VIFF Podcast Vancouver International Film Festival

In this episode we welcome Meredith Hama-Brown, director of the feature film Seagrass, in conversation with Sonja Baska, Programmer + Program Lead at VIFF


Having decamped to a Gabriola Island couples’ retreat in a last-ditch attempt to save their crumbling marriage, preoccupied Judith (Ally Maki) and Steve (Luke Roberts) leave their young daughters to their own devices. In turn, 11-year-old Stephanie (Nyha Breitkreuz) quickly ditches six-year-old Emmy (Remy Marthaller) in favour of a pack of unruly teens and their accompanying temptations. Abandoned and adrift, the introverted Emmy grows fixated with an eerie cave and convinced that her late grandmother has been conjured as an unseen ghost.


Drawing from her own childhood experiences, writer-director Meredith Hama-Brown demonstrates a profound talent for eliciting unspeakably nuanced, frequently heartbreaking performances from Breitkreuz and Marthaller. Likewise, she deftly investigates the unique tensions of Judith and Steve’s interracial marriage (including her infatuation with another man). All the while, Norm Li’s highly observant cinematography provides a practically mesmerizing degree of intimacy. A deftly orchestrated, deeply moving portrait of a family at the brink of implosion, Seagrass sees Hama-Brown exude compassion and conviction in an accomplished debut.


Meredith Hama-Brown is an actress, producer, and director. She is best known for her short Broke Bunny (2018), which won the Telus Sea to Sky Award at the Vancouver International Film Festival. With this short, she also won Best Narrative Film Award at Las Cruces International Film Festival and Best Film Award at the Future of Film Show. In 2020, Brown was selected for the TIFF Filmmaker Lab and was awarded the Canada Goose Fellowship for her first feature film, Seagrass (2023).



This conversation was recorded remotely in March 2024.


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This podcast is brought to you by the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Presented on the traditional and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) nations.
 
The Greater Vancouver International Film Festival Society is a not-for-profit cultural organization that operates the internationally acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF), and year-round programming at VIFF Centre. See what's playing now at viff.org.

In this episode we welcome Corey Payette, director of the movie musical Les Filles du Roi, in conversation with the film’s editor Christian Díaz Durán.
Adapted from Urban Ink’s stage production, this locally-shot film screened at VIFF 2023. Les Filles du Roi tells through song the powerful story of the young Kanien’kehá:ka girl Kateri and her brother Jean-Baptiste, whose lives are disrupted upon the arrival of the “Daughters of the King” in ‘New France’ (now Montreal) in 1665.
Corey Payette is an interdisciplinary storyteller, writer, composer, producer, and director in film and theatre. Since 2014, he has been the Artistic Director of Urban Ink, a position first held by Marie Clements, at one of Canada’s most ambitious theatre companies. Payette wrote the music, lyrics, and directed the acclaimed musicals Children of God, Les Filles du Roi, and Starwalker, among others. He is a member of the Mattagami First Nations, with French-Canadian and Irish ancestries. Les Filles du Roi is his first feature film.


This conversation was recorded at VIFF Centre in March 2024.


–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
This podcast is brought to you by the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Presented on the traditional and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) nations.
 
The Greater Vancouver International Film Festival Society is a not-for-profit cultural organization that operates the internationally acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF), and year-round programming at VIFF Centre. See what's playing now at viff.org.

In this episode, we’re featuring a conversation with Sierra Teller Ornelas –  co-creator, showrunner and executive producer of the critically-acclaimed, native-centred comedy series Rutherford Falls.
Ornelas had written for Superstore, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Selfie and Happy Endings before coming on board with Mike Schur and Ed Helms to bring Rutherford Falls to life, becoming the first Native American showrunner in history.   
Speaking to writer/producer Duana Taha at the 2021 festival, Ornelas chatted about the process of creating a sitcom that breaks down Indigenous stereotypes through humour, having one of the largest Indigenous writers rooms on television and how her museum background informed her writing on the show.
This conversation was recorded on October 5, 2021.

