7:30 PM (100 min)
Filmmakers: Nova Ami and Velcrow Ripper
An immersive cinematic experience, Incandescence endeavors to transform our understanding of wildfires, their consequences, and how we might better coexist with this awesome elemental phenomenon. It weaves together remarkable accounts of survival and adaptation with inspirational stories of support for people and animals affected by wildfires.
11:30 AM (26 min)
Director: Suzanne Crocker
The Home Team shares candid and heartfelt stories of new Canadians who have left big cities and warm climates for a tiny, frozen corner in the Yukon. Despite the challenges of leaving children and professional careers behind, these newcomers bring a piece of their world to the North, introducing traditions like cricket to the tight-knit community of Dawson City. This is an uplifting story about fitting in, finding connections and the magic that happens when different worlds come together.
12:10 PM (80 min)
Filmmaker: Jean-Philippe Marquis
Set amongst the rugged forests and shorelines of British Columbia, Silvicola is a tableau of the complex web of cultural and economic forces which compel and constrain modern forestry practices. A story told through the eyes of an eclectic mix of characters whose lives and livelihoods are intimately entangled with the forest. Contemplative and visually immense, Silvicola embeds the viewer within remote spaces and worksites normally hidden from view. This is a film that compels us to rethink the divisions between natural and industrial worlds by spotlighting the hidden labour and logics of modern forestry.
1:40 PM (17 min)
Filmmaker: Ed Carswell
Coming Home to Grandmother’s Garden is a beautiful film about Garry Oak ecosystems
from a Cowichan First Nation perspective. Hul’q’umi’nim-speaking people have lived on southern Vancouver Island since time immemorial and have tended and maintained p’hwulhp (Garry Oak) ecosystems as critical food gardens and hunting grounds. As Sulatiye’ (Maiya Modeste) says “When you have a relationship with the land, there is more initiative and passion toward saving it.”
2:10 PM (76 min)
Directors: Costa Boutsikaris & Anna Palmer
INHABITANTS follows five Native American communities as they restore their traditional land management practices in the face of a changing climate. For millennia Native Americans have successfully stewarded and shaped their landscapes, but centuries of colonization have disrupted their ability to maintain these processes. From deserts, coastlines, forests, mountains, and prairies, Native communities across the US are restoring their ancient relationships with the land. As the climate crisis escalates, these time-tested practices of North America’s original inhabitants are becoming increasingly essential in a rapidly changing world.
3:35 PM (88 min)
Filmmaker: Leslie Shampaine
Manish is a young and talented street dancer from Mumbai who is struggling against his parents’ insistence that he follow a traditional path because they are counting on their only son to support them.
8:00 PM (104 min)
Filmmaker: Maureen Gosling
The 9 Lives of Barbara Dane illuminates the extraordinary story of a trailblazer and an unsung hero of American roots music: folk, blues and jazz singer, social justice activist, feminist, record producer, and general troublemaker.
Saturday Dinner (Separate ticket)- a delicious all-inclusive meal of comfort food featuring local ingredients.
Director: Matthieu Rytz Narration: Jason Momoa
10:00 AM – 85 min
This exquisite environmental documentary is also a gripping tale of geopolitical, scientific, and corporate intrigue. It exposes the destructive machinations of a secretive organization, the International Seabed Authority (ISA), empowered to greenlight massive extraction of metals from the deep seafloor.
Filmmaker: Ali Grant
11:45 AM – 47 min
Might a genetic mutation be the very thing that allows this nice Jewish butch lesbian to be fully seen at last? Meet Sarah, 57. Lesbian? For sure. Jewish? Yes and no. Mother? In all but one sense. Trans? No, just often mistaken as such. Breast cancer survivor? Well, that’s the plan, the survival bit, but without the cancer or the breasts. Not Quite That is an intimate and insightful exploration of how we are seen, how we see ourselves, and why it matters.
1:00 PM – 2:30 PM
A collection of films suited for the whole family.
Director: Erika Cohn
1:10 PM – 81 min
When she was a young lawyer, Kholoud Al-Faqih walked into the office of Palestine’s Chief Justice and announced she wanted to join the bench. He laughed at her. A few years later, Kholoud became the first woman judge to be appointed to the Middle East’s Shari’a (Islamic law) courts.
Filmmaker: Manuela Dalle
2:45 PM – 72 min
In prisons ruled by toxic masculinity, dancing is an absolute taboo. But at Lancaster’s A-Yard, near Los Angeles, 10 young men are breaking this taboo by inviting French choreographer Dimitri to create a contemporary dance class, signaling a huge step towards their rehabilitation and hope for release back into society and ultimately creating a new prison culture.
Filmmakers: Heather Courtney, Princess Hairston, Chelsea Hernandez
4:10 PM – 99 min
Go behind the scenes at The 19th*, a digital news start-up led by a scrappy group of fearless women and LGBTQ+ journalists to buck status quo reporting by asking “who is omitted from the story and how can they be included?”
Directors: Josh Tickell & Rebecca Tickell
8 PM – 105 min
Fusing journalistic exposé with deeply personal stories from those on the front lines of the sustainable food movement, Common Ground unveils a dark web of money, power, and politics behind a broken food system. The film reveals how racist practices forged the current farm system in the US.
Director: Alistair Evans
7:30 PM – 100 min
Deep in the jungle of Central Vietnam, lies a magnificent underground kingdom. Hang Son Doòng which translates as “mountain river cave, is located in Quang Bình Province. In the middle of a UNESCO world heritage site, it is the largest cave passage in the world and a place of spectacular beauty.
Filmmakers: Ritchie Hemphill and Ryan Haché
7:30 PM – 15 min
Tiny is a stop-motion animation highlighting the life of ‘Nakwaxda’xw Elder Colleen Hemphill and her experiences growing up on a float house near Alert Bay. Colleen is featured telling stories about her relationships with family, the community and nature.
