Road movies often provide the perfect setting for journeys of self-discovery and this is no different in THE UNKNOWN COUNTRY, the visually stunning narrative feature debut from dir. Morrisa Maltz.
The women’s liberation movement of the 1970s gradually began to find some traction in Hollywood towards the end of that decade, but progress was painfully slow. In the more conservative business era of the 80s, women directors were mostly found on the margins, though occasionally stars like Jane Fonda (who produced the feminist comedy 9-to-5 as well as the Oscar-winning On Golden Pond) were able to get pet projects made. Another feminist comedy, Tootsie, won the Academy Award for Best Screenplay, but Elaine May,…
"Watching these movies now, we are struck by how they forge a cinematic language that is bold, critical, and engaged." VIFF Year-Round Programmer, Tom Charity
After lying dormant for two years, Rupture returns with a vengeance this June. And our annual showcase of genre cinema is ready to make up for lost time.
In this episode, we’re joined by a Songwriter Hall of Fame inductee – artist, producer, composer and all-around powerhouse, Linda Perry.
Get ready to be swept up by the winds of change reinvigorating French cinema. In this program, a new crop of rising talent is the centre of attention, with extraordinary performances by César Award-winning actresses Déborah Lukumuena (Robust, The Braves) and Lyna Khoudri (Gagarine), as well as impressive newcomers – actor Thimotée Robart (Magnetic Beats) and writer/director Luàna Bajrami (The Hill Where Lionesses Roar). Although older than most of the characters depicted in the program, fifty-something Michel (François Créton), the…
On this episode of the VIFF podcast, we’re featuring a conversation from our year-round virtual Creator Talk series with Dune Production Designer, Patrice Vermette - who recently took home the Oscar for Best Production Design at the 94th Academy Awards.
Our Italian Film Week features 14 films, seven new releases, seven classics from masters like Fellini, Visconti, De Sica and Monicelli, showing here in restored 4K digital prints. There’s a spotlight on actor Toni Servillo, who stars in four of this year’s selection, including the poignant prison drama The Inner Cage and a biopic about the legendary comic actor Eduardo Scarpetta, The King of Laughter, as well as his landmark performance in The Great Beauty. Our opening film and the…
VIFF's director of programming, Curtis Woloschuk, shares his five must-see films at this year's festival.
See the full VIFF 2023…
It is time to celebrate cinema in a big way, on the big screen...together. We are excited to share an…
What would you do if, like Marty McFly, you were given the chance to travel back in time – say,…
It’s been ten years since Hayao Miyazaki — the world’s greatest animator — released his last film, The Wind is…
French critics invented the term “film noir” in the mid-1950s to describe the wave of downbeat American crime thrillers of…
We hope you’ll agree, February is as good a time as any to celebrate Black film, Black film artists, Black…
Donya (Anita Wali Zada) worked as a translator for the US military in Afghanistan. Now she’s with a mom-and-pop fortune cookie factory in Fremont, California. She knows she’s lucky to have made it out, but she’s concerned about her family back home and she has trouble sleeping. Perhaps therapy will help? Perhaps not. But when she’s promoted to actually writing fortunes, her own takes an unexpected turn… This lovely slow burn comedy has been compared to the films of Jim Jarmusch and Aki Kaurismaki.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
This East Van movie is a fresh and engaging coming-of-age story about an Asian-Canadian teenager who is torn between his girlfriend’s dreams of their future and his father’s ambition, all the while struggling with finding himself and following his own desires. In his first feature, director Jason Karman vividly brings to life the joys and complications of a young man who suddenly discovers feelings for the boy next door.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
Before The Bad Seeds there was The Birthday Party, four Melbourne school kids burning with the white heat of punk with Nick Cave as frontman, a teenage Bukowski channeling poetry, literature, rockabilly and blues. Narrated by the original band, and featuring never-before-seen personal footage and jaw dropping concert clips, the film provides a sweaty, electrifying front-row seat to to one of the most legendary live acts of a wild era — without running the risk of a kung fu chop from a smacked up Nick Cave.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
Brunette Rita (Laura Elena Harring) wanders Mulholland Drive, dazed and confused after an auto accident. She finds refuge with Betty (Naomi Watts), an aspiring blonde actress who has arrived from Deep River, Ontario with her innocence intact. The two work together to try to piece together Rita’s story… But nothing is quite what it seems in this rich, disturbing neo-noir from David Lynch, an enigmatic mystery which invites multiple interpretations.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
Buenos Aires, the end of the world, 1997. Leslie Cheung and Tony Leung are lovers trying to hash out their on-off relationship in an alien environment. Very much a film made in exile, Happy Together is shot in grainy monochrome and bluesy greens and reds. An improvised movie, it’s akin to flicking through a photo album, over-exposed snapshots of splintered relationships. This fragmentary, intuitive style carries a powerful emotional charge, and Wong won the Best Director prize at Cannes.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
Set in 1960, in the milieu Wong Kar-wai grew up in (an immigrant from Shanghai, his father was the manager of a nightclub), the swooningly romantic Days of Being Wild envelopes you in a half-remembered world suffused in sweltering heat, torrential rain and existential ennui. Louche, listless lothario Yuddy (Leslie Cheung) seduces Su Lizhen (Maggie Cheung) then moves on to a showgirl (Carina Lau), before fate plays her trump card.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
September 11 is the 50th anniversary of the CIA-backed coup which toppled Salvador Allende’s socialist government in Chile and plunged that country into the Pinochet dictatorship. To mark this important date, VIFF is proud to present the first film by one of the world’s most respected non-fiction filmmakers, Patricio Guzmán (Nostalgia for the Light; The Pearl Button; The Battle of Chile). The First Year is a fascinating, vivid record of the radical changes Allende made to redress inequality.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
A key work from the British realist "kitchen sink" movement, Shelagh Delaney’s groundbreakng play explores multiple layers of social oppression. A selfish, hard-drinking mother (Dora Bryan) and her pregnant daughter (Rita Tushingham) represent examples of how women of no means often must choose between independence and security.
Screening at the VIFF Centre viff.org/whats-on
The 42nd Vancouver International Film festival runs September 28 to October 8, 2023. Explore the festival lineup below and secure your tickets at viff.org.