Harry Styles and Emma Corrin Film ‘My Policeman’ to Receive 2022 TIFF Tribute Award for Performance

On Monday, the Toronto International Film Festival announced the 1950s-set drama My Policeman — starring Harry Styles, Emma Corrin, Rupert Everett, Gina McKee, Linus Roache and David Dawson — as a recipient of the 2022 TIFF Tribute Award for Performance.

The film revolves around a police officer named Tom (Styles) and museum curator named Patrick (Dawson) who fall in love in 1950s England but are unable to live as an openly gay couple due to the time period. As such, Tom marries a female teacher named Marion (Corrin), though, as TIFF notes in a press release, “flashing forward to the 1990s, Tom (Roache), Marion (McKee), and Patrick (Everett) are still reeling with longing and regret, but now they have one last chance to repair the damage of the past.”

“When your film shifts through time and across fluid boundaries of love and desire, you need a cast that can embody those nuances in every gesture,” Cameron Bailey, TIFF’s CEO, said in a statement. “Harry Styles, Emma Corrin, and David Dawson deliver beautiful, mirrored performances with Linus Roache, Gina McKee, and Rupert Everett. We’re thrilled to honour the ensemble cast of My Policeman with the TIFF Tribute Award for Performance.”

Directed by Michael Grandage and based on the novel by Bethan Roberts, My Policeman makes its world premiere at TIFF this year as a Special Presentation. Oscar-nominated screenwriter Ron Nyswaner (Philadelphia) wrote the screenplay.

The celebration of an ensemble cast with the TIFF Tribute Award for Performance signals the fest’s move away from gendered award categories to more gender-neutral honours. It’s also the first time that an ensemble cast has received the honour.

 

 

Established in 2019, the TIFF Tribute Awards (for Actor, Director, and Emerging Talent, as well as a Variety Artisan Award, Jeff Skoll Award in Impact Media and a Special Tribute Award) have proven prophetic when it comes to award season honours.

In 2019, Joaquin Phoenix won the TIFF Actor award for his titular role in Joker, and then went on to win the Best Actor Oscar in 2020. That same year, Taika Waititi won the TIFF Director award for Jojo Rabbit and then went on to win an Oscar for the film, though it was for Best Adapted Screenplay. Anthony Hopkins earned a TIFF Actor award win in 2020 and then nabbed the Oscar for Best Actor in 2021 for The Father, while Chloé Zhao won the TIFF Director award that year for Nomadland and then went on to make history as the first woman of colour to win the Best Director Oscar. In 2021, Jessica Chastain won a TIFF Actor award for her eponymous role in The Eyes of Tammy Faye, which preceded an Oscar win for Best Actress for the role earlier this year.

The 2022 Toronto International Film Festival runs from Sept. 8-18, 2022.

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