From December 3rd to 7th, 2014, the Whistler Film Festival (WFF) will celebrate its 14th edition as one of Canada’s leading festivals. Featuring innovative and original films from around the world and opportunities to connect with the people who made them, this year’s five day Festival will be filled with a solid lineup of premieres, star-studded guests, lively celebrations and unique industry initiatives.
This year Whistler Film Festival goers can look forward to 87 films from 18 countries, selected from over 700 submissions, including 41 features and 46 shorts, exhibited on six screens in five theatre venues over five days – phew!
The feature program includes an unprecedented 22 World Premieres, 8 Canadian Premieres, 1 English Canadian Premiere, 33 Western Canadian Premieres, 11 British Columbia Premieres, and 10 Whistler Premieres.
Here are some top picks from 2014’s extensive line-up:
A still from the film Backcountry, starring Missy Peregrym.
BACKCOUNTRY
Directed by Adam McDonald – British Columbia Premiere
| Friday, December 5 7:30pm Whistler Conference Centre BallroomBuy Tickets |
Sunday, December 7 1:00pm Whistler Conference Centre BallroomBuy Tickets |
Based on a true story, Backcountry is a particularly horrifying movie involving a couple of campers who were viciously attacked by a black bear during a mountain-area excursion. The actual event occurred in Quebec and the bulk of the movie was shot in Ontario, but the bear attack footage was shot in Squamish, where Canada’s best-trained black bear resides. This is a film that is gaining major traction on the international horror genre film festival circuit. It owes a lot to Jaws, but on a more intimate, authentically Canadian scale.
A full blown, full blooded horror film about the apathy of nature… Chris Alexander, Fangoria.com
Snowman
Directed by Mike Douglas – British Columbia Premiere
| Sunday, December 7 Doors 7:00PM | Film 8:00PM Whistler Conference Centre BallroomBuy Tickets $25 |
Gala PackageBuy Tickets $45 |
From childhood, Kevin Fogolin dreamed of living and working in the mountains. After breaking the shackles of small-town expectations, his dream comes crashing down in a helicopter avalanche bombing mission gone horribly wrong. In the aftermath, Kevin and his childhood friend, freeskiing icon Mike Douglas, are forced to confront the risks and rewards of following their passion for the mountains. Set in British Columbia’s rugged Coast Mountain Range, Snowman is a familiar tale of dreaming big and a life where the greatest risk is not daring to dream at all.
Tyler Labine and Chace Crawford star in Mountain Men.
MOUNTAIN MEN
Directed by Cameron Labine, World Premiere
| Thursday, December 4 8PM Rainbow TheatreBuy Tickets |
Sunday, December 7 7PM Rainbow TheatreBuy Tickets |
An engrossing mix of sibling comedy and survival thriller, Mountain Men tells the story of two estranged brothers who travel to a remote family cabin in the mountains in order to evict a reported squatter. When an unexpected fire leaves them abandoned and exposed to the wintry Rocky Mountain elements, they must bury their unresolved resentments if they are to have any hope of making it back to civilization.
ShortWork Showcase
Garfinkel’s Saturday December 6
Doors: 7:30PM | Showcase: 8PM
Event 8PM – 9:30PM
Bedbugs – A Musical Love Story, directed by Matthew Kowalchuk, features in the ShortWork Showcase.
Hosted by Vancouver’s Crazy 8’s filmmaking event, this year’s ShortWork Showcase features a lively presentation of an eclectic collection of short films comprised of top Crazy 8 Alumni films, Content Connections panelists films, and some of WFF’s programmed short films. Have some drinks and enjoy some funny short films!
Late Night Film Series
Vampires, 70’s cops, fetishes, and gratuitous nudity. Need we say more? WFF’s Late Night selections showcases four great genre films.
Taika Waititi stars in What We Do In The Shadows.
Bad City
Following up on last year’s very successful film noir genre homage No Clue, local favourite Carl Bessai returns with his craziest genre send-up yet: a cross between blaxploitation films from the 70s and what film intellectuals like to call “canucksploitation” from the era. An evil guy named Kincaid has introduced a funky new party drug into Bad City and has murdered the mayor, on his road to taking over the entire town. But Detective Franky New Guinea and his partner, the truly unruly Detective Reverend Grizzly Night-Bear righteously stand in the way. Can you dig it? Right on! Dig out your best Afro wigs and get ready to party, in this funny film parody.
Deadly Departures
If the first half hour of this film doesn’t push your limits, nothing will, as a very violent and distastefully misogynistic home invasion horror movie turns into a post-feminist meditation on gender roles within modern relationships. This is a smart but very discomfiting film from the director of Drop Dead Fred, with lush camera moves and very solid acting, but it is not for the squeamish.
The Duke of Burgandy
Certainly one of the strangest late night films we are ever likely to present, the first thing to know is that the title has absolutely nothing to do with the film’s contents. It is a BDSM lesbian fetish movie that focuses on a slave/master relationship between a middle-aged woman and her younger partner, all done in the lush widescreen visual style of Italian “giallo” films. The film is fetishistic, but features no real nudity, just sometimes humorous play-acting power dynamics, and lots of corsets and garter belts. The Duke of Burgandy is brought to you by the director of the equally stylish Barbarian Sound Studio.
What We Do In The Shadows
A recent vampire recruit Nick invites his human filmmaker friend to come film their rather mundane daily lives and attend some undead parties, promising to protect the crew from unwanted blood-sucking. Hilariously deadpan, this film won the Audience Award at this year’s TIFF Midnight Madness.
Enjoy!
