VIFF Podcast

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 freque...

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 Mat...

In this episode, we’re joined by a Songwriter Hall of Fame inductee – artist, producer, composer and all-around powerhouse, Linda Perry. Linda Perry began her journey as the lead singer and songwriter of 4 Non Blondes – penning the band’s hit song “What’s Up?” – before turning her hand to production. As a songwriter-producer, Perry quickly established herself as one of the industry’s heavyweights,...

In this episode, we’re throwing it back to a creator talk from the 2021 Festival, with one of the filmmakers behind the documentary My Name is Pauli Murray.   Co-directors Julie Cohen and Betsy West received an Academy Award nomination for their documentary RBG , on the life and career of late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. It was from RBG that they first learned about their next subje...

In this episode, we’re revisiting a conversation with Canadian writer-director Emma Seligman, about her debut feature – the darkly comic, utterly chaotic coming-of-age story, Shiva Baby . Based on Seligman’s 2018 South By Southwest eight-minute short, Shiva Baby finds twenty-something Danielle (played by Rachel Sennott), dutifully attending a shiva for a family friend, where she spends her time lu...

In this VIFF podcast episode, we’re featuring a special talk from the 2021 Vancouver International Film Festival with Jonas Poher Rasmussen, the writer & director behind the Sundance Grand Jury Prize-winning film, Flee . Blurring the line between documentary and narrative filmmaking styles, Flee tells the personal story of pseudonymous Amin Nawabi (a longtime friend of Rasmussen’s) and his har...

This week on the VIFF podcast, we’re featuring a conversation from our year-round virtual Creator Talk series with Dune Production Designer, Patrice Vermette When it comes to making movies, it’s a production designer’s job to transport audiences to a different world. But in the case of Denis Villeneuve’s epic sci-fi film Dune , that also involved creating entire planets. To pull off the godlike fe...

Hello! And welcome to the VIFF Podcast – a place to revisit some of our favourite conversations recorded at the Vancouver International Film Festival and year-round. We’re back with another season of in-depth interviews with some of the film industry’s most exciting creators including the Production Designer for sci-fi epic, Dune , Patrice Vermette; Editor of The Suicide Squad, Fred Raskin; The Gr...

In this episode, Emmy Award-winning production designer Mark Friedberg dives into the process behind creating the iconic cinematic worlds of films such as The Ice Storm, Joker, If Beale Street Could Talk, Selma and Barry Jenkins' limited series adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel for Amazon Studios, The Underground Railroad . Speaking to writer and film critic Nathal...

In this episode, Joel Bakan and Jennifer Abbott join us for a conversation to dissect their approach to The Corporation follow-up.  After Mark Akbar and Jennifer Abbott transformed VIFF audiences in 2003 with The Corporation , Bakan and Abbott returned to the 2020 Festival with  The New Corporation: The Unfortunately Necessary Sequel.   Refreshing the corporation’s evolution as a legal "perso...

In this episode, we’re joined by one of the most iconic musical voices in the world.  From his start in 1980 as trumpeter with the Lionel Hampton Orchestra to his collaboration with Spike Lee on Da 5 Bloods (for which he received an Oscar nomination for Best Original Score), Terence Blanchard has been an idol in the worlds of jazz, theatre, film and television.  Headlining the 2020 VIFF AMP Music...

In this episode, we’re joined by Academy Award-winning screenwriter Charlie Kaufman who shares insights into his Netflix adaptation of Iain Reid’s novel I’m Thinking of Ending Things – a tightly wound metaphysical thriller that tackles our assumptions about identity and relationships in Kaufman’s signature surrealistic style.  Speaking with VIFF’s Associate Director of Programming, Curtis Woloschu...

In this episode, filmmakers Eliza Hittman, Director of Never Rarely, Sometimes Always , Kris Rey, Director of I Used To Go Here and Amy Seimetz, Director of She Dies Tomorrow , discuss how they navigated the disrupted 2020 festival-circuit to ensure their stories were brought to life – earning them multiple awards and rave reviews along the way. This conversation is hosted by VIFF’s Associate Dire...

