The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) returns for its 51st edition from September 10-20, 2026. Founded in 1976, TIFF has cemented its status as one of the most prestigious and well-attended film festivals in the world. Academy Award winners like La La Land, American Beauty, Jojo Rabbit, Nomadland, Slumdog Millionaire, and more have screened at the festival, highlighting the esteem of the kinds of movies that premiere at the event.
The programming for TIFF 2026 will seemingly continue the festival’s strong track record, with 293 total titles in store for the 11-day event. Some of these are critically acclaimed movies that previously premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2026, whereas many others are making their world premieres at the festival. ScreenRant will once again be there to cover them from the ground, with both reviews and interviews providing an early look into these upcoming releases.
Movies from acclaimed directors like Danny Boyle and Martin McDonagh, stars like Sebastian Stan and Mahershala Ali, and countries around the world are among some of the projects to keep an eye on ahead of September 10. Of those 293, these 15 movies from TIFF 2026 are the ones that we’re most excited to see.
Being Heumann
The opening night film of TIFF 2026 was clearly selected for a reason. Being Heumann comes from Siân Heder, whose previous film CODA won the Academy Award for Best Picture. Heder’s latest movie tells the true story of Judy Heumann, the woman who led a world-altering campaign for accessibility by rallying hundreds of Americans to push the government for appropriate rights and accommodations.
Heder’s talent behind the camera is equaled by the talent in front of the camera. The paradigm-shifting activist is played by English actress Ruth Madeley, known for her roles in Doctor Who, The Rook, and Years and Years. Playing Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare Joseph Califano, Heumann’s opponent who refuses to sign regulations for the Rehabilitation Act, is Mark Ruffalo, an actor whose mere presence in a project speaks to its quality.
I Play Rocky
Making its world premiere at TIFF, I Play Rocky tells the story of how Sylvester Stallone made Rocky and became a global movie star in the process. Academy Award winner Peter Farrelly (Green Book) helms the film, which is anchored by Anthony Ippolito, whose most notable prior work was as Al Pacino in the Paramount+ series The Offer. Based on available promotional material and a special preview showcased at CinemaCon 2026, Ippolito appears to capture the presence, voice, and mannerisms of Stallone with uncanny accuracy.
Joined by an all-star cast that includes Tracy Letts, Stephan James, Matt Dillon, Toby Kebbell, and AnnaSophia Robb, I Play Rocky intrigues on a meta-level, in that it is a movie about beating the odds to make a movie about beating the odds. A promising young lead and sturdy hands behind the camera suggest this may be one of the highlights of TIFF 2026.
Misty Green
Chris Rock takes on triple duties as director, writer, and star in Misty Green, which makes its world premiere at TIFF. Described as a satire of the institutional bigotry and soul-draining hustle that characterize the film industry, the movie stars Rosalind Eleazar in the lead role, with supporting performances from Adam Driver, Daniel Kaluuya, Anna Kendrick, Topher Grace, and Rock himself.
The story follows Misty (Eleazar), a star navigating the tumultuous landscape of Hollywood. Struggling to curb her worst habits and on the precipice of losing out on a big project, Misty wins over director Jordan (Rock), who casts her in a remake of Dreamgirls. The dream role, however, is accompanied by other struggles, including an eviction, a brother with bipolar disorder (Kaluuya), and a former lover (Driver).
There’s something indescribably great about LA movies, especially those that have something to say about the film industry. What better person to do that than Rock, a veteran of film and television with a deft understanding of comedy and drama?
La Bola Negra
Earning a whopping 20-minute standing ovation when it made its world premiere at Cannes in May, La Bola Negra is a must-see Spanish drama that has received immense praise for its approach to queer characters, emotional scope, and cinematography.
The film spans three eras and explores young men as they face oppression and self-discovery of their queer identities. After a major bidding war, Netflix acquired the film and granted it a 47-day theatrical window beginning on October 16, a testament to the confidence the studio has in the film. How it lands at TIFF could be a key part of whether it builds enough awards season momentum to be a major player.
Wild Horse Nine
Few filmmakers have such a strong handle on black comedy as Martin McDonagh, whose previous efforts include In Bruges; Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri; and The Banshees of Inisherin. His latest film, Wild Horse Nine, bolsters a stellar duo in the form of John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell as bickering CIA agents in 1970s Chile, just before the 1973 Chilean coup.
After making its world premiere at the Venice International Film Festival in early September, Wild Horse Nine will screen at TIFF and, based on promotional material and an exclusive preview shown at CinemaCon 2026, will treat audiences to yet another black comedy from McDonagh that blends his trademark wit with tragic, existential themes.
Ink
Danny Boyle tells an important true story that many may not be aware of, with disturbing relevance in the modern day, in his latest film, Ink. Making its world premiere at Venice International Film Festival and subsequently screening at TIFF, Ink follows Rupert Murdoch (Guy Pearce) and his editor Larry Lamb (Jack O’Connell) as they transform the struggling British newspaper The Sun into a tabloid juggernaut.
Boyle is a filmmaker with a singular vision that is recognizable the second one of his films kicks off. After applying this trademark style to the apocalypse in 28 Years Later, Boyle turns to something decidedly more grounded: a chilling story about media manipulation and the dark journalistic legacy of one of the industry’s most important figures.
Fjord
Winner of the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Fjord is a must-see at TIFF ahead of its scheduled U.S. release on October 9. The film from Cristian Mungiu (Beyond the Hills, Graduation) follows Lisbet (Renate Reinsve) and Mihai Gheorghiu (Sebastian Stan), a conservative couple who relocate from Mihai’s native Romania to a remote town in Lisbet’s home country of Norway. There, the two face a legal and moral crisis as locals become concerned about how they are raising their children.
