A collage of photos of Christine Boyle, a community activist, and a OneCity Vancouver must-elect candidate for Vancouver City Council in our current municipal election cycle.
Earlier this week, Charlie Smith, the longtime beloved and respected editor of The Georgia Straight published an article in The Straight titled 12 noteworthy independent Council candidates running for office in the current Vancouver municipal election. One expects that Charlie did so to make some sense of this confusing election: 71 candidates will find their names listed on a non-alphabeticized, randomized ballot; when you head to the polls, you’re gonna have to sift through those 71 names, and make some sense of the jumbled mish-mash of names with which you’ll be confronted.
Independent candidates for Vancouver City Council Sarah Blyth, Rob McDowell, Erin Shum & Wade Grant, acknowledged by The Straight’s Charlie Smith as noteworthy candidates.
Charlie was just trying to help, and good on him for making the attempt to bring order into the chaos that is the 2018 Vancouver municipal election.
In respect of the randomized ballot draw, as we wrote yesterday …
This past Friday at City Hall, the City Clerk and Chief Electoral drew names out of a spinning barrel to determine the order of candidates on the newly adopted randomized ballot, as it applies to the 2018 Mayor’s, City Council, School Board and Park Board Vancouver municipal election races.
Bartender, independent & utterly unknown Council candidate Mario Franson tops the ballot. As may be seen in the graphic below, placing second on the ballot, OneCity Vancouver’s splendid candidate Christine Boyle — the single most important Council candidate to elect to City Hall in the next term of office — followed by Vancouver First’s Nycki Basra, who we know nothing about given that she left her disclosure statement blank — maybe she exists only on paper. Enquiring minds want to know a bit about you Ms. Basra, given that you’re applying to voters for an $88,000-a-year job at City Hall as a City Councillor; your résumé offers thin gruel. I’m afraid that we’re going to have to reject your application. Better luck next time.
Taking a look at the randomly organized City Councillor ballot above, there’s a goodly number of those candidates who will be elected to Vancouver City Council. Voters tends to vote by name recognition, ballot order of names, and political party, all of which leaves the NPA’s Melissa De Genova and Colleen Hardwick in good shape, as well as the Green Party’s Pete Fry, One City’s Christine Boyle, independent and top polling School Board candidate in the 2014 civic election, Penny Noble, COPE’s Anne Roberts, and current Park Board Commissioner, Catherine Evans. Four or more of these candidates are almost a lock for Council come October 20th.
For the record, we neither support, nor are we endorsing either of Colleen Hardwick or Penny Noble, who we believe would make for terrible, non-co-operative, right-of-centre City Councillors, blustery narcissists and non-progressive candidates, who have their but not our best interests at heart.
Voters generally scan the whole ballot before casting their votes. If there’s a candidate’s name in the middle of the ballot that jumps out at them (i.e., name or party recognition), a voter will generally put a check beside that candidate’s name. For the most part, though, for time immemorial, voters cast their ballot for candidates topping the list, and feeling a pang of guilt, head to the bottom of the ballot to cast their remaining votes.
This is what “the end” of the City Councillor randomized ballot looks like …
The end of the ballot sports a surfeit of well known candidates who will be elected to City Council in the 2018 Vancouver civic election. COPE’s Derrick O’Keefe is all but a lock (yippee!), as are the Green Party’s Adriane Carr and Michael Wiebe. Independents Sarah Blyth and Rob McDowell and the Coalition Party’s Glen Chernen have strong name recognition, and Heather Deal’s chances for re-election rise astronomically by being the final name on the ballot — a necessary vote for Heather will mean preservation of institutional memory, which will be sorely lacking on the next Council.
Candidates at the top of the ballot, and candidates at the bottom of the ballot have to be feeling pretty darn good about their chances for election this next four year term to Vancouver City Council.
Candidates whose names appear in the middle of the ballot (#36, active transportation advocate Tanya Paz; #40 Sarah Kirby-Yung, a current Park Board Commissioner, who we believe is a must, must-elect; and #45, anti-poverty activist, Jean Swanson — although she’s got good name recognition) have to be feeling that there names will get lost amidst the morass that is the 2018 Vancouver civic election randomized ballot.
Voters have only 33 names to consider on each of the randomized School Board and Park Board ballots — but you have to figure that wading through 158 names on this year’s oversized election ballot when considering who to vote for at the polling station will prove to be a significant concern to many voters. Perhaps by the time most voters get to the School Board and Park Board ballots, they’ll either leave those ballots blank, or cast their votes hither, thither and yon. We continue to believe, as well, that in 2018, we’ll experience a record low turnout among voters — only time will tell, though.
As Winnie the Pooh would say, “What to do? What to do?”
In order to make sense of the mishegas that is the 2018 Vancouver municipal election, you’ll want to make some sense of what’s going on.
