Rendezvous With Madness: Program

“In a city rotten with film, it’s a smartly curated, accessible festival known for intense panel discussions”
Katrina Onstad, National Post 2004

Films At a Glance (212KB PDF)

Festival Panellist

Click on the program to get a full description		THURSDAY NOVEMBER 8	FRIDAY NOVEMBER 9	SATURDAY NOVEMBER 10	SUNDAY NOVEMBER 11
		7:30PM	1:30PM	1:30PM	1:30PM
		OPENING NIGHT GALA Desperately Seeking Normal	The Art of Mental Health	The Writing on the Wall	Experimental Fix: Real World Escape Routes
			7:30PM	7:30PM	7:30PM
			The Gutter and the Stars	The Voice of God	Other Visions of Healing

MONDAY NOVEMBER 12	TUESDAY NOVEMBER 13	WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 14 SOLD OUT!	THURSDAY NOVEMBER 15	FRIDAY NOVEMBER 16 SOLD OUT!	SATURDAY NOVEMBER 17
1:30PM	1:00PM Time Change	12:30PM	12:30PM Time Change	1:00PM	1:30PM
Hitting the Streets	Senior Youth Program: Am I Normal?	Junior Youth Program: The Search for Perfection	Senior Youth Program: Am I Normal?	Senior Youth Program: Am I Normal?	Opening Night Repeat Screening
7:30PM	7:30PM	7:30PM	7:30PM	7:30PM	4:00PM
A Child’s Perspective	Cold Crimes and Shadowed Minds	Family Portraits: Navigating Schizophrenia	Queer Madness	Cultural Connections – Tonight in Tehran	Madness in Toronto & NFB Animate the Issues
					7:30PM
					CLOSING NIGHT GALA From Ordinary to Extra Ordinary

OPENING NIGHT GALA

Thursday November 8 7:30PM This program is 18A

Desperately Seeking Normal

Robert Hofmeyr * South Africa / 2004 / 2:58 min / BetaSP / North American Premiere

Vuyisile Funda is the dune runner. A former watchman who has suffered a severe beating, he returns home to the eastern cape in South Africa and a life that is familiar. In the mornings when the sand is high enough, Vuyisile runs along the dunes tracing patterns in the sand. A truly wonderful film

Robert Hofmeyr was born in Johannesburg in 1978 and graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts. He is currently a computer consultant in Cape Town. The Dune Runner is his first short film.

What does it mean to be “normal?” This is the central question in Canadian director Carl Bessai’s latest film. A highly accomplished work, Normal features a host of characters trapped in self-reckoning. Like the Altman film Short Cuts and the recent film Babel, the characters are connected by one event, in this case the death of 16-year-old Nick, a high school basketball star killed in a drunk driving accident. Nick’s death has left a hole in the lives of all those involved, especially his mother Catherine (played with exceptional depth by Carrie Anne Moss) and his best friend, Jordie (Kevin Zegers) who was driving the car Nick was in. The driver of the other car is a failed writer named Walt (Callum Keith Rennie) who stands by helplessly as his marriage disintegrates.

Bessai reveals the connections between the stories gradually, creating a sophisticated portrait of the trauma and guilt that can engulf and destroy families grappling with a tragedy. Beautifully shot, Bessai creates sterile and contained spaces to underscore the complex, emotional landscape that lies just beneath the surface.

Carl Bessai was born in Edmonton and studied at the Ontario College of Art and Design and York University in Toronto. He has worked extensively in film and television as a director, cinematographer, writer and producer. He directed the documentaries Brothers from Vietnam (98), Out of Orbit: The Life and Times of Marshall McLuhan (99), and Indie Truth (02). His feature films are Johnny (99), lola (01), Emile (03), Severed (05), Unnatural and Accidental (06). Normal is his 6^th feature film.

Official Selection: Toronto International Film Festival (2007), Pusan International Film Festival (2007), Atlantic Film Festival (2007), Cinefest (Sudbury) (2007), Calgary International Film Festival (2007), Edmonton International Film Festival- Opening Night film (2007), Vancouver International Film Festival (2007)

Stephanie Anne – “Going Home”

oil on linen 24 x 30

Artists statement and bio

Stephanie Anne is currently based in Toronto and creates work inspired by prayer. She has lived a life of high drama and diversity. She lived in the wilderness in a log cabin and became a business leader, trainer and motivational speaker. Stephanie Anne brings a wealth of life experience to her work in visual art and writing.

