Film critic Stephen Whitty spent the past week reporting

from the Toronto International

Film Festival, investigating hot new films, award-show buzz and rising stars. You can also follow the details of his Canadian adventures online, at nj.com/entertainment/whitty.

Eight years ago, when the planes of 9/11 hit, I was in a screening in Canada, watching the delightful "Monsoon Wedding." I walked out of the theater -- and right into a shocked and saddened world in which people kept announcing everything had changed forever.

This year, on that very day, at that very moment, I was standing in Newark Airport, waiting to go through security to get my flight to Canada. A moment of silence was announced, and the line stopped. The woman in front of me rolled her eyes. The man behind me sighed.

So much for eternal remembrance.

But some things have changed since then, and you could see the signs everywhere at the Toronto International Film Festival, which ended yesterday -- evidence, mostly, of a North American economy that took one huge hit then and, after seeming to finally fully recover, got a second staggering punch last year.

Parties were smaller. Publicity junkets were subdued. Instead of trumpeting the latest big contracts, Variety reported that studios had cut their production deals by about half. News of films actually being bought at the festival was scant (although the Weinsteins finally scooped up "A Single Man," the arty tale of a bereaved, closeted gay professor).

But if all you wanted to do was escape for a bit, the festival still provided ways to do it.

First, of course, there were the films themselves -- more than 300 of them, spread out over 10 days, and literally impossible to fully explore. (Pedro Almodovar's "Broken Embraces," for one, was a film from which logistics just kept me separated.) But you could still sample the offerings and -- with the help of some early, pre-festival screenings in New York -- I made some decent inroads.

I didn't find too many flops, either.

Oh, Terry Gilliam's "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus" was, not surprisingly, a bit of a muddle (although its problems seemed to have less to do with Heath Ledger's death than the original script). Werner Herzog's "My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done" played like David Lynch-Lite, and "The Boys are Back" was a mediocre male weepie.

But the new Coen brothers film, "A Serious Man," told a sort of Book of Job story about a physics professor in 1967 Minnesota, assailed by comically extreme tragedies. "An Education" spun a lovely, clear-eyed tale about a precocious teen, and the immature adult she goes to bed with, and announced the arrival of a fine new actress in Carey Mulligan.

And "Up in the Air" was a joy -- a tautly shot, tightly scripted drama with George Clooney as a professional "downsizer" who spends five nights out of every week flying around the country firing people. Does it bother him? It would if he hadn't walled himself off from humanity, a long time ago. A great movie for grown-ups, and a clear Oscar contender.

Those were my favorite films.

But there was still much to like in the unhinged and yet never less than fascinating "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call, New Orleans," also from the busy Herzog, and featuring a wild performance from Nicolas Cage. "A Prophet" delivered a gritty French prison drama, and Todd Solondz served up another slice of Jersey angst with "Life During Wartime."

These are the sort of movies you go to Toronto for.

Of course, journalists also come here for the interviews, and I was happy to grab a number, including rare sitdowns with the Coens and Cage. And fans come here for the celebrities -- and there was no shortage of sightings. George Clooney? Michael Caine? Oprah? Mariah Carey? Megan Fox? Bono? All here and walking the streets, or at least getting in and out of limousines.

And they behaved -- well, exactly the way you'd expect them to behave. Colin Farrell, believing his sister had been insulted, walked off the red carpet to grab a photographer by the neck. Colin Firth, even though he was racing to his next interview for "A Single Man," stopped and politely posed for fans (even when the lady's camera took its own sweet time).

Bill Murray skipped his own events (but showed up at the party for "Up in the Air" -- it was directed by pal Ivan Reitman's son). Fox, here with "Jennifer's Body," made a crack about how refreshing it was to work with a female director. (Are you listening, Michael Bay?) And asked why he didn't have a Facebook page, Clooney said he'd "rather have a prostate exam. On live TV. By a doctor with very cold hands."

And what's a festival without a little controversy? This one hadn't even begun before one of its programs -- a celebration of Israeli film, tied to a "City to City" venture linking Toronto and Tel Aviv -- spurred Canadian director John Grayson to withdraw his own film, and about 1,500 people, including Jane Fonda and Danny Glover, to sign a letter decrying the Israeli government and calling Tel Aviv "a city built on destroyed Palestinian villages."

