Canadian Premiere
Veteran filmmaker James Ivory takes a look back at his life in this warm, engrossing documentary. Co-directed with Giles Gardner, A Cooler Climate recalls Ivory’s unfinished film about Afghanistan; those reminiscences are paired with a wider biographical summary, which takes us from his childhood in Klamath, Oregon through his beginnings as a director and his partnerships with producer Ismail Merchant and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. Shot in and around Kabul, the Afghanistan footage is notable for its air of mystery as much as for its beauty. Ivory had planned to make a documentary that followed the city’s long, winding river, and there are beautiful shots of sun reflecting off its waters mixed in with what is now a fascinating time capsule. No less engrossing are the reminiscences of small-town life, Hollywood dreams, and beginnings as a documentarian of Venice and India. Ever discreet and tasteful, Ivory discusses his sexuality honestly but without salaciousness. Ultimately, the film is a record of triumph—a moving valediction to a great career.
Series Media Partner
James Ivory
France
2022
Portraits
English
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits
Producer
Bertrand Faivre
Screenwriter
James Ivory
Editor
Giles Gardner
Original Music
Alexandre Desplat
Directors
James Ivory
James Francis Ivory (born June 7, 1928) is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. For many years, he worked extensively with film producer Ismail Merchant, his domestic as well as professional partner, and with screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. All three were principals in Merchant Ivory Productions. Ivory won awards for Best Adapted Screenplay from the Academy Awards, British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and many others. Upon winning the Oscar and BAFTA for Best Adapted Screenplay for Call Me By Your Name at the age of 89, Ivory became the oldest-ever winner in any category for both awards.
Filmography: Shakespeare Wallah (1965); A Room with A View (1985); Howard’s End (1992); The Remains of the Day (1993); The White Countess (2005)
Giles Gardner
Giles Gardner has been working with James Ivory for over twenty years. He lives in Paris where he has edited numerous award winning documentaries that regularly appear on the International Festival Circuit.
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Tokyo Godfathers
Shinjuku, Tokyo, Christmas Eve. Middle-aged has-been Gin, aging drag artist Hana, and teenage runaway Miyuki are three homeless friends who stumble across an abandoned baby and do their best to care for the infant over the course of a long and perilous night.
Auction
Inspired by a true story, writer-director Pascal Bonitzer has crafted an inquiring, witty drama about the art market. When a long-lost Egon Schiele masterpiece reemerges, art appraiser Alex is initially skeptical. And yet...
The Librarians
Dispatches from the front line of America's culture wars (and ours too): librarians speak out about the war against ideas, history, freedom of expression and sexual identity, a campaign in which an open mind is the ultimate enemy.
The Secret Agent
Having run afoul of an influential bureaucrat in Brazil’s military dictatorship circa 1977, Marcelo decamps to Recife to live under an assumed name — but he’ll soon come to understand precisely how rampant the country’s corruption has become.
Sinners
This year's unexpected box office sleeper is that rare beast, a genre movie full of bold invention and surprise. We are in Mississippi in the early 1930s, and the opening of a new blues joint on the edge of town is the signal for all hell to break out.