The Toronto film festival concludes with raw truths and unexpected beauties

From I, Tonya to The Death of Stalin, here are the most noteworthy films of the latter half of the festival

'I,Tonya'
(Image credit: Courtesy TIFF)

Because major film festivals screen hundreds of movies each year, some are bound to have overlapping subjects ... in fact, sometimes that's even by design. I'd bet that as soon as the programmers at this year's Toronto International Film Festival booked Battle of the Sexes — a star-studded dramatization of the controversial, zeitgeist-defining 1973 exhibition tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs — they immediately went after Borg/McEnroe, a smaller-scale Swedish film about two very different Wimbledon champions.

Which film has the advantage? Call it square. Borg/McEnroe over-explains both the game of tennis and the different approaches taken by the intensely focused Bjorn Borg and the volatile John McEnroe. But Shia LaBoeuf does give a career-best performance as the brash American, channeling a lot of his own reputation as a talented brat into a take on McEnroe that's at once electrifying, scary, and sympathetic.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Noel Murray

Noel Murray is a freelance writer, living in Arkansas with his wife and two kids. He was one of the co-founders of the late, lamented movie/culture website The Dissolve, and his articles about film, TV, music, and comics currently appear regularly in The A.V. Club, Rolling Stone, Vulture, The Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.