Hollywood righteousness was in full force; sober judgment, not so much. No one noted, for example, that Israel was probably the only country in the Middle East where Grayson's film -- about a gay festival in Sarajevo -- could actually be shown. Nor that even as Israel's record on human rights was being assailed, the city was happily preparing for a "Havana Cultura" celebration two weeks later.

No, those ironies were not discussed. But the festival refused to back down, and a number of other celebrities -- from David Cronenberg to Lisa Kudrow -- signed a counter open letter. Finally even Fonda had to publicly retreat, noting she had signed the original proclamation "without reading it carefully enough" and the "omission" of any discussion of Hamas' own behavior was a mistake.

Yeah, perhaps.

Still, there were no reports of violence, and apart from a few Jewish Defense League hecklers at one meeting, things seemed to proceed rather politely. This is Canada, after all. It's a nation of politeness.

And, for 10 days, this is also Hollywood North -- a place taken over by producers, publicists and celebrities, all carefully lobbing the first few salvos of their Oscar campaigns straight at the hearts and minds and notepads of the journalists covering the festival. And with 10 nominees up for best picture this year, there was twice as much work to do.

So who was ahead, as the festival concluded yesterday? Hard to say, but when I left Thursday, "Up in the Air" seemed like a safe bet to eventually pick up a best-picture nomination, directing and screenwriting nods and maybe one for star George Clooney as well. It's that good.

Other favorites? Everyone -- myself included -- was very fond of Mulligan in "An Education" (although I think a critics' prize is more of a sure thing than an Oscar nod). And no one doubted that Mo'Nique would get a nomination -- either best actress or best supporting -- for her role as a horrifically abusive mother in "Precious."

Any other predictions come down to pure partiality. I'd make a case for a supporting Oscar for Vera Farmiga in "Up in the Air," mostly because she's been a favorite supporting actress of mine for years. And Michael Moore's "Capitalism: A Love Story" has a shot at best documentary -- although that depends on whether you found it pandering or powerful. (For once, I'm in the middle of the road.)

But those were the only frontrunners I could see emerging. Because even though the race has widened, the trainers no longer have quite so much to spend. No one does.

You could see it in the streets surrounding the festival. Gone were the wonderful movie-poster store and the retro toy shop; arrived were payday-loan storefronts and greasy lunchrooms. The stores that remained had raised their prices and, thanks to our battered economy, the U.S. dollar now brought only an extra 6 cents or so more than the Canadian one. (At one point, it carried a premium of about 60.)

You could overhear it, even at the fancy publicity junkets. That soundman hired for the day to hook up speakers usually works on feature films; business, he confessed, has been down for years. Those two veteran critics huddled in a corner weren't talking about the latest Almodovar film; they were comparing who got the better buyout package.

It's not the plush, expansive festival it used to be. These are no longer plush, expansive times.

But it is still a movie festival -- the best and biggest on the continent. And if all it can still reliably offer is a bit of glamour, a sizzle of excitement and the chance to lose yourself in another world for two cool dark hours, well, who can complain too much about that?

Stephen Whitty may be reached at swhitty@starledger.com or (212) 790-4435. Film critic Stephen Whitty spent the past week reporting from the Toronto International Film Festival, investigating hot new films, award-show buzz and rising stars. You can also follow the details of his Canadian adventures online, at nj.com/entertainment/whitty.

George Clooney plays a corporate downsizer in "Up in the Air," a film generating enormous Oscar buzz at the Toronto film festival. Mariah Carey drops the glamour to play a social worker helping an abused teen (Gabourey Sidibe, right) in the critically acclaimed "Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire." Heath Ledger in his final role, as Tony in Terry Gilliam's "The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus."<br/>Ellie Kendrick, right, and acclaimed newcomer Carey Mulligan, center, in "An Education," a film about a girl growing up fast in early-'60s England.; ASSOCIATED PRESS Lionsgate Liam Daniel