You can certainly do that by returning to VanRamblings each day for the next 24 days — you can read what we write, or read between the lines. Christopher Porter is doing a pretty fine job of covering the election over at Canadian Veggie. Ian Bushfield, Patrick Meehan and Matthew Naylor, of this election’s indispensable Cambie Report blog, are doing a pretty darn fine job of covering the election with some of this civic election’s most pointed, poignant and informed repartée on the podcasts you’ll find on their site.
Charlie Smith at The Straight continues to do a bang up job of covering our current municipal election, as does Frances Bula at the Globe and Mail, Jen St. Denis at the Star Vancouver, Dan Fumano at Postmedia (the Vancouver Sun and The Province); and Mike Howell, Allen Garr and my friend and civic affairs columnist, Mike Klassen at the Vancouver Courier.
Stephen Quinn, on CBC’s Early Edition, is providing some of the best municipal election coverage you’ll find anywhere. A must listen. If you miss Stephen’s interviews and commentary live, you can always subscribe to the podcast (as VanRambling does), or listen online to the very same podcasts.
You’ll also want to attend as many all-candidates meetings as you can make it to, which is the most fun you can have with your clothes on. We’re updating our DEFINITIVE upcoming candidate forum and townhall listings daily. Today we’ve added a Science & Policy Integration forum, an Arts Alliance of BC townhall, a new Mayoral debate scheduled for next Monday in Mount Pleasant, and a must-attend Women Candidate Civic Election Forum.
To access the listings, all you have to do is click on the link directly below.
This past Friday at City Hall, the City Clerk and Chief Electoral drew names out of a spinning barrel to determine the order of candidates on the newly adopted randomized ballot, as it applies to the 2018 Mayor’s, City Council, School Board and Park Board Vancouver municipal election races.
The person you see at the top of today’s column is Jason Lamarche, a 2011 Vancouver Non-Partisan Association candidate for City Council who drew the ire and indignation of voters, women voters in particular, for a “Date Matrix” blog post that he posted prior to the outset of the civic election, that rated the women in his life based on 15 categories, including skills in the bedroom and pulchritude, a humourous endeavour he told his party, his NPA colleagues and the press, when asked about it. No one bought it.
Despairingly, for a beleaguered Mr. Lamarche, he came in dead last among his NPA peers on election night. Too bad, so sad. No political career for him.
Why is VanRamblings boring you with details of Mr. Lamarche’s sordid and inglorious history in Vancouver civic election politics?
Well, dear and constant reader: the aforementioned Mr. Lamarche’s name was drawn first in the Mayoral draw sweepstakes, which means that his name — despite his none-too-flattering Hitler moustache, and menacing, vacant-eyed serial killer look — will appear atop the Mayoral electoral ballot, a prospect that is guaranteed to garner him more votes than would otherwise have been the case were the ballot alphabetical, as per usual.
Mr. Lamarche may be laughing. The rest of us, particularly those of us who care about democracy, and the electoral process, not so much.
There are only 21 names on the Mayoral electoral ballot, and 15 of those named will be lucky to garner a thousands votes. Alphabetically, the six serious candidates for the Mayor’s chair in Vancouver are …
BREMNER, Hector. Yes Vancouver’s Hector Bremner, currently polling at 5%, according to internal party polling conducted by various of the campaigns, enmashed as he is in scandal, arising from an $85,000 expenditure by developer Peter Wall on billboards extolling Mr. Bremner’s “affordable housing plan”, and his purported association with a dark, mud-slinging third party electoral group called Vancouverites for Affordable Housing. Given the various controversies in which he’s found himself involved and the consequent bad press, and given the poor reception he’s received at various of the Mayoral election townhalls, Mr. Bremner’s nascent Mayoral campaign would appear to be over, even before it was given an opportunity to get itself effectively underway.
CHEN, David. The Mayoral candidate for an under-the-radar novice political party, Pro Vancouver, Mr. Chen’s standing in the polls has recently plummeted to 3% given his confusing message and inept candidates (save, perhaps, Raza Mirza), which means he’s no longer a factor in the 2018 Vancouver municipal election race. We will afford Mr. Chen the attention his campaign deserves: which is exactly none.
HARDING, Fred. The Mayoral candidate for Jesse Johl’s perennial far right-of-centre civic party, Vancouver First. Mr. Harding, for all his bluster, is also polling at 3%, which means he’s not a factor in the 2018 Vancouver Mayoral race, and therefore undeserving of our attention.
SIM, Ken. The novice Mayoral candidate with the powerhouse right-of-centre Vancouver Non-Partisan Association legacy civic party, which held power at City Hall for all but 17 years since the party’s founding in 1937 “to fight the socialist hordes.” The NPA is a well-oiled, well-funded political machine — even given the restrictive electoral finance legislation brought in by our current New Democrat provincial government. The NPA is currently polling at 26% according to insider party polling — less than would otherwise be the case were other right-of centre parties (Coalition Vancouver, Vancouver First, Yes Vancouver) not muddying the right-of-centre waters. The NPA is running nine candidates for Council, the party’s two best (and most deserving) prospects: current Park Board Commissioner Sarah Kirby-Yung, who is a must-elect, and all things being equal, the indefatigable Melissa De Genova — perhaps the most tireless and effective campaigner in the city (Ms. De Genova was telling VanRamblings on Sunday that for her the most difficult part of this year’s campaign for office is being away from her baby).
