Toronto Flashback: Francis Ford Coppola

Francis Ford Coppola, pictured here at a Toronto International Film Festival salute to Robert Duvall in 1983, periodically re-invents himself, and he has often used the Toronto fest to unveil his latest incarnation.

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In '83, the Godfather: Part II Oscar winner decided to work with a new generation of young actors, and the result was The Outsiders, starring Patrick Swayze, Matt Dillon and a young guy named Tom Cruise, which screened at that year’s festival.

This year, Coppola's latest reinvention is an even more experimental effort, Twixt, combining a mystery movie with a ghost story. The idea for his newest film, he says, came to him in a dream.

Coppola said at the Deauville Film Festival earlier this month that Twixt, which is in 3D, employs the technology that has been around for decades, "Around a year and a half ago, I was at a film festival somewhere where everyone was talking about Avatar and 3D film. I was very interested in 3D in the 1950s and for awhile it was considered to be the solution to get people into theaters and, well, that never really happened. Even Hitchcock made a 3D film that was never released."

As for what moviegoers can expect from the film, Coppola warned that it was "unusual," "It’s an archaic word that means between a dream and reality, between day and night, between good and evil. It’s a film in the tradition of gothic romance. It’s an unusual film that doesn’t fall into an easy category.

"It’s part gothic romance, part personal film. It’s a film that I am anxious to present to the public. I like the film a lot and I find it very unusual."