Tag: BC Film

Racism and Cultural Appropriation in the Arts: Screening, Workshop, and Panel with Simone Blais

On March 24-25 2021, Vancouver Short Film Festival is partnering with the CineVic Society of Independent Filmmakers for our first event in the VSFF On The Road series:

Racism and Cultural Appropriation in the Arts: Screening, Workshop, and Panel with Simone Blais

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Wednesday March 24th / 6:30pm via ZOOM
Short Documentary Screening and Discussion with Simone Blais
In this workshop, watch the 30 minute film Dance Like Everybody’s Watching, which explores the lives of Black dancers in Victoria, BC (Songhees, Esquimalt, W̱SÁNEĆ territories). After this private viewing, participate in a facilitated discussion with the director and other participants. This is the perfect opportunity for people looking to work though themes of cultural appropriation and inclusion in the dance community and is ideal for artists and non-artists of any background. If you are interested in community-building and anti-racism, this workshop is for you!

REGISTER VIA GOOGLE FORMS: https://forms.gle/V89FDvUwyrxsR8cE9

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Thursday March 25th / 6:30pm via Facebook Live
Filmmaker Panel featuring Peruzzo, Andy Hodgson, Adhel Arop
Moderated by Simone Blais, this panel will further the conversation begun in the screening and workshop, and explore the intersection of these themes with the work and career of local filmmakers.

ACCESS ON MARCH 25TH VIA FACEBOOK LIVE: https://www.facebook.com/events/2632082723748643/

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Simone Blais is a dancer, doula, director and aspiring midwife. She is a recent UVic Gender Studies graduate whose work focuses on decolonizing the dance community and reproductive justice for marginalized communities. In the past 5 years, she has worked with the Nesting Doula Collective, and the Native Youth Sexual Health Network, delivering workshops about reproductive justice. She is also the director and producer of the documentary Dance Like Everybody’s Watching, which highlights the experiences of Black dancers in ‘Victoria’. Find about more at simone-blais.com About Dance Like Everybody’s Watching: Dance Like Everybody’s Watching follows three Black dancers in Victoria, BC as they expose their worlds of flamenco, hip hop, and dancehall. While the dancers grapple with racism, tokenism, and stereotypes, we are reminded that dance is always political. This short film deals with themes of cultural appropriation in dance and is uniquely a BC production. 100% of the production, cast and crew are based in Victoria, BC. Dance Like Everybody’s Watching is funded by Storyhive and Creative BC.

About VSFF On The Road: The Vancouver Short Film Festival is excited to announce VSFF ON THE ROAD: an online event series connecting filmmakers across the province while staying apart. Sponsored by Creative BC. VSFF is proud to partner with film organizations province-wide and connect with communities outside of Vancouver as we create unique educational and professional development opportunities for filmmaking in British Columbia.

couchwalker on film by Jenny Banai

“couchwalker on film” is a short film experiment, imagined and created by Jenny Banai; a visual representation of her sophomore album “couchwalker”.

“couchwalker on film” premieres Monday, December 14 on Audiofemme. Read full conversation Jenny Banai had with them about the story behind the film here – https://www.audiofemme.com/jenny-bana…

Inspired, in part, and due to the limited ways live music can be shared in our current world environment, Banai envisioned a multi-medium digital concept performance to clarify “couchwalker” on another level, so as to invite viewers in as close as one can to the music and to her particular creative character.

Starring Banai, the film features long single-shot segments in a warehouse fashioned to look like a living room set, with a couch—and her interactions with said couch—as the centrepiece. She is accompanied by two dancers, who appear throughout the film and represent the emotional pulls within her humanity as she sorts through her convictions and feelings regarding relationship choices and her faith.

Pulling on her novice dance and theatre background, and audio editing skills, the creation of “couchwalker on film” both challenged and unveiled Banai’s abilities. She first edited her album down to twenty minutes of audio; a mix of full album production, lo-fi live takes and voice memos, to create an audio narrative. She then brought on film director, Matej Balaz of Colla Films and choreographers and dancers, Joanna Anderson and Kezia Rosen, as her collaborating partners on the project.

Over weeks of meetings, a handful of rehearsals and two postponements, couchwalker on film became the intricate and nuanced piece that it is. Expressing the wrestling match between the conscious and subconscious, reason and intuition, convictions and feelings, Banai invites the viewer into a world where moving through various emotions is both an invitation and a necessity, and how we move through them is the choice we are gifted with.