Maybe prospects for the spoiler right-of-centre parties will fade, and the right-wing will get behind Ken Sim & his Vancouver Non-Partisan Association. We think prospects for that outcome are slim, at best. But you never know — Ken Sim could sweep into office, along with a coterie of his Council candidates, and …
STEWART, Kennedy. The smart money is on Kennedy Stewart, the recently retired NDP Member of Parliament and 15-year resident of Vancouver, to become Vancouver’s next Mayor. When Vision Vancouver Mayoral candidate Ian Campbell pulled out of the race, the lion’s share of his support went to the affable and nominally left-of-centre Mr. Stewart.
Labour is fully on board with Kennedy Stewart’s candidacy — that means all 50,000+ Union members who live in the city of Vancouver — as are significant factions within both the provincial and federal New Democratic Party. Mr. Stewart’s campaign is well-funded, and his campaign machine well-oiled. In the main, Vancouver voters tend to vote progressive. Mr. Stewart appears far from scary in his various campaign pronouncements, and if voters are looking for a reliable stand-up guy who is the antithesis of Donald Trump, or the Trump-like conservatives running for office with the right-of-centre parties, Kennedy Stewart is definitely their guy.
For VanRamblings, the best part of Mr. Kennedy’s campaign for the Mayoralty is his loud & proud willingness to build a team of progressives around him: for instance, OneCity Vancouver’s must, must-elect City Council candidate, Christine Boyle (who we love — based solely on her platform, and utterly winning presentation of self), by far our favourite candidate for civic office in the 2018 Vancouver municipal campaign, and someone we absolutely guarantee you will become smitten with (smitten being the operative word of the day, which is the word anyone who speaks of the accomplished Ms. Boyle employs, as the progressive, utterly transcendent difference-maker candidate in this election, who every other civic candidate is politically smitten with, as well).
Christine Boyle who won’t let you down. We absolutely guarantee it.
Now, Kennedy Stewart and Christine Boyle are going to need a team around them if they’re going to effectively and pro-actively address the issues of importance to all of us: affordable housing, responsible environmental stewardship, transit, and the social issues of importance: women’s equity, the living wage campaign, reconciliation with our indigenous peoples, the important issues surrounding our gender variant and LGBTQ2+ communities, fighting poverty and ensuring all the children in our city are well-fed when they start their school day.
Who are the progressive candidates who comprise Kennedy Stewart and Christine Boyle’s team of action-oriented community activists?
Pete Fry, the Green Party. Another must, must, must-elect, the city builder, the neighbourhood activist, the focused and friendly guy who’ll make a difference for the better in your life. Again, we absolutely guarantee it. Anyone and everyone who knows Pete, who has worked with Pete, is just as smitten with him as they are with Christine Boyle. Because folks like Christine and Pete, they’re utterly selfless and absolutely brilliant people, community activists who mean to make a difference, and will make a difference, in your life and your family’s life, and the lives of all your neighbours and friends and colleagues. Christine and Pete are civic treasures, once-in-a-lifetime folks who if we’re very, very lucky, and really smart, we’ll elect overwhelmingly to City Council on Saturday, October 20th.
Derrick O’Keefe. Yep, Christine Boyle and Pete Fry are absolutely in love with Derrick O’Keefe — and why wouldn’t they be? Christine and Pete know that Derrick O’Keefe will become the most beloved, and kinda cantankerous for us, political figure of change for the better in our city since Harry Rankin. You’ve read all this press on the new, beloved socialist candidates (because, you know what, they’re bright and principled and on our side) in the U.S.: New York’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Seattle’s Kshama Sawant, Tallahassee mayor and Florida gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum, Massachusetts Democrat Ayanna Pressley, Philadelphia’s Elizabeth Fiedler. That’s Derrick O’Keefe, a member of the family and Christine and Pete’s staunch ally.
Now, Christine, Derrick, Pete and Kennedy are going to need to fill out their slate of change for the better progressives: that means, two-term City Councillor Adriane Carr and her Green Party colleagues Michael Wiebe and David Wong; Christine’s Boyle’s OneCity colleague Brandon Yan, and Derrick’s COPE running mates, Jean Swanson and Anne Roberts. And let’s not forget Vision Vancouver’s Catherine Evans and Heather Deal, two must-elects, whether you believe it or not.
