Toronto Lift-Off Film Festival 2023 - Network Round Features

Thursday 6th July - Thursday 13th July

1.

Philosopher of the Sea
Dir. Andreas Oscar Eidhagen
Sweden
Logline: At the ripe age of 83, Swedish sailor Sven Yrvind has become a renowned figure around the world for his solo voyages across the oceans. For the last five years, we have had the privilege to observe closely as Yrvind puts together his boat and readies himself for the difficulty of being alone on the open sea - a journey spanning almost 15,000 miles from Ireland to New Zealand, estimated to take 300 days. Although many view Yrvind's project as a reckless venture, he himself believes that he is one of the few sane people in the world. However, the real exploration behind this journey is of a much deeper nature; an exploration into how we choose to live our lives.

2.

Heavis Tendres (Tender Metalheads)
Dir. Joan Tomàs
Spain
Logline: Juanjo is an asthmatic boy who has lived protected by his family to the point of drowning him. And Miquel grows up in a family with an absent father. His mother tries to get ahead by herself, but she does not always succeed. Heavies Tendres is about the relationship between Juanjo and Miquel, two teenage boys from Barcelona in 1991 who will take in their friendship and heavy music refuge from the gray world they live in.

3.

Faces of war
Dir. Anton Zharov
Cyprus
Logline: The main focus for this film is to fully depict how the lives and fates of Ukrainian people are destroyed by the various aspects of the war.
In our film we strive to provide an accurate unfiltered insight on the full spectrum of effects caused by the war.

4.

Wayne's Misery (Eymdin hans Wayne)
Dir. Gudmundur Bjarni G (Michael G)
Iceland
Logline: When two people from New Jersey meet by coincidence in a small town in Iceland, their stories intertwine and turn them to crime. Wayne, a ten-year-old boy, is forced to face his own demons when his psychopathic friend, Simon, pushes him to commit worse-and-worse crimes as he slowly begins to lose his sanity. Wayne's father, Erlendur---a police officer, begins to investigate the crimes, leading him to his first crime scene where he met a boy, who---even a decade later, still warms his cold soul.

5.

Wanton
Dir. Victor Dubyna
Canada
Logline: Wanton is an abstract and expressionistic musical-horror-show about identity, self, repression, anxiety, nostalgia, and the digital age. Through a series of obscure and ghostly images, the film tells the loose story of a man fighting to take off a self-imposed mask. He succeeds, however the mask then grows into a malevolent being, preying on his fears, haunting him, and plunging him deeper into the void.