“For me art can be an expression of the soul, or a representation of our human spirit. Good art nurtures both. Then occasionally there is inspired art that comes form somewhere beyond ourselves and challenges both our spirits and souls to look beyond where we already are. It is this inspired art that brings tears to my eyes and richness to my life.”

Friday November 9 1:30 pm This program is PG

The Art of Mental Health

“Even a disturbed mind searches for meaning,” so says one of the subjects in le Diable au Corp, the Canadian documentary that is the centrepiece of The Art of Mental Health. All of the films in this poetic and probing selection focus on the centuries old relationship between madness and creation. For so many who suffer from mental illness or trauma, the ability to express what lies deep inside is a form of exorcism and release that is often life saving. To translate confusion and fear and pain and give it form and colour and sound is to have a gift that communicates and moves both the artist and the audience. It is this exchange that connects us and illuminates both giver and receiver.

The daisy becomes a symbol for healing in this experimental video by Roxanne Joseph. Using words and images, she engages the audience in a dialogue about her transformation from a victim of an abusive relationship to a survivor.

Director/Writer Roxanne Joseph, an interdisciplinary artist for over twenty years, invites viewers into discourse with provocative art works examining multi-layered social constructs that permeate our environment and influence our thoughts and behaviour.

In this lovely Canadian short, a clown contemplates and questions the fragile state of his own existence.

Billie Mintz’s professional film making career began at the age of 21, when he met and started managing Raul, the “Superdancer of the world.” Intrigued by this man and how those around him perceived him and treated him, Billie began to study the diminishing role of the “fool” in our society, and how individuals are treated for their differences.

Official Selection: Vancouver Film Festival, Houston World Festival, Clermont Ferrand Short Film Festival

Certainly the only film in modern movie history with a squirrel as its lead character, Squirrel Waltz is an experimental short about a furry little animal who lives on the grounds of CAMH and wants nothing but respect.

TK Workman has a Bachelor in Fine Arts (Major in Cinema) from Concordia University. TK has made two 16mm experimental films, Head Pieces, and Five Crystal Roses. She is a multimedia artist, committed to exploring environmentalism and social issues. Thanks to Workman Arts, TK has made the jump to video.

Prolific collector and creator Lee Sjostrom’s film is about the self - and in her case the many selves - that find their way into the core of her work both directly and indirectly.

Lee is prolific in most arts, having been featured in many art exhibits, film festivals and even producing her own cable TV series in Hollywood. As well as singing with several bands, she has had her own arts column and comic strip in a newspaper. Her art remains an expression of a mind and a person seeking to understand herself and the world around her.

Vincent Van Gogh is the patron saint of artists. In le Diable au Corp, four artists who have battled mental illness all their lives prepare for Vincent et moi, a show curated by Le Centre Robert Giffard, a mental health centre in Quebec. Taking turns both confessional and humorous, they invite us into their worlds and reveal what art has meant for them. Filmmaker Johanne Pregent uses spare but haunting visual metaphors to illustrate their states of mind. As insightful and humane as the delightful, surprising and touching work of the artists themselves, this is a beautiful film that celebrates the strength and will of the human spirit.

Johanne Pregent began her career in film in the wardrobe department and quickly proceeded to working as a costumer, camera assistant, assistant director and script supervisor before graduating to directing. Since the critical success of her first film La peau et les os (Skin and Bones), she has contributed works to screens large and small, to documentary and television series.

Francois Bertrand from the film and another surprise guest will be in attendance.

Friday November 9 7:30PM This Program is PG

This program explores questions of identity in relation to the cycle of extreme mood disorders. Who are we when the “normal” parameters of perception and reception of reality exist in a flux of emotions and delusions? When a flight to the stars is followed by a dizzying fall, how do you know who you really are? Do prescription medications bring you closer to your reality or do they distance you further from the hope of truly knowing yourself?

Gary & Krista Ledbetter * Canada / 2006 / 28:48 min / DigiBeta / Canadian Premiere

Meet Dave, Karen, Lisa, Phil, Hans, and others who could easily be are our brothers and sisters, parents and partners in this straightforward documentary about living with mental illness and what it takes to survive. The subjects of Meds talk openly about their lives and their experiences taking psychiatric medications. In candid interviews, they share stories about the interruptive and often life-threatening symptoms of their illnesses, the negative side effects and benefits of medications, and what it all means for them to live a life they can call their own.

Gary Ledbetter has worked as a producer, director and writer. His films include An Act of God and the multiple award-winning debut feature Henry and Verlin. He has also served on various film juries in Canada and worldwide.

Krista Ledbetter studied film at Ryerson University in Toronto. She has worked in the film industry as a P.A. and an office assistant. In 2006 she co-directed Meds.

