Fans slept through the night on the sidewalk outside the TIFF Bell Lightbox theater in hopes of getting a seat through the wait, while bars and restaurants along the festival’s King Street hub blasted the 2012 classic “All Too Well” – which inspired the short. Taylor Swift fans take over #TIFF22 pic.twitter.com/N3bDxzMvTi — Deadline Hollywood (@DEADLINE) September 9, 2022 For Swift, the event gave her the opportunity to give the short project a public screening in its original 35mm format. “It’s really important to show the short in 35mm because that’s how it was originally shot,” Swift said before the screening. Watch her introduction below. Taylor Swift opens ‘All Too Well’ at #TIFF22 pic.twitter.com/8L8QvxlX0M — Deadline Hollywood (@DEADLINE) September 9, 2022 Sink (Stranger Things) and Dylan O’Brien (Maze Runner) co-star as a younger woman and a slightly older man in a relationship that ultimately fails but leaves an indelible mark on both – and lingering regrets. Launching online last November, All Too Well played in select theaters in the US and screened at Tribeca in June, and now there’s talk of the short as a potential awards season contender. Swift told Bailey that it was no surprise that she ended up writing and directing a short film, explaining that there was always a visual element to the way she captured songs and presented them to an audience. Taylor Swift and many others hit the red carpet in Toronto “When I wrote a song, I immediately started thinking about how I want to present it on stage. If I made a music video for it, what would it look like?’ he said. “And then when I would create an album, halfway through, I would start thinking, what does this album look like? What colors are we dealing with here? What are the issues? aesthetics? What do I want this to symbolize? Because from very early in my career, I wanted to establish each album as its own era.” See all of Deadline’s Toronto Film Fest coverage She revealed a number of filmmakers who had influenced and inspired her work over the course of her 20-year career. “It has fluctuated over time. I’ve always liked certain movies in certain phases when I was musically. Like when I was doing the ‘1989’ album, I was watching a lot of John Hughes movies like Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club over and over again,” he recounted. “When the pandemic hit, I watched a lot of Guillermo Del Toro, The Devil’s Backbone, Pan’s Labyrinth. My whole world turned into fairy tales, forests and mythical creatures. I was so blown away by those movies and obviously I’ve always loved The Shape Of Water, it’s one of my favorite movies ever.” He also mentioned more recent titles such as Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story and Joanna Hogg’s The Souvenir and The Souvenir Part II. “I really like the fact that it’s about this young woman who experiences this extreme brokenness and despair and then makes something like that,” she said of The Souvenir Part II, adding that she had seen it after finishing All Too Well. Swift said it was a “baby-step process” to begin the short film project. “It wasn’t like I woke up one day and wanted to direct,” he said. “I’ve been involved in the filming of over 60 music videos and I’ve learned a lot from this process because I always keep my eyes and ears open. I always look at footage and think, “I like this, but I don’t like that. Why and why not?’ Securing Sink and O’Brien in the lead roles was a key step forward in the project, Swift revealed. “It was a very instinctive decision based on having watched their shows. If I had to assign analytical thought to it, I’d say I’ve never seen either of them play roles quite like this. But I’ve seen them ace anything put in front of them,” Swift explained. “I thought I wonder if Sadie Sink wants to play a romantic lead. I know I haven’t seen it yet. I think she’s at that perfect point in her career where she could,” he continued. “If he had said no, I just don’t know if I would have done the film honestly. Yes it’s true. I really wanted to say yes to both. I know we have to compromise in life, but I didn’t have a backup plan and I didn’t want to compromise.” Swift, who is currently preparing for the Oct. 21 release of her 10th studio album “Midnights,” acknowledged that a natural progression would be to make a feature film now. “I would like to continue to take steps forward. And I think now I’m at a place where the next step is not a baby step, it would be a commitment to do a film and I’d love to find the right opportunity because I absolutely love telling stories that way,” he said.
