered performance by Clooney just gets better and better and better. The ending is beautiful and moving for all sorts of reasons, and it's a safe bet to suggest that Payne's film will feature prominently at next year's Oscar ceremony. So much is good here that several nominations – for Payne, film and Clooney – seem inevitable and deserved.

A less expected awards contender appeared in the form of (don't laugh) Roland Emmerich's Anonymous, a lush period thriller about the true identity of the man who wrote the plays attributed to one William Shakespeare of Stratford. I went under duress, but Anonymous proved to be a surprise pleasure. Yes, it's complicated and confusingly plotted, with flashbacks within flashbacks that I have yet to comprehend. But there's a genuinely gripping story here, some lovely ideas about art and politics, and the best use of CG that Emmerich has ever put his name to. But the reason this film will have a life is because of several superb performances, notably Vanessa Redgrave as Queen Elizabeth I, whose passion for plays and poetry is really at the crux of the story. Redgrave's Virgin Queen is astonishing to watch, an old lady partial to all the giddy distractions that would waylay a girl sixty years her junior, but whose iron will snaps into cruel relief whenever her life is threatened. It won't be a box office smash, but the production design and some key cast are outstanding.

Two more awards outsiders followed. At the moment, Oren Moverman's Rampart (pictured) has no US distributor, but that must surely change soon. Set in 1999, it is a hardboiled LA noir that features a career-best performance by Woody Harrelson, one so committed and fearless that it gives even Michael Fassbender's efforts in Shame a very close run. Harrelson plays LAPD cop Dave Brown, aka Date-Rape Dave, who lives, in a very strange set-up, with his two ex-wives and two daughters. Brown is a single guy, a smartass and a skirt-chaser; he's also an old-fashioned cop who believes in the law of the nightstick and the gun. When his car is rammed by a hit-and-run driver, Brown gives chase and delivers some of his famous rough justice to the perp involved. Coincidentally, his brutality is videotaped by a passer-by, and Brown is hauled before Internal Affairs. Is there more to this this meets the eye? Brown thinks so. The LAPD is in the thick of a massive corruption scandal, and Brown begins to believe that he is being scapegoated to distract the media from the bigger story.

Like Fassbender, Harrelson is simply amazing in this tough, gritty drama. There's no handholding – what do you expect from a script co-written by Demon Dog James Ellroy and finessed by the co-writer of Todd Haynes's I'm Not There? – and redemption just seems to get further and further away with each new explosion of violence. And though the focus is primarily on Brown and his dysfunctional relationship with his family, the film really comes alive in scenes of the investigation into his bad behaviour. Sigourney Weaver is especially good as the HR woman trying to cut a deal with him, and her scenes with Harrelson simply crackle with old-school chemistry. This, though, is Harrelson's film, and if the Academy see fit to ignore it, that would be nothing short of criminal.

Finally, today I saw a very touching, funny and sincere comedy called 50/50, which used to be called I'm With Cancer, and if you still don't rate Joseph Gordon-Levitt, this should seal the deal. He plays Adam Lerner, a public radio worker whose life is turned upside down when he is diagnosed with cancer. His pretty but non-committal girlfriend (Bryce Dallas Howard) is mortified. His cloying mother (Anjelica Huston) threatens to move in with him. And his unsentimental best friend (Seth Rogen) seems to see this as little more than excuse to get drunk and score a few sympathy fucks. It's a simple enough story but it's also deceptively effective. Gordon-Levitt plays the part with empathy and subtlety, and Rogen reaches previously unseen new heights in a role that helps sweeten the bitter pill of its morbid theme. And Jonathan Levine, director of The Wackness, corrals the whole thing with such understatement that it's sometimes easy to forget the gravity of the situation, until some final, truly heart-wrenching hospital scenes in which Adam comes to terms with his mortality, knowing that his chances of survival could go either way. Maybe this is an Independent Spirit awards piece rather than Oscar material, but it's very, very good, tackling a taboo and upsetting subject with originality and – with one particular joke about Patrick Swayze – balls.