{"id":664992,"date":"2026-08-31T10:10:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T10:10:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/664992\/"},"modified":"2026-08-31T10:10:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T10:10:14","slug":"tiff-2026-film-trailer-love-is-the-monster-starring-paulina-garcia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/664992\/","title":{"rendered":"TIFF 2026 Film Trailer: ‘Love Is the Monster’ Starring Paulina Garc\u00eda"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tLove Is the Monster (Amor es el Monstruo<\/a>). Costa Rican writer-director Neto Villalobos Brenes (All About the Feathers,\u00a0Helmet Heads) has picked a title for his latest film that will make you sit up straight, deal with questions swirling through your head, or both. The chilling dystopian thriller, starring Paulina Garc\u00eda<\/a> (Gloria<\/a>) and teeming with fear and inequality, will world premiere in the Toronto International<\/a> Film Festival\u2019s (TIFF<\/a>) Centerpiece strand<\/a> on Sept. 15.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tFilmed in Costa Rica\u2019s South Pacific region, Love Is a Monster features Chilean star Garc\u00eda as a grandmother determined to make the most of the time she has left with her six-year-old granddaughter. After her daughter cuts off all contact, she has to earn her trust back, only for tragedy to strike: the girl gets kidnapped for ransom. What is the grandmother willing to do to protect the ones she loves?<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cShe is forced to make choices she never imagined, pushing love, loyalty and survival into increasingly tense territory,\u201d notes a synopsis of the movie that explores family, love, age and class inequality. <\/p>\n

\n\tLove Is the Monster sees Villalobos Brenes return to Toronto, where his two previous features also debuted. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cA few years ago, I lost the person I loved most, my mother,\u201d says Villalobos Brenes in explaining his sharp turn from two comedies to a dark, genre-infused cinematic ride. \u201cAs everyday life became more difficult for her, she found in her granddaughter the strength to keep fighting. That experience sparked the question at the heart of this film: how far would you go to protect the person you love most?\u201d <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\u2018Love Is the Monster,\u2019 courtesy of Bendita Film Sales <\/p>\n

\n\tLove Is the Monster also stars Natalia Regidor, Gloriana Vargas and Ericka Reikendorf. Written by Villalobos Brenes and Diego van der Laat, the film features cinematography by Nicol\u00e1s Wong D\u00edaz and editing by Yibr\u00e1n Asuad and Villalobos Brenes. Bendita Film Sales is handling world sales.<\/p>\n

\n\tGarc\u00eda, who won the Silver Bear for best actress at the Berlin International Film Festival for her performance in Gloria, shares: \u201cI don\u2019t think love really has limits. You only discover that when you\u2019re put to the test and find yourself doing things you never imagined you were capable of. When a child is involved, that feeling becomes even stronger. You\u2019re willing to do absolutely anything to protect them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tTHR can now exclusively premiere the poster for the film right here.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\n\tNow, if you finally want to see a video teaser, we got you covered, too. Here is the exclusive premiere of the trailer for Love Is the Monster. Whenever you are ready, buckle up and take a deep breath!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Love Is the Monster (Amor es el Monstruo). Costa Rican writer-director Neto Villalobos Brenes (All About the Feathers,\u00a0Helmet…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":664993,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[263],"tags":[18,117,19,1452,17,327,280903,11523,249709,261948,13245],"class_list":["post-664992","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-international","tag-ireland","tag-movies","tag-paulina-garcia","tag-tiff","tag-tiff-2026","tag-toronto-2026","tag-toronto-film-festival"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117189583045269388","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664992","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664992"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664992\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/664993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}