TORONTO, ONT – Anyone will tell you it’s the audiences that make the Toronto International Film Festival . They aren’t purely industry folks, like they are in Cannes or Venice, but more boisterous, enthusiastic moviegoers with their own rituals, like growling like buccaneers at the piracy warning that plays before each screening.

That real-moviegoer energy has always made TIFF a good measuring stick for not just what might catch on during Hollywood’s awards season, but also what will click with audiences. Yet there might be no more endangered species in today’s film industry than the kind of crowd-pleaser that thrives in Toronto.

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More than most years, this year’s festival, which wraps up this weekend, has been a veritable ark for the castaways of today’s Hollywood:

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