The dazzling career of legendary singer-songwriter Luther Vandross gets revelatory reappraisal in Dawn Porter’s moving biographical documentary. In addition to making his own beloved hits (Never Too Much; Dance with My Father; Here and Now) the trailblazing soul artist was a titanic musical force in the 1980s and 90s, arranging and producing songs for a staggering range of artists: from David Bowie to Dionne Warwick and Mariah Carey, to name just a few.
Even before his life was cut tragically short at 54, Vandross suffered from media scrutiny about his weight and sexuality, and from pigeonholing within the music industry. Drawn from roughly four decades of interview and performance footage, as well as retrospective assessments by confidantes and artistic contemporaries, Luther is an eye-opening examination of a legacy that we are only now able to fully reckon with, and a reintroduction to music we can’t get enough of.
Presented by
Media Partner
Community Partner
Luther Vandross
USA
2024
English
At International Village
At Fifth Avenue
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits & Director
Executive Producer
Dawn Porter, Eli Holzman, Aaron Saidman, Tom Mackay, Richard Story, Jon Platt
Producer
Trish D. Chetty, Ged Doherty, Jamie Foxx, Datari Turner, Leah Smith
Cinematography
Bryan Gentry
Editor
Mark Fason
Production Design
Chloe Reisen
Original Music
Robert Glasper
Dawn Porter
Dawn Porter is an American documentary filmmaker and the founder of the production company Trilogy Films. Her award-winning films include Gideon’s Army (2012), Trapped (2016), and Bobby Kennedy for President (2018). As a two-time Sundance Film Festival director, Porter’s work has been featured on HBO, Netflix, CNN, PBS, MSNBC, MTV Films, and other platforms. Dawn’s recent projects include The Lady Bird Diaries (2023) and Deadlocked: How America Shaped the Supreme Court (2023), both of which garnered her nominations for two Critics Choice Awards and a Spirit Award.
Filmography: Gideon’s Army (2012); Spies of Mississippi (2014); Trapped (2016); The Way I See It (2020); The Lady Bird Diaries (2023)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Familiar Touch
A loving portrait of an octogenarian transitioning into an assisted living facility, this award-winning first feature by choreographer Sarah Friedland has a simplicity and warmth that's exceptionally poignant.
Stories of Our Lives
Stories of Our Lives (62 mins) documents personal stories of lovers, fighters and rebels and the community histories that characterize the queer experience in Kenya. This is preceded by the touching and resonant 38-minute Nigerian love story, Ìfé.
Romeo and Juliet
Franco Zeffirelli directed one of the most successful and beloved of Shakespeare films, casting teenagers Leonard Whiting and Oliva Hussey as his star-crossed lovers. This month's Premium Pick by Sandy Dowling.
Super Happy Forever
This beguiling film depicts a man’s return to the Japanese seaside town where he met his now-deceased wife five years earlier. He tries to relive the past, and in the film's final section -- a flashback to 2018 -- the audience is afforded that privilege.
Georgia O'Keeffe: the Brightness of Light
Drawing on her copious correspondence and the world's leading scholars, this is a definitive documentary on the life and work of "the mother of American Modernism."