Dates 7 - 16 May 2010 Venues Vancity Theatre, Pacific Cinematheque & Empire Granville Theatres

No Fun City

85 min. Canada, 2010 dir. Melissa James and Kate Kroll, | Reviewer John Jane

This film, made on location in Vancouver, may be of special interest to those – and I’m sure there are many – Vancouverites who believe that the title aptly describes their town. With perhaps the most restrictive licencing laws of any major city in the western world, Vancouver has certainly earned its reputation as a “No Fun City”. It would seem that the city’s bureaucrats and politicians would be happy to turn all but the downtown entertainment district generally confined to the south Granville Street corridor into a ghost town after midnight.

No Fun City is a film about the underground music scene in Vancouver and its ongoing struggle in a city that seems to want no part of it. It follows the misadventures of colourful local promoters Wendy13, the last manager of the infamous Cobalt Motor Hotel on Main Street right in the middle of “Canada's poorest postal code” and Malice Liveit from the Sweatshop as they face police raids, eviction notices, heavy fines and lawsuits.

The city’s attack on such venues does have its supporters. Patrons at these venues have been known to get wildly drunk, and then out of control. But, as we watch “The Cobalt” close its doors for the last time, we cannot help but sympathise with the plight of those who would keep Vancouver's extreme underground music scene alive. The film features interviews and performances of some local bands.

Dreamland

89 min. Iceland, 2009 dir. Andri Snaer Magnason and Thorfinnur Gudnason, Soundtrack Valgeir Sigurdsson | Reviewer John Jane

In watching Andri Snaer Magnason's critical essay about the Icelandic government’s ill-advised decisions to sacrifice the Nation's environment in undertaking the huge Kárahnjúkar Hydropower Project, it quickly becomes obvious that the film’s title – Dreamland – is a purely satirical one. A more obvious title might have been “The seduction of Iceland’s economy by a large corporation”.

Magnason chronicles how Iceland's government actively pursue an ill-fated programme to attract Alcoa Inc, the world’s largest aluminum company with a promise of cheap energy. The film is worth seeing if only for its breathtaking aerial photography. However, its heavy journalistic narrative makes for stark storytelling. The film certainly offers rhetorical arguments that put the tiny country’s environmental and financial problems into an historical perspective. Since it was made the nation’s three leading banks have collapsed and Iceland now owns a huge dept and a very unsettling future.

The Referees (Les Arbitres)

77 min. Belgium, 2009 dir. Lehericey Delphine and Yves Hinant | Reviewer John Jane

If you’re an air traffic controller, an inner city high school teacher or a stock exchange floor trader then you already know what work related stress is all about. But at least you won’t likely require police protection for up to twelve hours after you finish your shift.

Besides the pressure of having to control a 90-minute game involving 22 passionate players in front of a partisan crowd of up to 70,000, professional soccer referees must make split-second decisions that can easily effect the final result. This fast-paced film focuses on three such heroes who officiated at the EURO 2008 championship held in Austria and Switzerland: Howard Webb from England, Pieter Vink from Holland and Roberto Rosetti from Italy who handled the final match between Germany and Spain. The film provides a peek into the psyche of those who would subject themselves and in some cases their families to such adversity for the love of the game.

Soccer devotees will notice former referee Pierluigi Collina in his new capacity as a member of the UEFA Referees Committee.

Buffy Sainte-Marie: A Multimedia Life

60 min. Canada, 2007 dir. Joan Prowse | Reviewer John Jane

By any measure, Buffy Sainte-Marie has had an incredible career, arguably being the most successful aboriginal artist ever. All the more remarkable considering that she has achieved much of her success on her own terms. Joan Prowse’s film provides a snapshot of a career that has endured for five decades as well as fleeting glimpses into her personal life.

The film features performances in concert and television including film footage of Sesame Street episodes and Interviews with some of her music contemporaries including Joni Mitchell, Robbie Robertson, Taj Mahal and Steppenwolf's John Kay. The concert segments include some of the singer’s most inspiring songs such as: Fallen Angels, Until It's Time for You to Go, Universal Soldier

Prowse’s cinematic study is not a biopic. It offers the audience hardly more than a peek into her personal relationships. Sainte-Marie was married three times to: Dewain Bugbee, Sheldon Wolfchild (father to her son Cody) and Jack Nitzsche, but only her current partner, Chuck Wilson was interviewed.

Cameroon: Coming Out of the Nkuta

52 min. France, 2009 dir. Céline Metzger | Reviewer Michael Pink

This French film by Celine Metzger raises some important and timely questions about the issue of human rights and homosexuality in Cameroon which is heavily persecuted. Although gay rights are increasingly observed and protected in the West such is not the case in many parts of the world, particularly Cameroon where harassment and imprisonment are common due in part to the fact that homosexuality is still criminalized in the penal code.

The film raises and exposes these issues with clarity and detail. It is also noted in the film that criminalizing homosexuality and lesbian relations is a pretext for corruption. The camera work for the film, although basic, does lend a raw element to the style and the interviews are candid. A powerful figure in the documentary is the advocate Alice Nkom who repeatedly has to contend with bias and ignorance within the legal and police structure that permits the harassment of gay persons. It is sad that in this modern age such battles over basic rights are common but important that the filmmaker had the determination to bring forward this necessary story.

The Sari Soldiers

92 min. USA, 2008 dir. Julie Bridgham | Reviewer Michael Pink

This simple yet poignant Nepalese story by Julie Bridgham raises important questions about human rights and poverty.
Nepal is a tiny nation that is mostly removed from the mainstream media and close international scrutiny. The abuses there are deep and shocking and need to be told.

Under the pretext of subverting a Maoist insurrection, the government and military have been involved in gross human rights violations, particularly at the village level. Devi, a main character in the film, recounts how her own 18 year old niece was dragged from their village house one day to be raped, mutilated and murdered. The violence is systematic and leaves whole communities terrorized.

Ironically, such brutality and injustice forces many people, as the story shows, to join the Maoists as an alternative and for safety. Indeed many recruits are young females. The footage is gritty and realistic and the interviews are revealing. This is documentary cinema verite at its best. It is notable that the film won the Nestor Almendros Prize at the Human Rights Watch International Festival.

When The Mountain Meets Its Shadow

63 min. Germany, 2009 dir. Alexander Kleider and Daniela Michel | Reviewer Michael Pink

This documentary by Alexander Kieder and Daniela Michel explores with quiet frustration the intolerable poverty in Cape Town, South Africa that leaves a huge socio-economic gulf between the white and black citizens. A proud black mother in the film is shown applying for jobs as a maid while young black males apply for basic security guard positions. Meanwhile the upper crust live in luxury that is built upon the labor of toiling black masses. The film teems with injustice.

An excellent scene shows a black maid dusting a white home owner’s room with fancy pink lace pillows on the bed. Back home, her daughter is shown living in a shack. The film could also be subtitled: Worlds Apart. This is clearly a powerful message of the film. Color is the great divide. The profound ignorance and waste of opportunity that is created by racism, is writ large across the film. The black citizens portrayed in the film are renters in their own land. They are dispossessed not only economically but also socially.

One can only admire the stoic patience that is displayed by key persons in the film such as Ashraf, Mne, Zoliswa and Arnold. Despite the poverty and injustice of their surroundings, they display uncommon fortitude as they work day by day within a tainted white dominated world that has strong vestiges of racism and inequity.