SYLVESTER, SHAUNA. If there were a God in the heavens watching over us, the single most articulate, the single brightest, the only Mayoral candidate with an effective action plan on: affordable housing, transit, climate change, diversity, women’s equity, parks and recreation, the arts, breaking down anomie and isolation in our city, enhancing neighbourhood involvement in determining development and the livability of Vancouver’s distinct communities … well, that’s Shauna Sylvester in spades. Maybe there is a God in the heavens, and she will appear on Sunday, October 14th at Christ Church Cathedral for the pivotal, all-important Cathedral Mayoral debate, and there will emerge such a groundswell of support for Shauna Sylvester as Mayor that on October 20th, she will be carried into office. We certainly hope so.
YOUNG, WAI. A strong campaigner, good on her feet, a compelling verging on charismatic speaker, Ms. Young’s time in Parliament has prepared her we
ll for the exigencies of running for Mayor in the 2018 Vancouver civic election. Running on a platform of cleaning up City Hall, dismantling the bike lanes along West 10th Avenue outside VGH and on the Cambie Street bridge, and moving or eliminating the Adanac bike corridor, and her consultative neighbourhood development plan (“Putting power back in the hands of the people”) has a populist ring to it that probably resonates with many voters — as a consequence, Wai Young is polling at 8%, not enough to become Vancouver’s next Mayor. Coalition Party insiders have told VanRamblings that Ms. Young is counting on NPA Mayoral candidate Ken Sim’s support collapsing the closer we get to election day, thus creating path for her to sweep into office. We’ll see.
The non-alphabetical, randomized Mayoral electoral ballot. 21 names on the ballot. Compared to the 71-name City Council randomized ballot, the Mayoral randomized ballot will be a cakewalk for voters.
You see who the serious candidates are above. Vote for the city you want, vote for the city you need, vote for the city we all need.
The homophobic and anti-SOGI (Sexual Indentification and Gender Identity) forces of hatred have emerged as a malevolent and troubling force in the 2018 civic election process across British Columbia.
On Sunday afternoon, former Vancouver School Board Chairperson and current Georgia Straight education columnist, Patti Bacchus, attempted to attend a public meeting of the Parent’s Heart reactionary activist group.
According to their own website, this is what those persons who are members of Parent’s Heart are fighting against, a policy that mandates …
Schools must clearly define what are the appropriate criteria, words, actions and actions to prevent discrimination and nuisance. If there are any complaints based on sexual orientation or gender identity or gender, the school should ensure that policies and procedures are adopted. Strict, rapid and effective methods (must be implemented) to deal with incidences of discrimation. Negative behaviors, comments, manners, contacts, etc. are all classified as discrimination.
The school council (sic) must educate all campus members (including staff, students, parents, guardians) to prevent discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity or gender expression; the school council must support schools and faculty members to place positive opinions (ed. note. materials?) in the library. The Bureau of Education (ed. note. huh?) should support the appropriate activities that promote the expression of all sexual orientations and sexual orientations, and supply resources in this regard.
The school council must support schools to join each subject with positive affirmative gender-diverse textbooks.
The school council should set up an advisory committee that includes adults and students representing the gay community to enable them to play a consulting role in effectively implementing SOGI policies, including long-term training of faculty and staff, with the aim of supporting different sexual orientations and gender identity within the school district. The community promotes anti-gay fear and heterosexualism.
School committees, management and staff must participate in on-the-job workshops on homosexuality, transgender people, lead by example, establish a relationship The respect and affirmation of the sex and transgender community.
School committees, management and staff must use words that affirm all sexual orientation, without contempt and derogatory remarks.
Schools, staff, and students must be challenged by parents, staff, or students who are biased in different sexual orientations and transgender communities.
In Vancouver, voters will have to confront the anti-SOGI forces not just of reactionary activist groups extant in Vancouver, but through the candidacy of former NPA School Board trustees, and current Coalition Party candidates for School Board, Ken Denike (a longtime Chairperson of the Vancouver School Board, and a retired UBC Professor Emeritus), and Sophia Woo.
In a phone interview with Straight reporter Carlito Pablo, community activist, former Vancouver False Creek provincial New Democratic Party candidate and current party vice-president, and a current independent candidate for Vancouver School Board, Morgane Oger, a transgender woman and parent of two school-age children, told The Straight …
“I’m mindful of the fact that Ken Denike and Sophia Woo, who both fought hard against SOGI policies are in the same party that … is led by mayoral candidate Wai Young, and Wai Young, when she was a member of the Conservative Party, she voted against extending explicit protection against discrimination on the basis of gender identity or expression.
She voted against Bill C-279 in Parliament, so I’m a little bit horrified that in Vancouver in 2018, we have at least three candidates who actively … participated in an effort to oppress, like, me and my family and my friends, you know, people in my community.
It’s really offensive to me that people who have done this are running as candidates in 2018 in Vancouver. I think it’s shameful.”