“The [Hebrew] word, the word timshel—’Thou mayest’—that gives choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open”
– Lee (Character in John Steinbeck’s “East of Eden”).

Credits:

Concept and creation by Jenny Banai and her collabs: Matej Balaz, Joanna Noelle, and Kezia Rosen
Directed by Jenny Banai and Matej Balaz
Produced by Colla Films
Cinematography: Nate J Slaco
Editing: Daša Netíková and Matej Balaz
Choreography: Joanna Anderson and Kezia Rosen
Costume Design: Jenny Banai, Joanna Anderson and Kezia Rosen
Artistic Direction: Camille Candia
Music: Jenny Banai
Live Take Edits: Scott Currie
Production Assistant: Michal Slako

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
We thank Creative BC for their Showcase grant helping us out during the strangest of times for artists (and all people of course!).

website: https://jennybanai.com
spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/3dUsj…
instagram: https://instagram.com/jennybanai
facebook: https://facebook.com/jenny.banai
bandcamp: https://jennybanai.bandcamp.com
twitter: https://twitter.com/BanaiJenny
soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/jennybanai

How to (Safely) Shoot Your Indie Film During a Pandemic

Have you been chomping at the bit to get cameras rolling on your next film project, but feel bogged down by isolation and public health guidelines?

CineVic presents How to (Safely) Shoot Your Indie Film During a Pandemic — an informative panel of local Victoria talent who have tackled the challenge of film production during Covid-19 restrictions over the past several months. Five experienced filmmakers will divulge the trials and tribulations of managing a distanced cast and crew without sacrificing the quality of your cinematic storytelling. They’ll also give some hot tips on how to follow protocols and resources published by WorksafeBC, ActSafe, DOC, CreativeBC, and others (hint: it’s more than masks, sanitizer, and six feet of space!)

Wednesday January 20th 2021 @ 7:00pm on Zoom

FREE for CineVic Members
(Email us at office@cinevic.ca to get the Zoom link)

$25 for Non-Members
(Register on Eventbrite – the Zoom link will be sent in your ticket confirmation email)

Meet our panelists:

Tamara Tulloch is currently serving as a Covid Compliance Officer/Health and Safety Supervisor for Air Bud Entertainment and Lighthouse Pictures inc. With 10 years as a set medic/craft service and the last 4 years as a paramedic and dispatcher for BC Ambulance – being able to tap into “insider knowledge” in the early days was vital to understanding the path and transmission of this virus in our midst. With an extensive education background in OH&S, in May 2020 she was asked to be at the forefront of covid protocol creation and implementation for the film/television/performance art industry and by late June was boots on the ground building Compliance and Enforcement teams all over the province. She is currently completing her 17th show in the Covid Era as lead for Covid Health and Safety with 3 more productions trained, crewed and beginning in the next month.

Libby Kaul has been involved in the indie film scene on Vancouver Island since 2016. She has a background in corporate administration and education but was drawn to the intense team environment of a working film crew while chaperoning her son to film sets in Vancouver and Los Angeles. She produced her first UBCP Ultra Low Budget short MIA in 2017 which won an Award of Distinction at the Canada Short Film Festival. She also produced Bump in the Night which debuted at the Telluride Horror Show in 2019. ​Libby was Location Manager for the short film version of All-In Madonna and worked as Second Assistant Director on the feature film Open for Submissions. During the pandemic, Libby has been advising on Covid Safety Plans and monitoring on-set regulations on local indie film productions.

Lukas Hanulak is a writer and director for film & television based in Victoria, BC. He was born in former Czechoslovakia, where his longtime passion for visual and emotional storytelling began, and where he has directed a dozen crime/drama series for major film and TV producers. As a writer, he co-created the award-winning film The Good Death, a story about voluntary assisted dying, that aired on many worldwide TV markets. He is a member of the Directors Guild of Canada, and his first Canadian production – the short film Empty Spaces – was made in December 2020, right in the middle of the pandemic.

