The TIFF Film Review: Ally Pankiw’s Lilith Fair: Building a Mystery
By Ross
WORLD PREMIERE – Canada | 2025 | 99m | English
Diving into the phenomenally crafted documentary, “Lilith Fair: Building a Mystery“, directed with a strong intent by Ally Pankiw (I Used To Be Funny), I couldn’t help but kick myself a few times in the butt for not being there to see this show when it was live and touring in the late 1990s. Where was I? I mean, I know I tend to not go to concerts, espeically music festivals, regardless of who’s in the lineup, but really, Sarah McLachlan’s legendary all-women music festival that featured performers that included Sheryl Crow, Jewel, Bonnie Raitt, Erykah Badu, Fiona Apple, Tracy Chapman, Suzanne Vega, Indigo Girls, Pat Benatar, and Emmylou Harris, is an event worth putting up with almost anything. So once again, I have to ask myself, where was I?
The music festival, aptly named Lilith Fair, did indeed change everything, particularly in the music industry, challenging how these ridiculous men in the industry viewed female music artists, performers, writers, and singers. Helmed and heralded by the Canadian superstar singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan and featuring exclusively women or women-led acts, the festival emerged with a vengeance in 1997, exploding forth unto the world the notion that popular music could only support a token quota of women’s voices was as misogynistic as it was false. And watching this documentary that chronicles Lilith Fair’s triumphant three-year run brought tears to my eyes more times than I can count.
Back in the ’90s, commercial radio wouldn’t play two women artists in a row because they believed, stupidly, that the listener would turn the station if they heard that lineup. Little did they know how wrong that idea was. So frustrated by all this, McLachlan decided to throw those misconceptions aside and go on tour with another female artist, Paula Cole, to offer audiences an entire night of women’s artistry. And to the industry’s surprise, that tour went a resounding success, going so well that the next summer McLachlan pushed her agenda forward with Lilith Fair, beautifully named after the Lilith of Jewish lore: Adam’s renegade first wife, who is mostly forgotten. And this female-centric music festival became the year’s top-grossing festival simply because, well, the music and the artists were so damn good at what they do.
This CBC documentary dives into the process, following McLachlan as she pushes forth her agenda with fearless (nervous) energy. It’s compelling and emotional watching these women stand up for something powerful and honest. “Society made them competitors,” we are told, but this “good Canadian girl” found that she wasn’t alone and wanted to feel the unity and support of all these female artists, and soon others joined in, even those who weren’t exactly on board from the get-go (I’m looking at you, Sandra Bernhard).
With beautifully integrated performances, backstage footage, and media coverage, director Pankiw unpacks the emotional engagement with well-formed explorations and insights into the logistics and challenges of changing societal perceptions and challenging misogynistic ideas. It even ushered in a new generation of collaborators, these younger up-and-coming artists like Brandi Carlile and Olivia Rodrigo, who are given a bit of interview time to note just how important this festival was to their attitudes and confidence within the music industry. There’s also a touching testimony from actor-filmmaker Dan Levy, a producer of the film, who caught his first Fair as a boy and was forever affected. If only I could have been there myself.
When the film ended at the Toronto International Film Festival press screening, I sat back, overwhelmed. “Lilith Fair: Building a Mystery” (watch here) doesn’t just chronicle a festival; it reflects a seismic cultural shift, and it made me take stock of the world we live in now — a world still steeped in racism, misogyny, transphobia, and homophobia. The documentary broke my heart and stirred my anger, but it also reminded me of the courage and solidarity that built something extraordinary. When Natalie Merchant says, “give me a second,” it lands like a prayer for all of us. This film made me cry for what was happening then, for what’s happening now, and for what still needs to change — but it also rekindled a glimmer of hope. Lilith Fair gave us that hope once, and this film suggests it’s still there, waiting to rise again.