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This podcast is brought to you by the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Presented on the traditional and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) nations.

The Greater Vancouver International Film Festival Society is a not-for-profit cultural organization that operates the internationally acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF), the year-round programming of the theatres at the VIFF Centre and the online streaming platform, VIFF Connect. See what's playing now.
As a nonprofit cultural organization, VIFF relies on community support to help make everything we do possible.  You can show your love of cinema by making a tax-deductible gift to VIFF. goviff.org/donate

In this episode, we’re featuring a creator talk from the 2021 Vancouver International Film Festival with Craig Zobel – the director behind the wildly popular HBO crime drama, Mare of Easttown, starring Kate Winslet.
The Emmy-nominated director spoke to host Zach Lipovsky about crafting a crime series that leaves room for soulful human drama and humour, shooting emotional and technically daunting scenes, and working with Director Of Photography Ben Richardson on letting characters guide the shot styles.
This conversation was recorded on October 4, 2021.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

This podcast is brought to you by the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Presented on the traditional and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) nations.

The Greater Vancouver International Film Festival Society is a not-for-profit cultural organization that operates the internationally acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF), the year-round programming of the theatres at the VIFF Centre and the online streaming platform, VIFF Connect. See what's playing now.
As a nonprofit cultural organization, VIFF relies on community support to help make everything we do possible.  You can show your love of cinema by making a tax-deductible gift to VIFF. goviff.org/donate

In this episode, we revisit a conversation from the 2021 Festival with award-winning Canadian production designer Jade Healy.
Jade Healy has created the look of some of our favourite films, including A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, Marriage Story, The Killing of a Sacred Deer, A Ghost Story, Pete’s Dragon, Mississippi Grind, and Ain’t Them Bodies Saints.
2021 saw Healy reunite with her frequent collaborator David Lowery on the visual masterpiece and epic fantasy adventure, The Green Knight. 
Speaking to Canadian Director and Production Designer, Sophie Jarvis, Healy delves into how she approached the monumental task of creating an Arthurian world, bringing to life the fabled sets of the famed Camelot, the otherworldly Lady and Lord’s castle and the verdant Green Chapel.
This conversation was recorded on October 4, 2021.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

This podcast is brought to you by the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Presented on the traditional and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) nations.

The Greater Vancouver International Film Festival Society is a not-for-profit cultural organization that operates the internationally acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF), the year-round programming of the theatres at the VIFF Centre and the online streaming platform, VIFF Connect. See what's playing now.
As a nonprofit cultural organization, VIFF relies on community support to help make everything we do possible.  You can show your love of cinema by making a tax-deductible gift to VIFF. goviff.org/donate

In this episode, we bring you a masterclass in editing with BAFTA-nominated editor, Fred Raskin.
Fred Raskin is best known for his collaborations with Quentin Tarantino on Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood, Kill Bill, and The Hateful Eight, Justin Lin on The Fast and the Furious films, and James Gunn on Guardians of the Galaxy 1 and 2. 
Speaking to two-time Canadian Screen Award-winning editor Mathew Hannam, at VIFF 2021, Raskin breaks down his process editing the superhero blockbuster The Suicide Squad – detailing how the story took its final shape in the editing room, his favourite scenes from the film, and his advice to emerging editors.
This conversation was recorded on October 6, 2021.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

This podcast is brought to you by the Vancouver International Film Festival.
Presented on the traditional and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) nations.

The Greater Vancouver International Film Festival Society is a not-for-profit cultural organization that operates the internationally acclaimed Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF), the year-round programming of the theatres at the VIFF Centre and the online streaming platform, VIFF Connect. See what's playing now.
As a nonprofit cultural organization, VIFF relies on community support to help make everything we do possible.  You can show your love of cinema by making a tax-deductible gift to VIFF. goviff.org/donate