1996 Toronto International Film Festival

The 21st Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) took place in Toronto, Ontario, Canada between September 5 and September 14, 1996. The festival opened with the film Fly Away Home, and closed with That Thing You Do!.

This year's festival marked significant changes in the programming streams, including The Edge, Asian Horizons and Latin American Panorama being merged into Contemporary World Cinema, and First Cinema being discontinued with first films instead appearing under Contemporary World Cinema, Real to Reel and Discovery. The Dialogues series, which had been introduced the previous year as a special event, was turned into a permament program.

Vietnam Perspective
A special program highlighting films from Vietnam.

Unverified program

 * The Arena of Murder by Amos Gitai
 * Beautiful Thing by Hettie MacDonald
 * La bouche de Jean-Pierre by Lucile Hadžihalilović
 * Bound by Lilly Wachowski & Lana Wachowski
 * Box of Moonlight by Tom DiCillo
 * Color of a Brisk and Leaping Day by Christopher Münch
 * Floating Life by Clara Law
 * Forgotten Silver by Peter Jackson & Costa Botes
 * Gabbeh by Mohsen Makhmalbaf
 * Grace of My Heart by Allison Anders
 * Kolya by Jan Svěrák
 * Life by Lawrence Johnston
 * Little Angel (1996 film) by Helke Misselwitz
 * Ponette by Jacques Doillon
 * Prisoner of the Mountains by Sergei Bodrov
 * The Quiet Room by Rolf de Heer
 * Ripe by Mo Ogrodnik
 * Some Mother's Son by Terry George
 * The Square Circle (Daayraa)) by Amol Palekar
 * Swingers by Doug Liman
 * A Tickle in the Heart by Stefan Schwietert
 * To Speak the Unspeakable: The Message of Elie Wiesel (Mondani a mondhatatlant: Elie Wiesel üzenete) by Judit Elek
 * Trees Lounge by Steve Buscemi
 * Trinity and Beyond by Peter Kuran
 * Vesna Goes Fast (Vesna va veloce) by Carlo Mazzacurati
 * Waiting for Guffman by Christopher Guest
 * The Whole Wide World by Dan Ireland