Tropicalia

Heavyweight German filmmaker von Trotta turns her attention to one of the pre-eminent thinkers of the twentieth century, Hannah Arendt, and in particular to the crucial time in 1961 when she reported on the trial of Nazi Adolf Eichmann for the New Yorker. It was Eichmann’s pathetic disavowals of the Final Solution policy he helped frame that inspired Arendt to coin her famous phrase, "the banality of evil."

"Trotta has made an extremely vivid cinematic essay, thrilling in its every minute, deeply moving in its seriousness and suitably unsettling." Elke Schmitter, Der Spiegel

"A thrilling lesson in courage." Deborah Young, Hollywood Reporter

"The best movie this critic has ever seen about the life and times of a writer." Brandon Harris, Filmmaker

Caesar Must Die

Program Running Time 76 min.

Jun 20 07:00 pm

Jun 24 07:00 pm

Jun 25 07:00 pm

Jun 27 07:00 pm

Films in Program

Caesar Must Die

(Cesare deve morire)

Directed By: Paolo Taviani, Vittorio Taviani

(Italy, 2012, 76 mins, DCP)

Filmed in a documentary style in Rome’s high security Rebibbia prison, the movie chronicles a production of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar performed by the inmates just a few miles from where the Roman emperor was assassinated. The actors are real life murderers, mafiosi and drug dealers, and their performances slip subtly between Shakespeare’s text and their own contemporary argot, blurring the lines (literally) between past and present, art and life… But complicating things even further, the Tavianis scripted everything, off-stage as well as on, so what we take for "reality" is every bit as artificial as the play itself - and just as true.

Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar” usually runs about two-and-a-half hours uncut. Italian directors Paolo and Vittorio Taviani’s tale of a prison-based production of the classic runs 74 minutes. Yet the film gets on screen not only the play’s bloody, double-dealing, hungry essence, but the redemptive potential of art […] Such is literature’s power that the cast is more at ease portraying ancient Romans than speaking as versions of themselves. Muses the man playing Julius Caesar, “To think I found this so boring in school.” Farrah Smith Nehme, New York Post

"At once ancient and dangerously new." Anthony Lane, New Yorker

Lessons for a War

Program Running Time 120 min.

Jul 07 08:00 pm

Vancity Theatre

Films in Program

AFTER EFFECTS: Lessons for a War

((Lecciones para una guerra))

Directed By: Juan Manuel Sepúlveda

(Mexico, 2012, 120 mins, Blu-ray Disc)

Between 1982 and 1996, the Ixil and Quiché people took refuge in the mountains as a last resort to save themselves from the massacres carried out by the Guatemalan Army, which took the lives of more than 200,000 indigenous people. After those fourteen years, the communities ended up settling in the northeastern part of the range, an area currently under siege due to the wealth of natural resources to be found there. Lessons for a War is a celebration of the resistance of people preparing to defend themselves against another coming war. A chant of hope of a community that will not give up.

Levon Helm: Ain't In It For My Health

Program Running Time 83 min.

Films in Program

Levon Helm: Ain't In It For My Health

Directed By: Jacob Hatley

(USA, 2010, 83 mins, Blu-ray Disc)

"For the fans left bereft by his 2012 death, it’s impossible to imagine a more exquisite, honest, and beautifully detailed documentary about the life of Levon Helm than Jacob Hatley’s Ain’t in It for My Health. This film seems as much man as it does movie, capturing the many sides of The Band’s former drummer: his modesty, his humor, his anger about how his group fell apart. And, without getting all gooey, the doc shows how Helm handled the cancer that hovered over his final decade. Finally, this unassuming little flick makes a sham out of drugs-a-go-go melodramatic crap like Walk the Line—maybe because Hatley never forgets he’s making a movie about a goddamn musician. This is one of the most fully rounded, unsentimental portraits of an artist you’ll ever see on film." Peter Gesternzang, Village Voice

Crulic - The Path to Beyond

Program Running Time 73 min.

Films in Program

Crulic - The Path to Beyond

Directed By: Anca Damian

(Romania, Poland, 2011, 73 mins, Digital Betacam)

When Claudiu Crulic, a young Romanian in Poland, was arrested for a crime he didn’t commit, he became a pawn in a Kafkaesque miscarriage of justice and went on a hunger strike to protest his treatment in jail. Anca Damian’s documentary is by turns chilling and heartbreaking, and also ironic, with black humour forcing through.

Crulic himself “narrates” the film posthumously, his words voiced by Vlad Ivanov, star of such Romanian New Wave titles as Police, Adjective and 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days—but what makes this extraordinary documentary even more compelling is its strong visual style: Damian uses handdrawn, cutout, and collage animation techniques to create a strikingly memorable film

"Technically a documentary, this brilliant medley of animation and cutouts, with slivers of live action tossed in, is creative interpretation at its most sublime. Crulic has a distinctly Eastern European dry humor, manifest in the drawings and in the rapid, highly detailed voiceovers (mostly in Romanian, with a few observational points made in English)…. Telling a tragic true story with almost lighthearted animation techniques is a brilliant choice that pays off." Howard Feinstein, Filmmaker

"Lean, astute… the variety of animation techniques - hand-drawn, cutout, stop-motion, and collage - indelibly convey the bureaucratic horrors the young man faced." Melissa Anderson, Village Voice

"Visually stunning… Magnificent." Anja Savic, Vancouver Weekly

Round Midnight

Program Running Time 133 min.

