Toronto film festival 2025 preview: Screen’s guide to TIFF Docs

TIFF Docs opens with Ben Proudfoot’s The Eyes Of Ghana, exploring the life of filmmaker Chris Hesse, personal cinematographer to Ghanaian president Kwame Nkrumah. Proudfoot won the documentary short film Oscar twice, and here teams with executive producers Barack and Michelle Obama and their Higher Ground Productions.

Fellow Oscar winners Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin (Free Solo) bring Love+War (National Geographic), a profile of Lynsey Addario, reflecting on the Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist’s career as she covers the war in Ukraine.

Three titles focus on Indigenous communities: Darlene Naponse’s Aki captures life on her homeland Atikameksheng Anishnawbek; Sky Hopinka’s Sundance Institute-backed Powwow People explores contemporary Native American powwow culture; and Shane Belcourt’s Ni-Naadamaadiz: Red Power Rising focuses on the 1974 Anicinabe Park occupation led by a residential school survivor.

Michèle Stephenson’s True North documents the 1969 student anti-racism protests at Montreal’s Concordia University, while Lorena Luciano’s Nuns Vs The Vatican exposes the abuse of predatory Catholic priests through testimonies of convent victims, with Mariska Hargitay as an executive producer.

Zahraa Ghandour’s Flana centres marginalised Iraqi women, with an investigation into the disappearance of the director’s childhood friend illuminating a wider problem of gender-based violence.

Nicole Bazuin partners again with Andrea Werhun for Modern Whore (Quiver Distribution) depicting the realities of sex work through the latter’s lived experience — following their 2020 short of the same name, and Werhun’s 2017 memoir. Sean Baker executive produces.

TIFF Docs presents two chef profiles: Still Single (XYZ Films), Jamal Burger and Jukan Tateisi’s foray into the life of Toronto sushi master Masaki Saito; and Canceled: The Paula Deen Story (UTA), investigating the problematic celebrity chef and the racism scandal that torpedoed her career.

John Dower’s The Balloonists (AC Independent) follows aeronaut pioneers Bertrand Piccard and Brian Jones, the first to circumnavigate the globe in a hot air balloon. Christopher Nelius (who played TIFF in 2012 with Storm Surfers 3D) presents Whistle (CAA), about the Masters of Musical Whistling competition in Hollywood.

Toronto local Min Sook Lee’s There Are No Words explores the impact of her mother’s suicide when the filmmaker was a preteen. Peter Mettler’s seven-hour While The Green Grass Grows: A Diary In Seven Parts is an introspective epic on grief, relationships and nature. Tasha Van Zandt’s A Life Illuminated (MATR Labs) explores the career of legendary oceanographer Edith Widder, backed by nonprofit OceanX.

Arriving at TIFF Docs fresh from Venice are Lucrecia Martel’s Landmarks, Gianfranco Rosi’s Below The Clouds, Laura Poitras and Mark Obenhaus’ Cover-Up and Tamara Kotevska’s The Tale Of Silyan.

From Cannes are Raoul Peck’s Orwell 2+2= 5 (AC Independent) and Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk (Cercamon), Sepideh Farsi’s profile of Palestinian photojournalist Fatma Hassouna, killed by Israeli forces the day after the Cannes selection was announced.

Juan Camilo Cruz and Artem Ryzhykov’s Sheffield DocFest premiere A Simple Soldier (Propagate Content) follows the latter on the front lines of Ukraine’s armed forces.

Confirmed late for TIFF, after a period of uncertainty regarding its selection, is Barry Avrich’s The Road Between Us: The Ultimate Rescue, about a retired Israeli general’s mission to rescue family members during the October 7 Hamas attacks. At press time it was not clear which TIFF section the documentary will play in.

TIFF profiles by Charles Gant, Tim Grierson, Nadiya Jackson, Rebecca Leffler, Lee Marshall, Tara Nimmoneser, Jonathan Romney, Michael Rosser, Mona Tabbara, Silvia Wong