What does it mean that one of the world’s great film festivals resides in a city that has no film identity of its own? Toronto, on film and on the streets, lives permanently on the brink.
Few cities of comparable size and cultural ambition have so little presence on screen as Toronto. Painfully, when Toronto has appeared in film it has most often been as a stand-in for somewhere else. Mary Harron’s American Psycho (2000) staged Patrick Bateman’s Wall Street world on Bay Street, with Toronto high-rises dressed as Manhattan lofts. Rob Marshall’s Chicago (2002) recreated Prohibition-era Illinois entirely in Toronto studios. Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water (2017) used Toronto and Hamilton to play Cold War Baltimore. The Incredible Hulk (2008) and Suicide Squad (2016) transformed Yonge Street into New York. Mean Girls (2004) substituted Toronto suburbs for Evanston, Illinois, while My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002) stood Chicago on Canadian ground. Even the first X-Men (2000) filmed in Toronto, with Casa Loma dressed as an American estate.
Subscribe to continue reading
Become a paid subscriber to get access to the rest of this post and other exclusive content.