Film Festival

34th World Community Film Festival (2025)

Jan 31 & Feb 1, 2025. Tickets on sale in Dec. 2023

Sid Williams Theatre, Courtenay (in-person only)

Friday night feature: Incandescence by Velcrow Ripper and Nova Ami

Saturday: Five inspiring films from 11:30 am to 5 pm

Saturday night feature: The 9 Lives of Barbara Dane

Patrons may purchase separate tickets for Saturday evening dinner (Evergreen Seniors’ Lounge).

Friday, January 31 – 730pm – Sid Williams Theatre

Incandescence

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.

Saturday, February 1 – Sid Williams Theatre (SID)

The Home Team

The Home Team

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.

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Silvicola

Silvicola

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.

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Coming Home to Grandmother’s Garden

Coming Home to Grandmother’s Garden

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.”

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INHABITANTS: Indigenous Perspectives on Restoring Our World

INHABITANTS: Indigenous Perspectives on Restoring Our World

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.

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Call Me Dancer

Call Me Dancer

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.

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Saturday, February 1 – 8pm – Sid Williams Theatre

The 9 Lives of Barbara Dane

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.