What's On
Bicycle Thieves
De Sica's film about a labourer desperate to track down the bike that has been stolen from him is a landmark in film history, the movie that cemented the impact of Italian neo-realism on world cinema.
Opening Night
Gena Rowlands plays aging stage actress Myrtle Gordon in this self-reflexive ghost story by John Cassavetes.
Finding Dory
By popular demand: Finding Dory is swimming your way to VIFF Kids Club! Our favorite forgetful blue tang sets out to reunite with her family. With Nemo, Marlin and friends, Dory dives back into the underwater world we all love, discovering the true meaning of belonging. Rated: G
Image: © Disney Pixar 2016
Love Streams
The last movie Gena Rowlands and John Cassavetes made together is an eccentrically beautiful, painful piece about a writer (Cassavetes) broken out of his self-imposed exile by the arrival of a son he doesn't know, and a sister he hasn't seen in years.
Karaoke
When a flashy and affluent new guy moves into their apartment building as their upstairs neighbour, elderly couple Meir and Tova expect the worst. But Itsik completely bowls them over with his charm and generosity...
Another Woman
Gena Rowlands as philosophy teacher whose meticulously controlled life begins to unravel after she starts to eavesdrop on a psychotherapist's sessions.
Night on Earth
Gena Rowlands takes a cab driven by Winona Ryder in this low-key charmer from Jim Jarmusch, one of five taxi rides around the globe, each ending with a sliver of insight and understanding.
Ali: Fear Eats the Soul
RW Fassbinder's lop-sided love story (60 year old German widow and a Moroccan twenty years her junior) shines an unflattering light on social hypocrisies.
The Second Mother
Humane, humorous and critically astute, this firm festival favourite from 2015 features a wonderful performance from Regina Casé as a nanny and housekeeper in São Paolo who begins to reevaluate her life when she's reunited with her teen daughter.
The Cloud-Capped Star
Ritwik Ghatak is the unsung genius of Bengali cinema. His best known film is a a brilliantly structured melodrama about the terrible demands of poverty and family on the prospects of a young woman.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Céline Sciamma's queer costume drama -- about a painter covertly studying a young noblewoman who refuses to sit for her portrait -- was voted 30th Greatest Film Ever Made in a 2022 poll, the highest ranking film of the past decade.
