CANADIAN HERITAGE FILM FESTIVAL

Jan 25, 2005

CANADIAN HERITAGE FILM FESTIVAL
Films from across the country and over the decades

Friday, February 18th to Monday, February 21st, 2005
Gibsons Heritage Playhouse

The Sunshine Coast Film Society is pleased to invite you to the first-ever Canadian Heritage Film Festival, Friday, February 18 to Monday, February 21, 2005 at Gibsons Heritage Playhouse. See films from across the country and over the decades, from the film pioneers to the post-modernists. The weekend-long festival includes 9 feature films, a few of them old and rare and hard to get, one of them brand new. The films will be supported by four documentaries, many classic National Film Board shorts, and several special events.

We have something to delight everyone, and we guarantee that you will see films you have never been able to see before as well as a couple you’ll be happy to see again.

Some of the Festival Highlights

Friday, Feb 18 – The weekend kicks off with an Opening Night Gala and the screening of Back to God’s Country (1919), starring the gorgeous British Columbia-born Nell Shipman, filmdom’s first action heroine and a great lover of animals and nature. Nell does the first nude scene in Canadian feature film history. (Hedy Lamarr’s notorious turn in Extase/Ecstacy came 14 years later!) Dr. Kay Armatage is our guest speaker, and the screening will be accompanied live by Ken Dalgleish on piano.

Saturday, Feb 19 -- Film archivist Emily Staresina will be holding an Antique FILMS Roadshow workshop. Bring in your old home movies – 8 mm film, Super-8, etc. – the film that you or your parents or grandparents shot and that is now stored at the back of a cupboard or in the shed or the attic or the basement. Emily will assess its condition, advise you on how to preserve it, and explain how to transfer it to another medium. Individual consultations available by appointment, too.

Sunday Feb 20 – We will also be hosting a morning of ANIMATION FILMS for the young at heart – and suitable for children from tots to teens, too! And, this event is free! Sunday afternoon will celebrate the works of Claude Jutra and the evening will feature Joyce Wieland’s work.

Monday, Feb 21 – After many exciting films and events (including a Guy Maddin double bill), we will be co-hosting a Closing Night Gala with the SC Museum and Archives. We will screen two films. Skana is a short documentary by late Sunshine Coast filmmaker Collin Hanney about Skana the Killer Whale’s journey from freedom to Hospital Bay to the Vancouver aquarium. And the closing film, In the Land of the War Canoes, a 1914 film made by photographer and ethnographer Edward S. Curtis, is a story of love and revenge that captures on film the culture of the Kwakiutl First Nation of Vancouver Island before contact with the white man. Representatives of the Kwakiutl Nation will be our guest speakers.

www.heritagefilmfest.ca
Check it out for festival films, events, and passes!

Early Bird Special! Buy your Festival Weekend Pass before midnight, January 31, and pay only * – for the entire weekend! Only 100 weekend passes will be available.
*if you are not a current Film Society member, you’ll need to add for SCFS membership

Book now online at: www.scfs.ca or www.heritagefilmfest.ca or call 604.886.1579. Passes also available at the usual outlets after February 1st.

A few rush seats for each event will also be put aside, so you may be able to cherry pick events. Individual event tix are between and .50 and are available only at the door.

List of Films (in alphabetical order):
- Artist on Fire: the Work of Joyce Wieland (Kay Armatage, 1987, col., 54 min. (doc))
- Back to God's Country (David M. Hartford (scen., star Nell Shipman), 1919, bw, 79 min.)
- A Chairy Tale (Norman McLaren, Evelyn Lambert, 1957, bw, 10 min., pixillated)
- Claude Jutra: An Unfinished Story (Paule Baillargeon, 2002, col., 85 min. (doc))
- Drylanders (Donald Haldane, 1963, bw, 69 min.)
- The Far Shore (Joyce Wieland, 1976, col., 105 min.)
- Goin’ down the Road (Don Shebib, 1970, col., 87 min.)
- In the Land of the War Canoes (Edward S. Curtis, 1914, bw, 47 min.)
- Mon oncle Antoine (Claude Jutra, 1971, col., 104 min.)
- The Saddest Music in the World (Guy Maddin, 2003, col. & bw, 99 min.)
- Skana (Collin Hanney, 1971, col., 27 min., (doc))
- Tales from the Gimli Hospital (Guy Maddin, 1988, bw, 72 min.)
- The Viking (George Melford (Varick Frissell, prod., scen.), 1931, bw, 71 min.)
- White Thunder (Victoria King, 2002, col., 50 min. (doc))

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Canadian Heritage Film Festival – Friday, February 18th to Monday, February 21st
This project, presented by SCFS (a non-profit film society since 2001), is made possible by funding provided through the Department of Canadian Heritage and is produced with the assistance of the Audio-Visual Preservation Trust.

Francine Lucas
Festival Coordinator
phone: 604.886.1226
email: scfs@dccnet.ca
web: www.scfs.ca or www.heritagefilmfest.ca