As you can see and hear in the video recorded by Ms. Bacchus on Sunday afternoon at Burnaby’s Bonsor Recreation Complex, even given that the meeting was a public meeting held in a public community centre — which by its very nature should mean that the meeting is open to all members of the public — Parent’s Heart organizers were having none of it, blocking Ms. Bacchus’ view of the meeting’s proceedings at every opportunity.
Lest you think that it is only at secretive public meetings in Burnaby, or through the candidacy for School Board of anti-SOGI activists Ken Denike and Sophia Woo that anti-SOGI activists are active in our community, VanRamblings would advise that you to put that notion out of your head.
On Sunday, September 16th at the Fairview Baptist Church — the lifelong family church for current Vancouver Non-Partisan Association candidate for City Council, Colleen Hardwick, midway through the service, when the pastor asked members of the congregation if there was anyone members wished to pray for, a half dozen anti-SOGI activists at the back of the church — not church members, present in the church for the first time — spoke up to ask that a prayer be said “against the forces of SOGI.”
Vaguely aware what SOGI stood for and cognizant that it had something to do with education, the pastor prayed only for our education system.
After the service, VanRamblings proceeded to the back of the church to speak with the anti-SOGI activists, to query them as to why they would ask that a prayer be said against British Columbia’s SOGI curriculum. The collective response: “SOGI is against God’s will,” to which VanRamblings replied, “Who says it is against God’s will? That is not what is taught in any church, synagogue or mosque I’ve ever attended, hatred for those who find themselves on the gender variation spectrum, who may be subject to bullying. God is supposed to be about acceptance and love, not hate.”
The church’s choir master, Dr. Susan Porter, Dean and Vice-Provost of UBC Graduate and Post Doctoral Studies (who was more articulate than VanRamblings could ever hope to be, and absolutely and utterly indignant at the mid-service interference of the non church member SOGI group), spoke with the pastor about SOGI, what the acronym stood for — and a programme & curricula the two of us support and endorse unreservedly — and our disgust at the unwarranted intervention of the anti-SOGI activists.
Even in 2018 in Vancouver, prejudice, stigma and discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons resident in our communities remains an every day reality in our too often & regrettably fear-based city.
Next month, when you go to the polls, vote for the School Board trustee candidates who support diversity in our city, who not only support but have committed to working to ensure a public education system where every student is welcome and where every student will be made to feel safe.
Vote for OneCity Vancouver School Board candidates Carrie Bercic, Erica Jaaf and Jennifer Reddy, COPE’s Diana Day and Barb Parrot, the Green Party of Vancouver’s Janet Fraser, Estrellita Gonzalez & Lois Chan-Pedley, the Non-Partisan Association’s Christopher Richardson, and Vision Vancouver’s Aaron Leung, Erin Arnold and the extraordinary Allan Wong.
37th Annual Vancouver International Film Festival
Thursday, September 27th thru Friday, October 12th
The 37th annual Vancouver International Film Festival is about to fall into place, taking over cinemas across Vancouver with 300 films representing 55 countries. Running from Sept. 27th thru Oct. 12th, VIFF is best approached like a multi-country overseas vacation: with pre-planning, and lots of it.
Here are some tips for your VIFF vacation. What movies to choose?
On viff.org, you’ll find films organized by programme (e.g. Panorama, Gateway, Dragons & Tigers, B.C. Spotlight), by country of origin, by genre, or by director. See what intrigues you! Also, you’ll want to check to see which films have a guest attending (noted on each film’s individual online page), which might mean an interesting Q&A. Note should be made that the most accurate and up-to-date information about guests is online only.
You can also peruse the printed, glossy and absolutely stunningly beautiful VIFF Guide, available at Chapters & Indigo and other bookstores as well as at almost all libraries across our region, or at any one of the nine venues where films will be screened, as well as at coffee shops all across town.
As always, a number of VIFF films will be returning to theatres for regular runs post-festival, although it can be both fun and enlightening to see these films during VIFF, particularly if a guest director is presenting the film, and also because most of these snob appeal, certain future Oscar nominee “Special Presentations” will screen at the luxurious 1800-seat Centre for the Performing Arts, on Homer Street across from the Vancouver Public Library.