Described as an intricate courtroom drama, coming from a now two-time Palme d’Or winner, and starring two of the most talented actors working today, Fjord checks every box of a must-see movie at TIFF. The subject matter appears destined to generate conversation as it pits conservatives against liberals and has been praised by many for not taking easy sides.
Everybody Wants To F*ck Me
In the year that Obsession (a TIFF 2025 premiere) became a breakout horror hit, another movie premieres at TIFF that chronicles the disaster that follows when a man gets exactly what he wants: to be wanted by others.
Everybody Wants to F*ck Me stars Taron Egerton as Adam, a man who uses yoga, feminist literature, self-deprecating humor, and active listening to make himself the perfect man to women. Unfortunately for Adam, his plan goes a little too well as he becomes the subject of intense interest and aggressive, overwhelming pursuit.
A strange, more comedically tinged companion piece to Obsession, writer/director Jonathan Schey’s film makes its world premiere at TIFF, and seems like it will be a sharp comedy with something poignant to say.
Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother
Audiences may never get to see Mahershala Ali kick ass as Blade, but they will get to see him use his expertise in action choreography when Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother premieres at TIFF 2026.
From writer/director Bassam Tariq, Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother stars Ali as Latif, a devout muslim who must navigate single fatherhood and protect his children from a dangerous threat. Ali has appeared in a lot of awards fare in recent years, so it will be refreshing to see him tackle a more action-heavy venture, albeit one that appears to have an emotional edge to it.
River
A departure from much of the dense, dramatic offerings at the festival, River is the feature debut of Joshua Giuliano, whose acclaimed short film In Sound, We Live Forever put an inventive spin on slashers.
River finds Giuliano once again dipping his toes in the slasher genre with a story about three embittered siblings (Jane Levy, Jessica Rothe, Max Mattern) stalked by a malevolent figure (Dane DiLiegro) when their car stalls out beneath an old bridge next to a rural waterway. In a year that has already seen Jane Schoenbrun breathe new life into slashers with Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, it looks like Giuliano may do the same when River makes its world premiere at TIFF.
The Julia Set
2025’s breakout star Chase Infiniti (One Battle After Another) headlines a new thriller about a university student who becomes romantically involved with a teaching assistant as she prepares for The Putnam Exam, a prestigious undergraduate mathematics competition.
Infiniti is joined by Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs in supporting roles, while The Summer I Turned Pretty’s Christopher Briney plays Pascal, the teaching assistant drawn to Infiniti’s character. Marking the feature debut of Niki Byrne, The Julia Set looks to be more than yet another story about an ill-fated romance between a student and an authority figure; it seems the filmmaker is interested in exploring the competitiveness of the academic world and how intellect is groomed as a result.
The Face Of Horror
Adapting Tsuruya Nanboku IV’s Yotsuya Kaidan, arguably Japan’s most iconic ghost story, The Face of Horror has all the trappings of a Hammer horror classic of the 1950s and 1960s, gory Technicolor and all.
The Face of Horror transposes the Japanese ghost story to 14th-century feudal England, where rogue knight Edward (Jonah Hauer-King) kills a farmer, forces his daughter (Kristine Froseth) into marriage, and then pursues a wealthy countess (Bella Heathcote), as his seemingly insatiable libido has no bounds.
Minotaur
Winner of the Grand Prix at Cannes in May, director Andrey Zvyagintsev’s political thriller Minotaur is one of the most talked-about films heading into TIFF 2026.
Set in Russia in 2022, Minotaur follows a high-powered executive named Gleb (Dmitriy Mazurov), who faces stress as he grapples with suspecting his wife Galina (Iris Lebedeva) has been unfaithful while also being forced to meet employee draft quotas for the war. Based on Claude Chabrol’s 1969 film The Unfaithful Wife (La femme infidèle), Minotaur has received rave reviews out of Cannes and is a must-see as part of TIFF’s Special Presentations program.
Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo
Abel Ferrara and Werner Herzog offered two distinct odysseys through the darkest, seediest corners of the criminal underworld in Bad Lieutenant and Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call – New Orleans, respectively. Now, Japanese filmmaker Takashi Miike (Ichi the Killer) returns to TIFF for the world premiere of a standalone Bad Lieutenant film with similar moodiness, grit, and violence.
Set in the Tokyo underworld, Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo follows a police officer (Shun Oguri) who teams up with an FBI agent (Lily James) to locate the missing daughter of a politician. Miike’s unique filmmaking vision applied to a crime epic with the reputation of Bad Lieutenant makes this one of the most anticipated premieres out of TIFF 2026.
Prima Facie
Last but not least is Prima Facie, an adaptation of Suzie Miller’s acclaimed one-woman play, starring Academy Award nominee Cynthia Erivo and directed by Susanna White (Andor, Our Kind of Traitor). The film is a legal drama about an ambitious attorney with a reputation for defending people accused of sex crimes who becomes the accuser when she is sexually assaulted by a colleague.
With an ensemble that also features Andor breakout star Elizabeth Dulau, Prima Facie looks to be one of the more thought-provoking and emotionally stirring world premieres of TIFF 2026. It will be interesting to see how Miller’s play translates to a new medium, while Erivo is handed the reigns of a complex character who finds herself on the other side of the merciless legal system she has found such success in.
The Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 10-20, 2026.