Videomatica is Vancouver’s premiere source for cinephiles, the video shop that all those who love film frequent to sate their need for international film, and a window on the world. In order to gain employment with Videomatica, job applicants are required to take a film erudition exam (see video below).
In 2006, consideration was given by the VIFF to making the Videomatica exam a part of the criteria for accepting volunteers to the 25th annual Vancouver International Film Festival. Such did not come to pass this year, but you never can tell what the future might hold. Click on the video below to see whether or not you qualify as a true, died-in-wool VIFF cinéaste.

With thanks to producer / filmmaker ‘Kino’ Klassen, and the inimitable J.B. ‘Showbiz’ Shayne, the ‘stars’ of this award-winning VIFF film short.
C’mon back tomorrow for a full VIFF posting. See you then.

The second week of the 25th annual Vancouver International Film Festival got off to a rousing start, with five more films taken in by Showbiz Shayne and Mr. Know-It-All. Having taken a brief break, we’re hard back at it …
First up: Dito Montiel’s film adaptation of his best-selling autobiography …
A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints (U.S.): A workshop production of the Sundance Institute (always a good sign), A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints is just the kind of film you want to see at the Vancouver Film Festival: no Canadian distributor in place (so, if you don’t see it at the Festival, you’re not likely to see it on a big screen at all), well-reviewed pretty much wherever it’s played south of the border, a vibrant, slice-of-life, coming-of-age saga that jumps off the screen with a raw power and intensity that is all but missing from the usual Hollywood fare. With outstanding performances throughout (most notably from Shia LaBeouf, who plays the young Dito), this brash, affecting, sometimes violent, and entirely engaging pic screens today at 4:15 p.m. and again Monday, at 8 p.m. Absolutely one to include on your Festival viewing schedule.
Candy (Australia): A wrenching, bittersweet tale of love, life and addiction, Candy grabs you from the moment the lights dim in the theatre, director Neil Armfield’s evocative depiction of the central characters’ headlong, drug-fuelled spiral into hell on earth allowing us to bear shuddering witness to the self-destruction of heroin addiction and the devastation felt by all those who come in contact with Dan and Candy. With superb performances by Heath Ledger and newcomer Abbie Cornish at the film’s centre, Candy has already screened for the last time at this year’s Festival. Maybe it’ll come back to Vancouver’s Cinemark art-house, Tinseltown Cinema.

Continue reading VIFF2006: A Day in the Life, The Weekend Edition →

While the inimitable Mr. Shayne keeps up the furious pace of four to five films a day, VanRamblings is taking a mid-Festival break, both to recover from too many late nights (and early morning hours at work the next day), and to focus on said aforementioned work, which has somehow been put to the side just a wee bit more than VanRamblings’ employers might prefer.
Just a couple of observations, then, and back to work with us.
First off, the Georgia Straight’s 2nd Film Festival review roundup came out today, and critics Mark Harris and Ken Eisner recommend …
Congorama (Belgium, Canada and France): Mark Harris describes Congorama as “independent filmmaking at its concise best,” while Jason Anderson, writing in Eye Weekly during the Toronto Film Festival, describes the film as “eccentrically endearing,” giving it three stars. Meanwhile, Variety’s Justin Cheng seems a bit more iffy, although the only way you’ll know for sure is if you attend a screening of Philippe Falardeau’s film.
La Coupure (Canada): “Dark, gruelling, and extremely convincing,” says Georgia Straight film critic / UBC professor, Mark Harris. Adam Nayman, writing in Eye Weekly, gives the film 3 stars, saying “To call La Coupure an “incest drama” would be terribly reductive — it’s intense but never lurid, utilizing up close and personal camerawork to pare its provocative subject down to recognizably human dimensions.” Meanwhile, Film Freak’s Bill Chambers just hates the film. Again, only you can be the judge.
The Elementary Particles (Germany): Whatever happened to Run Lola Run’s Franka Potente? To find out, you’ll have to attend a screening of The Elementary Particles, for which both Variety magazine and the BBC would seem to have a great deal of affection. Meanwhile, the Straight’s Ken Eisner has this to say: “A funny, tender, sexy, and overheated adaptation of a controversial late-’90s French novel.” Now, there you go: a “keeper.”

Continue reading VIFF2006: Mid-Festival Break, But Still Lots to Report →

At a screening of Dito Montiel’s A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints late last evening, while waiting for the projectionist to spool the film in preparation for the upcoming screening, Granville 7 theatre manager Ira Hannen asked the assembled audience of about 300 for a show of hands for …
Those who had attended more than 5 films. Almost everyone’s hand went up. Next: how many had attended 10 films, or more … about half the hands in the audience went up. More than 15, 20, 25, 30, 40 … and so on. The average number of films audience members had attended in the Festival’s first week was near 20, or some 3 films a day in the first six days.
This year, the Vancouver Sun is running a daily feature where dedicated film aficionados are asked why the Vancouver International Film Festival plays such an important role in their lives. For, in fact, there is a coterie of film-goers, numbering over 100, who each year plan their “vacation” — not to mention, their lives — around Vancouver’s august 17-day Film Festival.
In recent days, while waiting in the passholders line-up, VanRamblings has spoken with film-goers who have travelled to visit the VIFF — arriving from the South Pacific (“we do this every year, and have for more than 15 years”), Seattle, Los Angeles, Toronto, northern British Columbia and northern Vancouver Island, Idaho, the southern United States, western and Eastern Europe, Japan, China and Korea, Argentina and Bolivia, and even Australia and New Zealand, and other far flung provinces across the globe.
In addition, there are an equal number of veteran passholders who have taken two weeks of their annual vacation time to coincide with the VIFF, taking time off from BC Hydro, Telus, school districts (teachers who have delayed the beginning of their school year til mid-October, as VanRamblings did for years), the provincial and federal governments, Worksafe BC, Translink, their CGA firm, and more — just so they could participate in as many screenings as possible between September 28th and October 13th.
Why?

Continue reading VIFF2006: Same Planet. Different Worlds. →