'Room' wins TIFF People's Choice award

The audiences at the Toronto International Film Festival really liked hanging out in this Room.

Starring Brie Larson as a mother forced to live in a locked shed with her young son, director Lenny Abrahamson's drama won the People's Choice Award at the annual festival on Sunday. Second runner-up went to Spotlight, the upcoming film about a Boston clergy sex scandal starring Mark Ruffalo and Michael Keaton. Pan Nalin's Angry Indian Goddesses was first runner-up.

Larson already is an early favorite for a best actress Oscar nomination for Room — which opens in limited release Oct. 16 before going nationwide Nov. 6. But the TIFF honor could predict bigger success: Six out of the last seven winners of the audience award have been nominated for best picture, with Slumdog Millionaire, The King's Speech and, most recently, 12 Years a Slave all taking the season's biggest prize.

The first-person action-adventure Hardcore garnered the People's Choice Midnight Madness honor — with the horror films Green Room (starring Patrick Stewart) and The Final Girls (with Taissa Farmiga and Malin Åkerman) as runners-up — and Evgeny Afineevsky's Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom was named People's Choice Documentary winner.