Toronto the boring? Fashion at TIFF duller than at Venice film fest
It’s a tale of two festival cities: on the left, we have Natalie Portman attending the TIFF premiere of Black Swan last night, and on the right, the actor attends the same premiere two weeks ago in Venice. Can you spot the difference?
Seriously, celebrities. What is with the lazy fashion efforts this year? Are we not good enough to warrant sartorial excellence? In Venice, Portman (in Rodarte) looks like a golden-era movie star. And here in Hogtown (wearing Jason Wu), she looks like she’s on her way to senior prom.
Helen Mirren is another offender.
At left, Mirren attends the Toronto premiere of her movie Brighton Rock, looking a bit like a Grade 1 teacher at a garden party. At right, she supports The Tempest in Venice, looking decidedly more va-va-va-voom. So what if it kind of looks like she’s become tangled up in the red carpet—at least it’s a glamorous effort.
Perhaps our lack of red carpets is to blame. Or maybe it’s just that the people’s festival inspires a little too much every-man-ness on the fashion front. Whatever the case, we want glitz!
(Images: Portman in Toronto by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images Entertainment/Getty Images, Portman in Venice by Venturelli/WireImage/Getty Images, Mirren in Toronto by Karon Liu, Mirren in Venice by Franco Origlia/Getty Images Entertainment/Getty Images)
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Courtney Shea is a freelance journalist in Toronto. She started her career as an intern at Toronto Life and continues to contribute frequently to the publication, including her 2022 National Magazine Award–winning feature, “The Death Cheaters,” her regular Q&As and her recent investigation into whether Taylor Swift hung out at a Toronto dive bar (she did not). Courtney was a producer and writer on the 2022 documentary The Talented Mr. Rosenberg, based on her 2014 Toronto Life magazine feature “The Yorkville Swindler.”