In this episode, we’re joined by the creators behind two of the most audaciously funny series of the last year.  Tony McNamara is the creator of the Emmy-nominated The Great , a genre-bending, anti-historical ride through 18th-century Russia – following the wildly comedic rise of Catherine the Nothing to Catherine the Great. Tony is joined by Peabody Award-winning Alena Smith, creator of Dickinson...

In this episode, we revisit a conversation with Bill Lawrence – the creator behind hit sitcoms Scrubs, Cougar Town, Spin City , and the animated series Clone High .  Joining us online as part of our 2020 virtual Creator Talk series, Bill shared a behind the scenes look at his latest big-hearted comedy Ted Lasso.  The Apple TV+ show finds Jason Sudeikis recruited to manage an English Premiere Leagu...

In this episode, filmmakers Tracey Deer and Jules Koostachin discuss the legacy of resistance.  Tracey’s powerful feature debut Beans is inspired by her own coming of age as a Mohawk girl in Kahnawake during the 1990 Oka Crisis – the turbulent 78-day standoff between the Mohawks, the Quebec provincial police, and the Canadian military. This conversation was recorded at VIFF 2020, on the day that m...

Hello! And welcome to the VIFF Podcast – a place to revisit some of our favourite conversations with filmmakers and storytellers that were recorded at the Vancouver International Film Festival and year-round, as part of our VIFF Talks program. We’re back with another season of in-depth interviews with some of the film industry’s most exciting creators including, I’m Thinking of Ending Things direc...

In this episode, we present a conversation with Oscar and multiple Emmy award-winning director, Alex Gibney, whose critically acclaimed credits include Taxi to the Dark Side and Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief . Alex Gibney was hailed as “the most important documentarian of our time” by Esquire Magazine and has a signature cinematic style that lends itself to penetrating, grippin...

In this episode, we present a conversation with Cliff Martinez, film composer and regular collaborator of Steven Soderbergh and Nicolas Winding Refn.  Cliff Martinez is widely known for his idiosyncratic and iconic scores for Drive, Traffic, Spring Breakers, and The Knick. He was also inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a drummer for the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Martinez joined critic AA...

In this episode, we present a conversation with one of the creative forces behind It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Rob McElhenney, who joined us at the Festival to discuss how, 15 years on, a show about a ragtag gang of narcissistic deadbeats continues to push the boundaries of what makes us laugh. Chatting with writer Tim Goodman, Rob speaks about his unlikely path to success, punching up...

In this episode, we present a conversation with Oscar-nominated costume designer, Arianne Phillips who speaks about the ‘twist of fate’ that led her to Quentin Tarantino’s 'Once Upon A Time In...Hollywood' , how Sharon Tate's family helped shape Margot Robbie's onscreen look and which items best identified Rick (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Cliff (Brad Pitt). Known for her cutting-ed...

In this episode, we present a conversation with RZA, hip-hop producer, director and leader of legendary group, The Wu-Tang Clan. Born Robert Diggs, RZA was inspired by kung fu classics at a young age, and he and his fellow Clan members would later incorporate them into their iconic debut album, Enter the Wu-Tang, and since then RZA has, while remaining loyal to hip-hop, moved into the film world....

In this episode, we present a conversation with Dr. Jane Goodall who reflects on seeing her life's journey to becoming one of the world’s most prominent conservationists chronicled through archival footage in Brett Morgen's 2017 documentary, Jane . In 1960, at the age of 26 and with little academic training, Jane Goodall set off into the Gombe Stream National Park forests to study the re...

In this episode, we present a conversation with the Co-Creator of the Golden Globe-winning cop comedy Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Dan Goor, who talks about meeting fellow show creator and longtime collaborator Mike Schur, attending clown school over becoming a doctor and not shying away from tackling topical subject matter such as gun control, sexism, and racial profiling.   Goor got his start writing for...

For our first episode, we present a conversation with Oscar-winning director, activist and political pundit Michael Moore , who shares his thoughts on Canada, Justin Trudeau and how the themes in his first documentary Roger & Me still resonate 30 years on. In 1989, Moore burst onto the American film scene with Roger & Me , which chronicled the efforts of General Motors to turn his home of...