Trends change and ebb and flow, but in years past, winning the Toronto International Film Festival audience award used to be a surefire way to mean you were getting an Oscar nomination for Best Picture and, and many instances, winning the big Academy Award prize. And while the winning element of that trend has somewhat waned in recent years, the power of the prize is still there. So, filmmaker Cord Jefferson has got to be feeling pretty good right now as his feature-length debut “American Fiction” has just won TIFF’s People’s Choice Award.
READ MORE: Toronto International Film Festival 2023: 26 Must-See Films To Watch At TIFF
Jefferson is an Emmy Award-winning writer and story editor whose television credits include “Master of None,” “Watchmen,” “The Good Place” and “Succession.” “American Fiction” stars Jeffrey Wright stars in Jefferson’s adaptation of Percival Everett’s “Erasure” — a wicked satire about the commodification of marginalized voices and a portrait of an artist forced to re-examine his integrity (read our review).
READ MORE: ‘American Fiction’ Review: Cord Jefferson Delivers A Funny & Insightful Feature Debut [TIFF]
The cast is quite immense and features Tracee Ellis Ross, John Ortiz, Erika Alexander, Leslie Uggams, Adam Brody, Keith David, Issa Rae, and Sterling K. Brown. Either way, this is all very good news for Jefferson and the film. “American Fiction” will be released theatrically by Orion Pictures through MGM on November 3, 2023, and surely that studio is currently celebrating.
And the odds are still very much in TIFF’s favor in terms of its People’s Choice to Oscar pipeline. For the last 11 years in a row—and for 14 of the last 15 years— the winner of the TIFF People’s Choice Award has gone on to receive an Academy Award Best Picture nomination. In total, the TIFF audience winner has gone on to win the Oscar five times: 2008’s “Slumdog Millionaire,” 2010’s “The King’s Speech,” 2013’s “12 Years a Slave,” 2018’s “Green Book,” and “Nomadland” in 2020 (to be fair, “Nomadland,” was at every festival that year).
In short, “American Fiction” is likely getting an Oscar Best Picture nod, and it likely wasn’t on many people’s early predictions lists beforehand. The first and second-runner-up prizes, Alexander Payne‘s “The Holdovers” and Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron” (in the animation field), bode well for the awards success of those films too.
Here’s the full list of winners:
People’s Choice Award: “American Fiction,” Cord JeffersonFirst Runner-up: “The Holdovers,” Alexander PayneSecond Runner-up: “The Boy and the Heron,” Hayao Miyazaki
People’s Choice Documentary Award: “Mr. Dressup: The Magic of Make-Believe,” Robert McCallumFirst Runner-up: “Summer Qamp,” Jen Markowitz | CanadaSecond Runner-up: “Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa,” Lucy Walker
Midnight Madness People’s Choice Award: “Dicks: The Musical,” Larry CharlesFirst Runner-up: “KILL,” Nikhil Nagesh BhatSecond Runner-up: “Hell of a Summer,” Finn Wolfhard, Billy Bryk
Platform Jury Prize: “Dear Jassi,” Tarsem Singh Dhandwar
Best Canadian Feature Film: “Solo,” Sophie DupuisBest Canadian Feature Honorable mention: “Kanaval,” Henri Pardo
Changemaker Award: “We Grow Now,” Minhal Baig
Amplify Voices Award for Best BIPOC Canadian Feature Film: “Kanaval,” Henri PardoAmplify Voices Award for BIPOC Canadian First Feature Film: “Tautuktavuk” (“What We See”), Carol Kunnuk, Lucy TulugarjukAmplify Voices Producers Award for Canadian BIPOC Trailblazer: Damon D’Oliveira
IMDbPro Short Cuts Award for Best Film: “Electra,” Daria Kascheeva
IMDbPro Short Cuts Award for Best Canadian Film: “Motherland,” Jasmin Mozaffari
Short Cuts Share Her Journey Award: “She (Snake),” Renee Zhan
NETPAC Award: “A Match,” Jayant Digambar SomalkarNETPAC Award Honorable Mention: “Mimang,” Ken TaeyangFIPRESCI Prize: “Seagrass,” Meredith Hama-Brown
Follow along with all our coverage of the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival.