The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) over the weekend announced its collaboration with three other international film festivals.
The agreement will see TIFF alongside the New York Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, and Venice Film Festival commit to cooperation, information sharing, and supporting one another’s global events.
“The art form we love is in crisis,” the statement reads in part. “Our own organizations have seen unprecedented challenges to our work and our financial security. The pandemic caught each of us as we were preparing for the biggest event of our year in the fall of 2020. We knew we had to adapt. We decided to collaborate as we never have before.”
According to the statement, the festivals have all endured financial challenges amid the health pandemic. As a result, it has been essential for each organization to reimagine the delivery of its film festival to its audiences.
Continuing, the statement said: “This year, we moved away from competing with our colleagues at autumn festivals and committed instead to collaboration. We are offering our festivals as a united platform for the best cinema we can find. We’re here to serve the filmmakers, audiences, journalists and industry members who keep the film ecosystem thriving. We need to do that together.”
The 2020 TIFF which is slated for September 10 will almost certainly hold virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic which has devastated global cinema, altered the culture of film, while bringing normal life activities to a halt.