Here are a few of the films with post-VIFF distribution planned for VIFF 2018, with tentative release dates …
Can You Ever Forgive Me? (October 19th), director Marielle Heller’s charming melancholic comedy about real-life writer-turned-criminal Lee Israel (Melissa McCarthy, a lock guarantee for a Best Actress Oscar nomination), who forged some 400 letters by dead celebrities and pawned them off until the FBI caught up with her scheme;
Boy Erased (November 2nd). A richly humanistic, emotionally searing drama that sticks in the memory, Lucas Hedges (Manchester by the Sea) stars as Jared, the son of a Baptist pastor in a small American town, who is outed to his parents (Nicole Kidman, a lock for a Best Supporting Actress nomination, and Russell Crowe) at age 19, who send him to a a gay conversion therapy programme;
A Private War (November 16th). The story of the late journalist Marie Colvin (Rosamund Pike), one of the most celebrated war correspondents of our time, an utterly fearless and rebellious spirit, driven to the frontlines of conflicts across the globe to give voice to the voiceless;
The Front Runner (November 21st). The Closing Gala film, tracking the rise and fall of Senator Gary Hart (Hugh Jackman, a lock for a Best Actor Oscar nomination), and the role tabloid journalism played in his downfall;
The Favourite (November 23rd). Entertainment Weekly’s Chris Nashawaty says about The Favourite, “a Satyricon-era Fellini-esque tragicomedy all hopped up with enough sex, deviance, hypocrisy, decadence, and spicy profanity to make your average Masterpiece Theatre patron reach into their PBS tote bag for some smelling salts.” And, oh yes, a lock guarantee for Best Picture, and a whack of actress nominations for Rachel Weisz, Olivia Colman, and Emma Stone.
Vox Lux (December 7th). Arriving on our shores directly from the Toronto Festival Festival, powered by a riveting performance of fiercely mannered bravado by Natalie Portman (a certain Best Actress nominee), Vox Lux paints a sharp, powerfully haunting and shellacked portrait of a ghost in the celebrity machine.
Destroyer (December 25th). A second VIFF 2018 film starring Nicole Kidman, director Karyn Kusama’s latest film follows the moral and existential odyssey of LAPD detective Erin Bell (Kidman, in one of the best ever performances). The film also features spectacular work from Canadian actress, Tatiana Maslany
Award-Winning Must-See Films
Over the past month, VanRamblings has written about each of the following films in our extensive coverage of VIFF 2018; for insight & information on what films to see, we recommend you peruse our previous posts on this year’s celebrated, must-see films for the VIFF 2018 films we list below.
The VIFF 2018 films we write about below constitute the 14 Cinema of the World films VanRamblings is recommending that those attending the 37th annual Vancouver International Film Festival give serious attention to when considering the purchase of tickets for this year’s film festivals, the films we believe are rock solid films that will both move you and change your world.
You may also want to check out Shane Scott Travis’ 25 Movies You Won’t Want to Miss at VIFF 2018 column on Taste of Cinema, as well as all of the coverage of VIFF 2018 in The Georgia Straight.
This year, the award-winning, must-see films arriving on our shores from places other than Hollywood, and set to unspool at VIFF include …
Screening at the 37th annual Vancouver International Film Festival this year: acclaimed Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda’s latest, Shoplifters, which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in May, a quietly devastating portrait of family and theft in contemporary Japan, resonant, compassionate, socially conscious filmmaking with a piercing intelligence that is pure Kore-eda, and a film that stole the hearts of the Cannes jury and even the most cynical of film journalists attending Cannes this year, a film made up of delicate brushstrokes: details, moments, looks and smiles, a heartbreaker that draws our empathy, and yet another charming, funny and affecting example of Kore-eda’s very special brand of tough-but-tender humanism.
Another Cannes favourite headed to VIFF 2018, Capernaum, Lebanese filmmaker Nadine Labaki’s politically-charged fable about a child who launches a lawsuit against his parents, a staggering heart-in-mouth social-realist blockbuster teeming with sorrow, yet strewn with diamond-shards of beauty, wit and hope, at once quietly absorbing and fitfully shocking as we experience the sights, sounds and smells of the streets where a one-year-old child can wander around alone without anyone stopping to wonder why, and a film that while choosing dramatic power over narrative finesse makes a powerful statement on human misery and grotesque inequality while tackling its subject with intelligence, heart and furious compassion.
Another acclaimed film set to arrive at VIFF 2018, the much-looked-forward-to Cannes FIPRESCI Prize winner, South Korean director LEE Changdong’s Burning, starring Hollywood actor Steven Yuen (Okja, The Walking Dead). Here’s what Los Angeles Times film critic Justin Chang had to say about Burning …
At 2½ hours, Burning is a character study that morphs, with masterly patience, subtlety and nary a single wasted minute, into a teasing mystery and eventually a full-blown thriller. To reveal more would ruin the story’s slow-building pleasures, which are less about the haunting final destination than the subtle, razor-sharp microcurrents of class rage, family-inherited pain, everyday ennui and youthful despair that build in scene after scene, even when nothing more seems to be happening than a simple or not-so-simple conversation.
Defying expectations throughout, offering multiple, murky solutions to a set of mysteries wondrous in their complexity and inscrutability, Burning, with its jazzy score, gorgeously immaculate camerawork, shifting moods and carefully calibrated minimalism emerges as a genre-bending murder-mystery that torches genre clichés, in one of the most scorching and beautifully unforgettable films of the year. Yet another VIFF 2018 must-see.
