Skip to main content
Caiti Blues film image

Caiti Blues

This event has passed

Madrid, New Mexico, population 276. Here, in this deserted mining town, 29-year-old Caiti Lord works at a bar to make ends meet, hosts a radio show on the side, and faces the existential ennui of a struggling singer-songwriter. An engaging, tender documentary of a talented artist whose childhood aspirations seem to have led nowhere, Caiti Blues is an intimate portrait of a woman at a crossroads in her life. An insightful examination of small town America, where there is little economic viability and the future is uncertain, this is a poignant piece, punctuated by moments of incandescent joy, and filled with incredible songs. Director Justine Harbonnier creates a beautifully observed film, and through impressive cinematography and camera work captures the quiet rhythms of the eccentric mining town. Winner of the DCG Special Jury Prize at Hot Docs.

 

Series Media Partner

Director
Credits
Country of Origin

Canada/France

Year

2023

Series

Portraits

Language

English

Film Contact
Links
18+
84 min
Art, Music & Photography Documentary Women Directors

Book Tickets

This event has passed.

Credits

Executive Producer

Riita Djime

Producer

Nellie Carrier, Julie Paratian

Screenwriter

Justine Harbonnier

Cinematography

Lena Mill-Reuillard, Justine Harbonnier

Editor

Xi Feng, Maxime Faure

Director

Justine Harbonnier headshot

Justine Harbonnier

Justine Harbonnier was born in France and grew up in Nantes. After completing a master’s in comparative literature at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), she began making short independent films. Her most recent short, Andrew Keegan is Moving, won the GREC/France TV “Une Minute” award. Harbonnier’s first feature-length film, Caiti Blues, co-produced by Sister Productions (France) and Cinquième Maison (Québec), was selected for Visions du Réel, Hot Docs and ACID Cannes. A documentary feature, LA Simulation, is currently in development with French co-producers Les 48e Rugissants and Special Touch Studios.

Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre

Orwell: 2+2=5

Dir. Raoul Peck
119 min

Oscar-nominated director Raoul Peck reimagines 1984 in this urgent essay on power, language, and control. With narration by Damian Lewis, it’s a chilling portrait of how Orwell’s warnings became our reality.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Wisdom of Happiness

Dir. Philip Delaquis & Barbara Miller
90 min

An audience with the Dalia Lama, who, at 90, looks back on his life and shares the tenets of Buddhism as a practical guide to surviving the 21st Century with joy and compassion.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Left-Handed Girl

Dir. Shih-Ching Tsou
109 min

Co-written and edited by Sean Baker (Anora), Shi-Ching Tsou's heartwarming solo feature debut follows a single mom in Taipei who is too consumed with her noodle stand to keep tabs on her five-year-old daughter's burgeoning shoplifting habit.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Sembene!

Dir. Jason Silverman & Samba Gadjigo
89 min

Sembene! tells the unbelievable true story of the father of African cinema, the self-taught novelist and filmmaker who fought, against enormous odds, a 50-year battle to return African stories to Africans.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

Train Dreams

Dir. Clint Bentley
104 min

A lovely, ruminative movie set in the Pacific Northwest in the first half of the last century. Robert (Joel Edgerton) is a lumberjack, a taciturn man who comes to appreciate the life slipping between his fingers.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Köln 75

Dir. Ido Fluk
116 min

The true story behind the greatest solo concert in jazz history, this is Keith Jarrett's legendary 1975 Köln Concert — as organized by 18-year-old rebel music promoter Vera Brandes. Fun, inventive and feminist, it's the Bend It Like Beckham of jazz films.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre
More info

Sold Out