Beginning with David Cronenberg's M. Butterfly, the opening night gala film, and closing 10 days and 18 galas later with David Anspaugh's Rudy, the 18th edition of the Toronto International Film Festival of Festivals looks again to go down as the best yet.

Playback's special report on the Sept. 9-18 screenathon includes a look at past editions of the Toronto festival, as recalled by a festiphile rummaging through old journals. Once again we put a spotlight on Canadian films - those with gala screenings and feature-length films and documentaries in the Perspective Canada program - in a series of film diaries. The business of film is further explored in a summary of Symposium '93's two-day agenda.

And debuting this time around is Playback's Guerilla Guide to the Festival, the ultimate industry bible of who's who and where they hang out as well as practical information about screenings and events.

For all the self-congratulatory applause to be heard this week at screenings of Canadian films, what fear and trembling that currently grips the film and television industry will likely surface during Symposium '93: Beyond the Screen?

The annual talk shop - held over two days on Sept. 11 and 12 - brings top industry players together to discuss the current state of film and tv production.

Take docudramas, the focus of a Saturday morning discussion panel, "Hot Docs: Real Life Dramas". The threat of libel suits, court injunctions and aggrieved pressure groups facing broadcasters down has made documentary makers defensive.

Line blurred

Catherine Olsen, a CBC Newsworld broadcaster, argues the line between point-of-view documentaries and docudramas on the one hand, and traditional documentaries on the other, has blurred. And while she has not yet detected a chill effect among docudrama makers due to the Valour and the Horror furor in particular, fallout is inevitable.

"In the real world, people are pitching pov films, and broadcasters are encouraging them to do so. But how many get financed and made during the coming year remains to be seen," Olsen says.

All the filmmakers on the Saturday morning panel - including Brian McKenna, John Smith and Bernie Zukerman - have used pov techniques and/or dramatizations in their work. Some even consider themselves more dramatists than documentary makers.

Olsen, who will moderate the workshop, says she has not yet ruled out inviting former soldiers upset with the recent Valour and the Horror program to address the panel discussion.

Spirited debate is also expected Sunday afternoon when the thorny issue of women in film comes up during "She Says. He Says. Who Decides?", a panel discussion sponsored by Toronto Women in Film and Television, the National Film Board and Norstar Entertainment.

Alternative films

Recent box office hits like Fried Green Tomatoes and Like Water For Chocolate - considered by many as "women's films" - have some forecasting a wave of new, alternative films in the future that portray women characters as subjects, not objects, and even headline women directors.