Women’s Films at the Toronto Film Festival

The Cannes film festival was widely criticized for failing to include films made by women so it is especially satisfying to see that the prestigious Toronto Film Festival is filled with exciting films from female directors, producers, and writers.  The extraordinarily talented Sarah Polley (star of “My Life Without Me” and a long, long time ago of the television series based on the Ramona books and writer-director of “Away From Her”) has a quasi-documentary memoir about her own family called “Stories We Tell.”  The always-provocative Sally Potter (“Orlando” and “Yes”) is showing “Ginger and Rosa,” reported to be a breakthrough for star Elle Fanning, following her superb performances in “Super 8” and “We Bought a Zoo.”  And Mira Nair (“Monsoon Wedding” and “The Namesake”) has made “The Reluctant Fundamentalist,”, based on the novel by Mohsin Hamid, a sure-to-create-controversy story about a Wall Street analyst disillusioned and bitter after 9/11.