Proiezioni in Lingua Originale con sottotitoli in italiano || Original version with Italian subtitles
Rupert Turner ha otto anni e una passione smisurata per John F. Donovan, star della televisione americana e supereroe sul grande schermo. Fan irriducibile, avvia con lui una corrispondenza regolare che nasconde a tutti, anche alla madre, giovane donna in ambasce che prova a ricostruirsi una vita. Il segreto non sfugge però al bullo della scuola, che ruba le lettere di Rupert scatenando la sua ira e la reazione sproporzionata dei media. Ma Rupert è più forte di tutto, perfino del suo idolo di cui segue le tracce diventando un attore altrettanto affermato. Una celebrità che adesso si confessa al microfono di una giornalista scettica a cui racconta la sua vita con John F. Donovan.
Xavier Dolan’s highly anticipated drama about a young man’s calculated reassessment of his infamous, and ultimately disastrous, childhood correspondence with an American television star features an all-star cast, including Kit Harington, Natalie Portman, Susan Sarandon, Kathy Bates, Thandie Newton, Jacob Tremblay, and Ben Schnetzer.
John F. Donovan (Harington), heartthrob star of film and TV, died alone and unexpectedly following a series of scandals. One fan in particular, 11-year-old Rupert Turner (Room’s Jacob Tremblay), has some singular insight into John’s soul. For five years John and Rupert were secret pen pals. Fast-forward to the present. Rupert (Ben Schnetzer, also at TIFF this year in The Grizzlies), now a successful actor in his own right, has written a memoir about his correspondence with John. In an interview with reporter Audrey Newhouse (Thandie Newton), Rupert will reveal all he knows about John’s troubled life, what compromises John made for fame — and how John’s tenderness and generosity inspired that little boy who was desperate to connect with the man he idolized.
Darting between flashback and postmortem, The Death and Life of John F. Donovan condemns the cruelty and prejudices that thwarted John’s too-short life while celebrating the depth of his connection to those who truly loved him.