WIFF 2010   REEL WOMEN. REAL LIFE.   at the Vancity Theatre, Vancouver BC

Screening #3 - Cherchez la Femme

Sunday, April 18 | 12:00 noon - 2:00 pm

Music. Dance. Funerals. These ecclectic films entertain us with their sometimes off-the-wall perspective.

Arithmetic - Annie’s Life in Numbers (Trailer)

Crows and Branches (4 mins)
PEI, Canada - Director: Millefiore  Clarkes
A meditation on the rhythms of nature, Crows and Branches pays homage to the daily phenomenon of the flight of crows in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island. At dusk each evening thousands of crows appear, as if out of nowhere, in the sky over the city, and flock to Victoria Park at the water’s edge. They amass in such numbers that they turn entire trees black and fill the sky with a symphony of haunting cries.
 
Evelyn’s Farm (8 mins)
BC, Canada - Director: Brian Johnson
Evelyn’s Farm is a dance film that explores distance, time, repetition, environment and human connection.  The two female characters repeat sequences of movement in the stark landscape of a theatre, a vast open field framed by low mountains and a muddy river.  The women transition between pushing the edges of their own physicality to moving in ways that are more sensorial, imagistic and individual thus creating a kaleidoscope of images that generate beauty, depth, and a sense of humanity. Evelyn’s Farm lets the moving body be the story teller and demonstrates the connection and separation between two individuals.
 
9-1-MUM (3 mins)
USA - Director: Allison Beda             
“Who else can you call?”  A woman calls her mother with what she thinks is a medical emergency involving a spork, on Mother’s Day.
 
The Delivery (10 mins)
USA - Director: Virginia Bogert
“Never underestimate the power of the written word nor a bit of chocolate.” Two irregular pegs who don’t quite fit into this world create their own. Can an isolated writer and a sweetly shy delivery girl find each other? Can she be the one to bring him out? Will he let her in? Some notes, a mouse, and a gift greater than chocolate work their magic.
 
Sweet Pickle (11 mins)
Newfoundland, Canada - Director: Lois Brown
Sweet Pickle is the story of a woman who leaves her outport community to go to the big city in search of better things... to eat. A short comedic operetta that traces a woman’s journey to self-esteem through the aisles of a supermarket.
 
In Between (8 mins)
Ontario, Canada - Director: Nadine Valcin
On a cold fall evening, Leila is left alone to tend the family convenience store. A series of strange clients keep her in a constant state of apprehension. Language and cultural barriers also contribute to the making of a nerve-racking evening.
 
Brain Clever (4:40 mins)
Yukon, Canada - Director: Lulu Keating
East meets West.   A flashlight, made in China.   Instructions translated from Chinese into English.  Can this flashlight really make your brain clever?  Industrial Man (David H. Fraser) slogs through the winter to meet Environment Woman (Beth Egnatoff) in the glory of summer.  The two opposites collide in a perfect union, brought together by the innocuous Hand-Pressing Flashlight.
 
Make Up the Dead (6:12 mins)
BC, Canada - Director: Danika Dinsmore
Every time Grace comes to town, Dorrie gets an earful about not getting any younger and not meeting any good men. But this time, Dorrie has concocted a little plan to finally get her nagging mother off her back...
 
Arithmetic - Annie’s Life in Numbers (13:36 mins)
Alberta, Canada - Director: Michal Lavi
At a young age, Annie receives a pet fish that meets an untimely death. She tackles yoga and feminism and has stand-offs with dictators.  She makes New Year’s resolutions she’s sure she can keep, deals with her overbearing mom and a methodical dental hygienist, and lies with such rigor and discipline that it’s virtually moral.
 
Grande Dame (14 mins)
Nova Scotia, Canada - Director: Anita Reilly McGee
Grande Dame is a film in two stand-alone parts: In Sex in Seven Ages, GRANDE DAME (Greg Malone), a transgendered diva reinterprets Shakespeare’s immortal As You Like It speech with verve, fury and a few sexual enhancements. In Encore!, the Grande Dame’s life and work are reconsidered from the point of view of three catty, but admiring women.
 
The Audit (6 mins)
Alberta, Canada - Director: Karen Hines
Set in a creepy government waiting room, our guilty little heroine, Pochsy (anagram for “psycho”), descends through seven levels of hell as she awaits the Tax Man’s wrath. This black little satire steals both from early horror films and contemporary Noxzema ads in the creation of a public service announcement from hell, peeling the layers off a century’s worth of North American dreams gone bad. “Best of Alberta,” CIFF 2009.