The 2026 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) will take place from September 10 until the 20th. From this year’s feature film lineup, we have selected 16 science or technology-themed works, with descriptions quoted from festival programmers. Most are world premieres. In addition, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation will be partnering for the fourth time with TIFF to honor one film from the lineup and to support a pitch session for science or technology-themed projects. More information on the Sloan projects to be featured at this year’s festival is to come.
CENTREPIECE
TREES ARE WATCHING. Dir. Bahman Ghobadi. World premiere. Iranian Kurdish auteur Bahman Ghobadi blends psychological horror and ecological allegory as he depicts the eerie haunting of a writer (Eva Green) reckoning with past misdeeds under the ominous gaze of a pair of trees and a malignant wooden chair.
THE SURGEON. Dir. Roshan Sethi. World premiere. Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh is back in action as a kidnapped surgeon forced to perform one last operation in this fun, pulse-pounding thriller.
LIGHT PILLAR. Dir. Xu Zao. North American premiere. A lonely caretaker, a dying film studio, and a seductive virtual world collide in Xu Zao’s formally daring animated debut feature: a melancholic, visionary parable about cinema, technology, alienation, and the fragile promise of renewal.
L’AUTRE. Dir. Alexandre Franchi. World premiere. Wild delusions and genuine dangers threaten a patient recovering from cancer surgery in this visceral and darkly comedic thriller by Quebec’s Alexandre Franchi.
FUTURE TENSE
FUTURE TENSE. Dir. Jenna Cato Bass. World premiere. With FUTURE TENSE, Jenna Cato Bass deals with climate change, human guilt, and South Africa’s identity in this bold time-lapse story based in the near future.
WAVELENGTHS
THE REMOTES. Dir. John Torres. This ambitious, beguiling narrative debut from acclaimed Filipino filmmaker and experimentalist John Torres follows a grieving detective who finds himself increasingly ensnared while investigating a case involving a sinister navigation app causing physical and psychological debris.
GALA
TENZING. Dir. Jennifer Peedom. Canadian premiere. Starring Tom Hiddleston, Oscar nominee Willem Dafoe, and Genden Phuntsok, this wondrous biopic recounts the story of Nepalese-Indian Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay who, alongside Edmund Hillary, became first to top Everest in 1953.
ONWARDS AND SIDEWAYS. Dir. John Madden. World premiere. The latest from Oscar-nominated director John Madden stars Oscar nominee Laura Linney and Rhys Ifans as strangers whose lives become entwined when both are diagnosed with Parkinson disease.
IT’S MY TIME. Dir. Bai Xue. North America premiere. Led by Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh, this inspired comedy about a woman on the road to magic-cube mastery is a story of galvanizing gamesmanship and ageless defiance.
BEING HEUMANN. Dir. Siân Heder. World premiere. Featuring a breakout performance by Ruth Madeley and Oscar nominee Mark Ruffalo, this inspiring historical drama from Oscar-winning filmmaker Siân Heder celebrates the paradigm-shifting activist Judy Heumann, “Mother of the Disability Rights Movement.”
DOCS
TEHRAN, UNDER THE SKIN. Dir. Afsaneh Salari. World premiere. In an age of body anxiety, filmmaker Afsaneh Salari embeds herself in the offices of Iranian plastic surgeons to interview their clients with humour and empathy.
MUSK. Dir. Alex Gibney. World premiere. The Oscar-winning documentarian Alex Gibney delivers his most ambitious and epic work in exploring the history of the world’s richest man, Elon Musk.
LOW LIES THE LAND
LOW LIES THE LAND. Dir. Emanuele Gerosa. World premiere. Set in the breathtaking landscapes of Piemonte in Northern Italy, LOW LIES THE LAND immerses us in the lives of three winemaking families facing an uncertain future.
PRIMETIME
OXYGEN MASKS WILL (NOT) DROP AUTOMATICALLY. Dirs. Marcelo Gomes, Carol Minêm. North American premiere. The first-ever series from renowned Brazilian filmmaker Marcelo Gomes tells the true story of a group of young flight attendants who smuggle treatment drugs from America into the hands of patients with AIDS in 1980s Brazil.
ALICE. Dirs. Virginie Verrier, Guillaume Lonergan. World Premiere. Amidst the advent of modern cinema, trailblazing artist Alice Guy becomes the first female film director in this lush historical series starring Academy Award–nominee Bérénice Bejo.
DISCOVERY
MEMORIES OF A FOREST. Dir. Katharina Rabl. International premiere. Katharina Rabl’s stunning debut feature toggles between loyalty and longing for independence, centring a doctoral student who must choose between carrying on her family’s legacy or forging her own path.
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