The Panorama programme spans four series: Contemporary World Cinema, Spotlight on France, Vanguard, and new this year, Focus on Italy. Panorama films arrive on our shores to much critical acclaim and near rabid VIFF patron interest, so if you see a film you like, you should book your tickets for those films now, including: Jafar Panahi’s latest, 3 Faces (which is currently taking TIFF by storm); and Alice Rohrwacher’s Happy as Lazzaro, the winner of Best Screenplay at Cannes.
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There are, of course, more than 100 films from across the globe in the Contemporary World Cinema series, including The Wild Pear Tree, the latest film from Master Nuri Bilge Ceylan (2014 Cannes Palme d’Or winner for Winter Sleep); the well-reviewed new film from German director Christian Petzold, Transit; Berlin Best Actor winner Anthony Bajon in The Prayer; and pushing the boundaries of cinema, Holiday, Swedish-born director Isabella Eklöf’s viciously auspicious low-temperature, high-impact début, a sun-splashed dark tableau about a frost-bitten summer vacation gone awry.
Each of the films named above are linked to the VIFF online page, allowing you to easily purchase tickets for one of the film’s upcoming screenings.
There are only nine films in the popular Spotlight on France series this year, each exceptional and each film exploring the rich cinematic culture that continues to flourish in France, a rare opportunity for habitués of the Lower Mainland to screen this year’s finest Gallic delights from l’Hexagone.
For instance, there’s Shéhérazade, proving that VIFF films are not only for the blue rinse and grey-haired crowd. Winner of the Prix Jean Vigo for France’s best first feature of the past year, Jean-Bernard Marlin’s slice-of-life drama about young love on the mean streets of Marseille harkens back to Italian neorealism in its use of non-professional actors and gritty locations. Kenza Fortas, as the tough teen prostitute Shéhérazade, is a real find. A native Marseillais, Marlin has crafted “an ultra-realist portrait of juvenile delinquency … and a surprising and engaging love story to boot.”
Eight films from Italy, long renowned for the world’s most groundbreaking cinema, comprises the first ever VIFF Focus on Italy series, including Daughter of Mine (pictured above), about which the VIFF 2018 programme guide records …
On sun-drenched Sardinia, ten-year-old Vittoria (Sara Casu), born of alcoholic party girl Angelica (Alba Rohrwacher) but raised as her own by sensible Tina (Valeria Golino), is drawn into her birth mother’s chaotic sphere, despite having no knowledge of the truth of her situation. Says Jessica Kiang in Variety “Laura Bispuri’s sunswept, emotive, and elemental sophomore narrative film… a noble rarity… unfolds with such a barefoot sense of place that you can almost feel the Sardinian sand between your unwashed toes.”
Oscar award-winning Iranian director Asghar Farhadi’s latest drama, Everybody Knows, opened Cannes this year to much acclaim, uniting lovers and longtime married couple Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz in a suspenseful kidnapping thriller set in Spain that will have you on the edge of your seat throughout, in the most gripping and propulsive popcorn-chomping genre film of the year, sociological cinema that explores the meaning of love, bitter resentment, societal divisions, class and the secrets that bind us together and pull us apart. Gosh, sounds just like our current Vancouver civic election — and probably just as compelling, too. Let’s face it, here’s a film not to be missed at VIFF 2018 — hey, it’s Asghar Farhadi … who misses an Asghar Farhadi film? Everybody Knows screens only once at VIFF, Friday, September 28th, 9pm at The Centre for the Performing Arts.
Cold War. A passionate love story between two people of different backgrounds and temperaments, who are fatally mismatched, set against the background of the Cold War in the 1950s in Poland, Berlin, Yugoslavia and Paris, Pawel Pawlikowski not only won Best Director at Cannes this year, Cold War has emerged as the odds-on favourite to pick up the Best Foreign Language Oscar this year (Pawlikowski’s film Ida won that very same award back in 2013). Says Time Out film critic Phil de Semlyen …
The Polish filmmaker has conjured a dazzling, painful, universal odyssey through the human heart and all its strange compulsions. It could be the most achingly romantic film you’ll see this year, or just a really painful reminder of the one that got away.
Accessible, humane, compassionate, epic, dreamlike, bittersweet and unbearably lovely, tell me, are you really planning on missing Cold War? No, I didn’t think so. Lucky us, Cold War screens twice at The Centre for the Performing Arts, on Tuesday, October 2nd at 6:30pm, and Wednesday, October 10th at 6:15pm. See ya there.
Here are two more VIFF 2018 films VanRamblings heartily recommends …
Director Jia Jia Zhang-ke’s Ash is the Purest White took Cannes by storm this year, a fierce, gripping, heartbreaking film that VanRamblings wholheartedly recommends.
And let us not forget the master of Asian cinema, Zhang Yimou (Ju Dou), who this year brings Shadow, as rousing and beautifully rendered a film as you’ll see at VIFF this year, and a stunning epic re-imagining of the Wuxia third century Three Kingdoms period in Chinese history.
