Canadian Premiere
A dazzling whirlwind, Apolonia Sokol seemingly lives an enchanted life: as the daughter of actor parents, she is surrounded by poets, artists, and intellectuals, and lives in a vast Parisian building home to an experimental theatre company. She puts on plays, hosts dinner parties for bohemians, and opens her dilapidated home to exiled Ukranian feminist activists. Apolonia is charming, captivating, and is the center of her social circle, switching effortlessly between French, English, Danish and Polish. She also happens to be an immensely talented artist with singular vision and drive.
Filming over 13 years, director Lea Glob follows the young French painter and chronicles her intense struggles to succeed in the patriarchal and capitalist art world. Apolonia, Apolonia is joyful, inspiring, and intimate; it is a portrait of the vibrant, charismatic force that is Apolonia, but is also a remarkable document of the friendship and creative interplay between the filmmaker and her subject.
The absorbingly intimate portrait of an artist as a young woman over the transformative span of 13 years.
Screen International
Presented by
Series Media Partner
Community Partner
Apolonia Sokol, Oksana Shachko, Lea Glob
Denmark/Poland
2023
Portraits
In Danish, English, French with English subtitles
Self Harm, Suicide
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Credits
Producer
Sidsel Siersted
Cinematography
Lea Glob
Editor
Andreas Bøggild Monies,Thor Ochsnerb
Original Music
Jonas Struck
Director
Lea Glob
Lea Glob was born in Mariager, Denmark. Her debut documentary, Olmo & The Seagull (2015), was co-directed alongside Petra Costa. The film won the Young Jury Prize at Locarno, as well as Best Nordic Dox at CPH:DOX. Afterwards, Glob co-directed Venus (2016) with Mette Carla Albrechtsen. The film premiered in IDFA’s First Appearance Competition and won the audience award in IndieLisboa IIFF. Apolonia, Apolonia (2023) is the director’s first documentary feature as a solo-director.
Filmography: Olmo & The Seagull (2015); Venus (2016)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Digital Colour Grading: Amelie
Digital color grading tools have vastly expanded the possibilities in how filmmakers manipulate color palettes, and the look of films and video have changed rapidly as a result. We'll look at the early days of this technology with Amelie.
Singing Back the Buffalo
Driven to the point of extinction in the 19th century, the buffalo is proving more resilient than once feared. Tasha Hubbard's rhapsodic doc weaves personal reflection, animated tales, observational reportage and gorgeous nature footage.
His Three Daughters
Three sisters -- Carrie Coon, Elizabeth Olson, and Natasha Lyonne -- congregate to attend the final few days of their father's life. They bring with them years of barely-repressed jealousy and resentment, as well as wildly different personalities.
Girls Will Be Girls
A prize-winner at Sundance, Shuchi Talati’s sensitive debut feature is an unusual coming-of-age drama for its nuanced and sympathetic portrait of mother-daughter dynamics in a sexually repressive culture; it doesn’t go where you expect.