Special Guests and Events

Selina Crammond introduces The Gleaners and I

Special Guests & Events

January

Acclaimed Canadian cinematographer Norm Li (Never Steady, Never Still, The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open) introduced a screening of his directorial debut Under the Viaduct (2018), an artful critique of Vancouver’s homelessness crisis. Italian-Canadian director (and SFU instructor) Simone Rapisarda Casanova joined us in person for a program dedicated to his poetic and principled brand of “meta-documentary.” Colin Browne, Vancouver filmmaker, poet, scholar, and Professor Emeritus at SFU, introduced the opening program of “The Image Before Us: A History of Film in British Columbia — Take 5,” curated by Harry Killas. Anne-Marie Dekker introduced a program dedicated to the films of her late husband Daryl Duke (1929–2006), the first Western Canadian to win the Directors Guild of Canada’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Filmmaker and ECUAD Assistant Professor Lindsay McIntyre introduced a screening of Gil Cardinal’s reclamation documentary Totem: The Return of the G’psgolox Pole (2003) and its sequel, Totem: Return and Renewal (2007). Vancouver-based film producer Cari Green joined us for a screening of Hugh Brody’s The Washing of Tears (1994), a documentary, produced by Green, on the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation of Friendly Cove, Vancouver Island.

Steve Gravestock (middlde) at the opening night of “Wayway Heroes: A Survey of Modern Icelandic Cinema”

February

To celebrate Black History Month, Trinidadian-Canadian filmmaker Selwyn Jacob introduced a screening of Mighty Jerome (2010), an NFB documentary Jacob produced on African-Canadian track legend Harry Jerome. The video work Hogan’s Alley (1994), which explores the history of Vancouver’s Black community, preceded the film, and was introduced by its co-director Cornelia Wyngaarden. Director Jonathan Tammuz introduced a screening of his B.C. road movie Rupert’s Land (1998), winner of six Leo Awards. A screening of multimedia artist Maggie Lee’s Mommy (2015), copresented with the Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art (Centre A), was introduced by the film’s producer Asher Penn.

March

Dorothy Woodend, cultural editor at The Tyee, introduced a program of animated films produced in British Columbia. Guests included animators Bettina Matzkuhn, Jody Kramer, Elisa Chee, Diego Maclean, David Fine, and Alison Snowden. Indigenous actor Angel Gates joined us for a screening of Vancouver filmmaker Wayne Wapeemukwa’s audacious debut feature Luk’Luk’I (2017), which she appears in. Curtis Woloschuk, Associate Director of Programming at VIFF, introduced a screening of Anne Wheeler’s powerful documentary Chi (2013) and Jill Sharpe’s Emmy-nominated Bone Wind Fire (2011), with Sharpe in attendance. Director David Paperny joined us in person for a screening of his Oscarnominated documentary The Broadcast Tapes of Dr. Peter (1993), based on the video journals of Vancouver physician and AIDS activist Peter Jepson-Young. As part of “Frames of Mind,” New York-based director Sandra Luckow joined us in person for the Vancouver premiere of her documentary That Way Madness Lies (2018). Thierry Garrel, a French Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres, introduced the opening screening of legendary French film essayist Chris Marker’s newly restored The Owl’s Legacy (1989), a 13-chapter symposium on ancient Greece. Garrel and Marker produced the ambitious work, originally broadcast on European television. On the morning of March 30, The Cinematheque welcomed a coterie of diehard cinephiles for our biennial 24 Hour Movie Marathon, which featured 24 consecutive hours of essential cinema around 2019’s theme of seasons.

April

Vancouver cinematographer and experimental filmmaker Kirk Tougas introduced a screening of Linda Ohama’s Obachan’s Garden (2001), which Tougas shot. To conclude the fifth season of “The Image Before Us: A History of Film in British Columbia,” Christine Haebler introduced a 35mm screening of Bruce McDonald’s Canadian rock ‘n’ roll movie classic Hard Core Logo (1996), which Haebler produced.

Post-screening Q&A with director Sean Baker (right)

Folk Horror Freak-Out! Halloween Party

May

The opening night of “High and Low: From Pulp to Poetry,” an exhibition of high-art films made from pop-art sources, featured an introduction by curator Donald Brackett before screenings of Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low (1963) and Stanley Kubrick’s The Killing (1956). As part of “DIM Cinema,” North Carolina artists Sabine Gruffat and Bill Brown joined us in person for a program of their experimental film work. Co-presented with Vancouver’s Iris Film Collective.

June

Dave Barber, programmer of the Winnipeg Cinematheque, and Kevin Nikkel, a Winnipeg documentarian and animator, joined us for a screening of their co-directed film Tales of the Winnipeg Film Group (2018), about the influential artist-run centre.

For National Indigenous Peoples Day, Blackfoot/Sámi filmmaker and actor Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers (The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open) produced a special video introduction to a program celebrating her acclaimed documentaries c̓əsnaʔəm: the city before the city (2017) and Bihttoš (2014).

Steve Gravestock, Senior Canadian and International Programmer at TIFF, introduced the opening-night program of “Wayway Heroes: A Survey of Modern Icelandic Cinema,” a touring series he curated.

Allison Collins, Curator of Media Arts at Western Front, introduced a screening of Claire Denis’s 35 rhums (2008) as part of the opening night of “Claire Denis: Trouble Every Day,” a major retrospective dedicated to the revered French director.

July

Casey Wei, a Vancouver-based interdisciplinary artist and musician, interviewed pioneering American video artist Skip Blumberg via Skype for a “DIM Cinema” program celebrating Blumberg’s four-decade career. Co-presented with VIVO Media Arts.

August

A joint opening night celebrating Film Noir 2019 and a retrospective on Jean-Pierre Melville, “godfather of the French crime film,” featured a courtyard reception with music by DJ Niña Mendoza. Sponsored by the Consulate General of France in Vancouver.

September

Wil Aballe, owner and curator of Wil Aballe Art Projects (WAAP), introduced a screening of Jack Hazan’s newly restored A Bigger Splash (1974), an innovative biopic on British pop artist David Hockney. Dr. Kenneth Paul Rosenberg, a Peabody Award-winning filmmaker and practicing psychiatrist, participated in a discussion via Skype following a “Frames of Mind” screening of his documentary Bedlam (2019), which follows several mentally-ill people over five years.

October

Victoria-born, Vancouver-based artist Julia Feyrer joined us in person for a program of her acclaimed moving-image work. Guest programmed for “DIM Cinema” by Steffanie Ling, Artistic Director of Toronto’s Images Festival. The centrepiece of our British folk horror program was a Folk Horror Freak-Out! Halloween Party on October 31, featuring a participatory theatre performance by Jarin Schexnider, Director of East Vancouver artist space What Lab, followed by a screening of Ben Wheatley’s folkhorror revival film Kill List (2011).

November

As part of the “Crave Hot Docs Showcase,” Hot Docs Associate Programmer Mariam Zaidi moderated post-screening Skype Q&As with sexual-abuse survivor Rod MacLeod, subject of Matt Gallagher’s Prey (2019), and Emily Gan, director of Cavebirds (2019).

December

For the opening night of “Viva Varda! The Films of Agnès Varda,” a near-comprehensive retrospective devoted to the films of Belgianborn French director Agnès Varda, DOXA Documentary Film Festival’s Director of Programming Selina Crammond introduced The Gleaners and I (2000), one of Varda’s seminal non-fiction works. Acclaimed writer-director-editor Sean Baker, a leading light in American independent cinema, joined us in person for a special 35mm presentation of his latest feature The Florida Project (2017) as part of the retrospective “Sean Baker: Peripheries.”