Joyce Kline is a 2017 Leo Award winning Production Designer with a passion for visual storytelling. Formally trained as a visual artist, she draws on wide-ranging experience as a writer, playwright, dancer, home stager, theatre designer and storyboard artist. Joyce has exhibited across Canada and in Finland, had theatre pieces produced and workshopped in Victoria, Vancouver, and Toronto, received Ontario, Toronto and Canada Council visual arts grants, danced in Canada, England and France and taught drawing and visual narrative at Victoria College of Art. Her short film Cancelled Stamp, which she wrote, directed and co-produced in the midst of the pandemic, is currently in post production.

Justus Lowry was born to independent filmmakers and grew up exposed to cinema and making videos. After a Computer Animation program at The Centre For Digital Imaging and Sound (now the Art Institute of Burnaby), he spent half a decade doing freelance graphic design and photography before starting his own freelance media company in 2007, producing websites, advertisements, music videos, corporate videos, and TV commercials. Since then, he’s produced a variety of short culinary documentaries and two short documentaries about cacao. In early 2020 the international production of his first feature film about the chocolate industry was interrupted due to the pandemic, but he pushed through and the project is currently in post-production.

Feature Documentary “4 Dancers’ Dreams” Directed/Produced/Narrated/Lyrics by Nancy J Lilley

4 Dancers’ Dreams is a Canadian Feature Documentary that is an inspiring story of 4 dancers’ dreams to go professional and the trials and tribulations it takes to get there. It not only teaches all about the dance world , it wows, entertains and inspires with spectacular dancing, while telling the intimate stories of these 4 friends. It was shot over 2 years as it followed these girls in their last year of dance school and where they ended up after graduation. We are taken into the rehearsals, around BC in local competitions, as well as Seattle, WA. at the Semi-Finals of the Youth America Grand Prix and Germany for the World Tap competition by the International Dance Organization. Principal photography of the film started in the fall of 2015 and was completed in June of 2017 with a re-edit done in 2020. In August, 2017 it had it’s World Premiere in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA and travelled all over North America and Europe including Italy and Spain in the film festival circuit of 2018/2019. It won many awards including Best Documentary Feature, Best Director, Editing, Narration, Cinematography, Ensemble Cast, a Scientific and Educational award and a Rising Star Award from the 2019 Canada International Film Festival. There is a lot of wonderful music to go along with the tap, ballet, lyrical, contemporary, hip hop, musical theatre dancing including 3 original songs written for the film.

As of November 8, 2020 “4 Dancers’ Dreams” will be streaming on Amazon Prime for one year in Canada and the USA only.

Blue Frog Virtually Live – Jim Byrnes Band

Blue Frog Studios is proud to host a special concert with JUNO AWARD winner JIM BYRNES and his stellar band. Jim’s evocative, smoky vocals and gutsy blues guitar weave together to create a unique sound that has all but vanished from today’s world.

Jim Byrnes needs no introduction. From his first professional gig in 1964, over the years, he has had the great good fortune to appear with a virtual who’s who of the blues such as Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Taj Mahal and Robert Cray.

Jim Byrnes’ fame as an actor has grown immeasurably from his too-numerous-to-mention TV and movie roles, highlights including television’s Wiseguy and Highlander series and his national variety show, The Jim Byrnes Show. Jim’s first love, however, is the Blues.

Be part of this extraordinary opportunity to experience a virtual concert and watch from your home.

Blue Frog Virtually Live – Jim Byrnes Band

Blue Frog Studios is proud to host a special concert with JUNO AWARD winner JIM BYRNES and his stellar band. Jim’s evocative, smoky vocals and gutsy blues guitar weave together to create a unique sound that has all but vanished from today’s world.

Jim Byrnes needs no introduction. From his first professional gig in 1964, over the years, he has had the great good fortune to appear with a virtual who’s who of the blues such as Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Taj Mahal and Robert Cray.

Jim Byrnes’ fame as an actor has grown immeasurably from his too-numerous-to-mention TV and movie roles, highlights including television’s Wiseguy and Highlander series and his national variety show, The Jim Byrnes Show. Jim’s first love, however, is the Blues.

Be part of this extraordinary opportunity to experience a virtual concert and watch from your home.

SIGGRAPH Now: Procedural Approach to Animation-Driven Effects for “Avengers: Endgame”

On Wednesday, 13 May, join us for a complimentary webinar covering the SIGGRAPH 2019 Talk, “Procedural Approach to Animation-Driven Effects for ‘Avengers: Endgame’” followed by live Q&A with the presenters.