The easiest way to purchase tickets is to go online to viff.org. Just put the name of the film you’re interested in into the search engine (top right), and click on Buy when you reach the film’s online webpage — from there it’s easy, allowing you to print your tickets at home.
Or, you can call the Festival Infoline at 604-683-3456 from noon til 6 p.m. daily through October 12th. (Online is quicker.) Note that there is a service charge for online and phone orders: $1 per single ticket, up to $4 per order. Note. Required by the provincial government (because VIFF films screen unrated) you’ll need to purchase a one-time $2 VIFF membership.
Tickets can be purchased at the venues during operating hours. As of September 28th, all festival venues — The Vancity Theatre on Seymour just north of Davie Street; The Centre for Performing Arts, on Homer Street directly across from the Vancouver Public Library; The Cinematheque on Howe Street just north of Davie; SFU Goldcorp Theatre, at Abbott and Hastings; Cineplex International Village, at Pender and Abbott; and The Playhouse Theatre, across from the old Post Office — will have a box office open daily, one hour before the day’s first screening. What about ticket packages or passes?
A Student or Senior 5-ticket pack goes for $60.
If you’re planning to go to a few films, for regular filmgoers the Festival Six-Pack is a good deal: six tickets for $85, compared to individual ticket prices of $13 – $17.
The best deal? A $160 Weekday Matineé pass, which will allow you to see all of the films you can get to between 10am and 5:55pm Monday to Friday, which if you play your cards right oughta allow you to see up to 75 films, and near double that if you choose to attend VIFF programmer Sandy Gow’s always spectacular & moving International Shorts film programmes.
The regular Senior and Student Pass goes for $330, while the full Festival Patron Pass is available for $420. What about all those lines outside the theatres?
Each VIFF screening will have three separate queues: a pass-holder line (for those with passes hanging around their necks; you know who you are), a ticket-holders line (for those with tickets in hand) and a rush line. Standby tickets, for screenings that are sold out, go on sale 10 minutes before showtime, at full price (cash preferred).
No matter which line you’re in, arriving at least 30 minutes early (arriving an hour early is better) is a good idea, particularly if you’re picky about where you sit. (Seating is not guaranteed, even if you have a ticket or a pass, if you arrive less than 20 minutes before showtime.) What about food and drink?
Though most VIFF venues serve the usual popcorn / candy / soft-drink fare, some have a few extras (there’s beer and wine at The Rio, and wine at the Vancity, for example). Not to worry, there are a wealth of restaurants just steps from the door from most venues. Outside food and drink is officially not allowed in the theatres, but VIFF-goers have been known to get away with it; be discreet, considerate and tidy. What about bus routes and parking?
Translink / Coast Mountain buses are the best way to get downtown, where most of the venues are located. Once downtown, most of the venues are within walking distance of one another. Or, if you’re planning on seeing a film at The Rio, Skytrain will whisk you there in no time flat. There’s parking at Cineplex International Village, but you’re going to want to check in with Festival staff (they’ll be wearing bright yellow VIFF t-shirts) to register your vehicle. What about crowds?
There will be crowds, particularly at the better-known films; not a lot you can do about that. Chances are that you’ll meet some thoughtful person or people in line; it happens often. Weekday screenings generally have shorter lines, particularly for the less well-known films.
All and all, quite simply, there is just no better time that can be had at any time of the year than through attending Vancouver’s international film festival, the most humanizing, eye-opening film event of the year, providing both a sympathetic & empathetic window on our too often troubled world.
As VanRamblings has written previously, while VIFF explores the Cinema of Despair, it also presents the festival-goer with the Cinema of Hope.
Over the course of the Vancouver International Film Festival’s 16 days, your world will be rocked — and, by festival’s end, you’ll emerge a changed, and a better person for the experience. Where else could that happen, at what other première arts event during the course of the year could that occur than at the Vancouver International Film Festival, where you’ll meet new friends, engage in a collective and humanizing endeavour that will provide insight into how lives are lived in every country and every region across our globe, and help you to realize and remember, as well, that we’re all in this together, we all seek love and connection, we all cherish family, and in the best of all possible worlds, we all seek understanding, and if we are very, very lucky, by film festival’s end, together we will have successfully fought the pervasive sense of anomie that has had us in its grip arising from the rise of the politics of fear and division currently extant in our world and even in our own country.
Through attendance at our 37th annual Vancouver International Film Festival’s, the possibility exists that we may achieve the realization of the spirit of collective transcendence, and hope for a better future for all of us through activism — which by film festival’s end means you should get out to vote for the candidates who mean to bring about change for the better.
Happy VIFF’ing, and happy voting in our current municipal election. See you at the movies, and at the election polls! Change for the better is near!
Independent candidates for Vancouver City Council Sarah Blyth, Rob McDowell, Erin Shum & Wade Grant, acknowledged by The Straight’s Charlie Smith as noteworthy candidates.