Films in Program

Round Midnight

Directed By: Bertrand Tavernier

(France, USA, 1986, 133 mins)

Trust the French to come up with the best bebop movie. Sax legend Dexter Gordon is mesmerizing as American horn player, Dale Turner (a thinly veiled amalgam of Bud Powell and Lester Young) trying to shake his demons in 1959 Paris, with loving help from a local fan and his young daughter. Plagued by years of alcoholism and drug use, knowing the end is near; he plays every note of his memories and battles with dignity and wisdom, and then returns home to New York. The forlorn music includes early work of Monk and Bird, the standards of Gershwin and Porter. Gordon’s contribution aside, Herbie Hancock is on piano and others such as Freddie Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson, Ron Carter and Billy Higgins all figure, with Lonette McKee on vocals. Hancock, who a star attraction at this year’s TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival, also composed the film’s beautiful score.

"This movie teaches you everything about jazz that you really need to know… It is about a few months in a man’s life, and about his music. It has more jazz in it than any other fiction film ever made, and it is probably better jazz; it makes its best points with music, not words.." Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

Blood Pressure

Program Running Time 94 min.

Jun 28 08:40 pm

Jun 29 06:45 pm

Jun 30 08:40 pm

Jul 01 06:30 pm

Jul 03 06:30 pm

Jul 04 08:40 pm

Films in Program

Blood Pressure

Directed By: Sean Garrity

(Canada, 2012, 94 mins, DCP)

Opening Night supported by First Weekend Club. Come early to enjoy a reception, Siobhan Devine's Vancouver-made short film OMG (starring Gabrille Rose and Matreya Fedor, and a post screening Q&A with director Sean Garrity.

At 41, Nicole is at a point in her life when she is asking is this all there is - or whether she still has more to offer? One day she gets a letter from an anonymous observer who seems to know her daily habits intimately. More than that - he seems to intuit a potential Nicole herself has buried deep inside. He has a plan for her, if she is interested… And so begins a dance that is by turns adventurous, romantic, erotic, reckless and potentially disastrous.

“The plot will creep under your skin and raise your pulse.”

Chris Knight, The National Post

"Tightly crafted… very gripping with a fabulous performance by Michelle Giroux." Brian D Johnson, City TV

“Garrity fashions something tense, steely, and affecting out of a premise that might’ve yielded an erotic fantasy if the events here weren’t so rooted.” Jason Anderson, The Grid

Pieta

Program Running Time 104 min.

Films in Program

Blood Pressure

(2012, 94 mins, DCP)

Director:

CAST Michelle Giroux, Judah Katz, Tatiana Maslany, Jonas Chernick, Jake Epstein

Program: Blood Pressure

Jun 28 08:40 pm

Jun 29 06:45 pm

Jun 30 08:40 pm

Jul 01 06:30 pm

Jul 03 06:30 pm

Jul 04 08:40 pm

Opening Night supported by First Weekend Club. Come early to enjoy a reception, Siobhan Devine's Vancouver-made short film OMG (starring Gabrille Rose and Matreya Fedor, and a post screening Q&A with director Sean Garrity.

Nicole (Michelle Giroux) is a pharmacist with a husband and two teenage kids. At 41 she is at a point in her life when she is asking is this all there is - or whether she still has more to offer?

One day she gets a letter from an anonymous observer who seems to know her daily habits intimately. More than that - he seems to intuit a potential Nicole herself has buried deep inside. He has a plan for her, if she is interested. The letter contains a green card that she should place in her window if she wishes to pursue the mysterious relationship. Hesitantly, she does so. And so begins a dance that is by turns adventurous, romantic, erotic, reckless and potentially disastrous.

This spine-tingling thriller from My Awkward Sexual Adventure director Sean Garrity has a craft and assurance more often associated with classy French drama than low budget English Canadian productions. Michelle Giroux gives one of the year’s outstanding performances as a middle-aged woman discovering untold layers within herself.

“The plot will creep under your skin and raise your pulse.”

Chris Knight, The National Post

"Tightly crafted… very gripping with a fabulous performance by Michelle Giroux." Brian D Johnson, City TV

“Garrity fashions something tense, steely, and affecting out of a premise that might’ve yielded an erotic fantasy if the events here weren’t so rooted.” Jason Anderson, The Grid

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Tropicalia

Films in Program

Hannah Arendt

Films in Program

Caesar Must Die

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Lessons for a War

Films in Program

Levon Helm: Ain't In It For My Health

Films in Program

Crulic - The Path to Beyond

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Films in Program

Round Midnight

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Films in Program

Blood Pressure

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Films in Program

Pieta

Films in Program

Blood Pressure

Program: Blood Pressure

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