Weta Digital’s Gerardo Aguilera (FX supervisor) and Tobias Mack (software engineer) will take a deep dive into the workflow for delivering real-time FX elements to animation in an omni-directional way and discuss their procedural approach to solving some of the challenges around “AnimFX.”

Marie Clements’ RED SNOW film premieres on Apple TV

Marie Clements’ award-winning narrative feature debut RED SNOW will be available for streaming and download on Apple TV beginning May 15th. Following its World Premiere screening at the Vancouver International Film Festival, a screening at the ImagineNATIVE Festival in Toronto, a robust global festival tour which continued into 2020, and a limited theatrical run, RED SNOW will now be available to viewers at home across the country.

Filmed on location in Canada’s Northwest Territories (Yellowknife and Dettah) and the desert interior region of British Columbia (the Ashcroft Band Lands, Cache Creek and Kamloops), RED SNOW is the powerful story of Dylan, a Gwich’in soldier from the Canadian Arctic, who is caught in an ambush in Panjwayi, Afghanistan. His capture and interrogation by a Taliban Commander release a cache of memories connected to the love and death of his Inuit cousin, Asana, and binds him closer to a Pashtun family as they escape across treacherous landscapes and through a blizzard that becomes their key to survival.

Featuring the talents of Tantoo Cardinal, Asivak Koostachin, Mozhdah Jamalzadah, Samuel Marty, Miika Bryce Whiskeyjack, Ishaan Vasdev, Shafin Karim and Kane Mahon, RED SNOW was shot in four languages including Gwich’in, Inuvialuktun, Pashto and English.

The Far North meets the Middle East in a journey of loss and rebirth that lays bare the land, blood ties, and two ancient cultures that collide to re-imagine a future born of 10,000 words for snow.

RED SNOW is written and directed by acclaimed Métis playwright, director, producer, and screenwriter, Marie Clements. Clements’ credits include the documentary feature The Road Forward, Looking at Edward Curtis and her fifteen plays, including The Unnatural and Accidental Women, have been presented on some of the most prestigious stages in the world, garnering numerous awards, including the 2004 Canada-Japan Literary Award and two prestigious Governor General’s Literary Award nominations.

RED SNOW has won numerous awards including Best Screenplay, Best Feature and Best Director at VIWFF, Most Popular Canadian Dramatic Feature at VIFF, Winner Best Canadian Feature Drama at EIFF and many more nominations at international festivals including LA Skins, American Indian Film Festival, the DGC and 10 Leo Award nominations.

RED SNOW was made possible with the support of CBC Films, Canada Media Fund, Telefilm Canada, the Women In the Director’s Chair Feature Film Award, Harold Greenberg Fund, APTN, Creative BC, the Canada Media Fund, APTN, the Harold Greenberg Fund, Creative BC, Film Incentive BC, CAVCO, and the Northwest Territories Film Rebate Program.

The Wound and The Gift

You and your family are invited to join us watch a film all week long at your leisure, with the opportunity to meet the director on the weekend.

Meet the director Linda Hoaglund online
Presentation of stunning still images from filming in beautiful Hokkaido, and a moderated Q&A session.

The Wound and The Gift is a film about the animal rescue inspired by ancient Japanese fable about a wounded crane, saved by peasants, that attempts to express her gratitude with a gift – 鶴の恩返し. The fable is illustrated by Victo Ngai. The film is suitable for viewers of all ages. (83 minutes)

View trailer here – https://vimeo.com/84432440

CanFilmDay Live with Mina Shum

Featuring Sandra Oh, Jay Baruchel, Colm Feore, Ethan Hawke, Atom Egoyan, Meghan Follows, Mina Shum, Philippe Falardeau, Don McKellar and many more. Hosted by Peter Keleghan and Ali Hassan.

This year, the centrepiece of our all-online edition of National Canadian Film Day is a four-hour live-stream: CanFilmDay Live. The interactive livestream will be broadcast on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and right here on our website from 6 PM to 10 PM EDT (see below for times in your region).

Whether you’re planning to join one of our national watch parties, organizing your own watch party, or just watching a movie at home with your family, you don’t want to miss CanFilmDay Live — and the many guests who will be stopping by from their own living rooms. n addition to the filmmakers and stars, we’ll have other fun and games on the livestream, including Can-con trivia, NFB classic shorts, and even a singalong!