When filmmaker Rob Spence saw a giant billboard for a Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, radio station proclaiming “Toronto Sucks!” he knew he had to make Let’s All Hate Toronto, a sometimes amusing but often dull documentary which had its World Premiere April 20th at the 2007 Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival.

Spence and co-director Albert Nerenberg attempt to ponder on film why most Canadians hate Toronto, Canada’s largest city. These two men embark on a cross-country “Toronto Appreciation Day Tour” of Canada with Spence dressing up as Mr. Toronto, a character he created to let fellow Canadians know how great Toronto really is. While touring Nova Scotia, Mr. Toronto makes a troubling discovery. He learns that many Torontonians like to hide the fact they’re from Toronto while in other Canadian cities because of the wide-spread animosity directed at Toronto.

Along the way, Spence and Nerenberg discover many myths about Toronto that are widely believed by Canadians, including that the United Nations actually declared Toronto to be the world’s most culturally diverse city, when in fact no such proclamation was ever made by the U.N. Mr. Toronto also finds out that the C.N. Tower which is currently the tallest freestanding structure in the world will soon lose that distinction to the Burj Dubai (aka The Tower of Dubai) in Dubai, United Emirates, which is scheduled to be completed in 2009. 

Spence and Nerenberg conclude that nobody really knows when or why Canadians started hating Toronto. However, they surmise Niagara on the Lake was probably the first town that started the hating tradition. This city was the former capital of Upper Canada, but when the capital was moved to Toronto in 1793, residents of Niagara on the Lake were outraged.

Mr. Toronto sees Canada as a giant focus group and believes he should counter Canadian’s concerns about Toronto point by point. While on tour across Canada, he began compiling a list of reasons why most Canadians like bashing Toronto based on the feedback he received from the media and the people he met on his cross-country tour.

Spence and Nerenberg felt that if Mr. Toronto could prove the reasons for hating Toronto to be false, then there would be no justification for people to continue bashing Toronto. Among the reasons Mr. Toronto found to explain why Canadians hate Toronto is that Torontonians act too much like New Yorkers and have adopted an American mentality. Many Canadians also feel Toronto doesn’t care at all about the environment and that residents of Toronto are too uptight, impolite and/or arrogant. 

Unfortunately, Let’s All Hate Toronto raises far too many questions it ever answers. Spence and Nerenberg seem unable to tie up any of the loose ends in this disappointing documentary.   

(Let’s All Hate Toronto, which had its World Premiere at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival on April 20, will be screened again there on April 28. For tickets, please call the festival box office at 416.588.8362 or go to www.hotdocs.ca )