Previous screening at MAD conference Kingston ON.(2006), 2007 INTERCOM Awards Cinema, The Chicago International Film Festival

Percy Paul began his journey in a remote Dene community in northern Saskatchewan, a place where far too often alcohol and violence were close at hand. Despite these circumstances, he excelled in school and sports, eventually proving himself a world-class distance runner and gold medalist. Within a few short years, Percy found himself at Princeton, working alongside one of the world's leading authorities on string theory, black holes and quantum field theory. But all this changed when he turned 28. Percy became an alcoholic in an effort to cope with his extreme mood swings. After a failed suicide attempt, he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Those afflicted with this life-long disorder suffer flights of mania followed by periods of clinical depression, during which many try suicide and tragically, many succeed.

Flight from Darkness focuses on the life of Percy Paul, from his dazzling rise and fall as a brilliant mathematician to his continuing struggle to prevail over his illness and realize his full potential.

Trevor Grant is an award winning director and writer whose passion for telling stories has led him on a wide-ranging creative journey within the documentary form. While continuing to learn the craft of storytelling, Trevor also mentors first time directors and teaches university level courses on visual story telling.

Saturday November 10 1:30PM This program is 14A

In keeping with our annual journey into the past, this year we present The Writing On The Wall, a program of two films that examine the lives of historical figures with mental illness. The famous King George is the subject of the Oscar-nominated The Madness of King George, while the film The Wall Project explores the lives of those among us who were in life forgotten, but in time, remembered.

Kathleen Mullen, Jane Kim, Chris McCarrol * Canada / 2007 / 2min / BetaSP

Geoffrey Reaume is a professor at York University and a man with a mission, to restore the dignity of those in the past who were misunderstood. For years now, Geoffrey offers free tours and a glimpse into the history of people who once lived behind the patient built boundary walls of what is now the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health.

Jane Kim graduated with a Journalism degree from Ryerson University in 1992, and was a director resident at the Canadian Film Centre in 2000. She is actively involved in programming films and industry events for festivals, and has worked with the Toronto International Film Festival, Hot Docs, Worldwide Short Film Festival, Reel Asian, Images Festival, SAVAC, Harbourfront Centre and the Ontario Arts Council. Jane's own dramatic short films have screened at numerous international film festivals, received several awards and nominations, and have been broadcast in Canada and USA.

Chris McCarroll is an emerging film and video artist who originally hails from Lethbridge, AB. Chris currently splits his interests between narrative cinema and conceptual video art practices. He lives in Toronto, ON where he is pursuing his MFA in Film Production at York University.

Kathleen Mullen is a programmer and emerging filmmaker. For five years she was the Director of Programming for the Inside Out Toronto Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. She has curated and programmed for film festivals locally and internationally for the past 11 years including the Vancouver International Film Festival, Boston Museum of Fine Arts Film Program, Out on Screen and Provincetown International Film Festival. Her film, you wash my skin with sunshine, has been screening internationally. She currently working on her MFA in Film Production at York University.

The year is 1788. King George III (Nigel Hawthorne – Oscar Nomination, Best Actor) has reigned over his empire for 30 years. He’s had fifteen children with Queen Charlotte (Helen Mirren – Oscar Nomination, Best Supporting Actress) and wears his crown well. Fear is struck in the court, however, when an abdominal pain leads George III to start acting in strange and mysterious ways. Unchanged after treatment, a royal and political crisis develops and as King George descends into illness, his enemies descend on him. A period drama with a punch.

Nicholas Hytner is an award-winning filmmaker and an esteemed stage director who first gained prominence in his native England. The Madness of King George was his feature film debut. Since then, Hytner has gone onto make such films as The Crucible (Daniel Day Lewis, and Winona Ryder) and The Object of My Affection, starring Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston.

The Friends of the CAMH Archives and Workman Arts join in congratulating the University of Toronto’s Department of Psychiatry on its centenary. In honour of the event a short, one-act opera seria by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Eight Songs for a Mad King (based on King George’s degenerative mental affliction) will have one free public screening at the Betty Oliphant Theatre on Friday evening, Nov. 23, 2007. For information and inquiries about advance tickets please go to www.utpsychiatry.ca/centenary.

Saturday November 10 7:30PM This program is PG

For centuries the Church held the belief that psychological disorders were actually instances of demonic possession. In some cases it was suggested that a person was taken over by the devil as retribution for sin, and the only way to release the devil was through exorcism. Others with mental illness were thought of as deliberately making a pact with the devil. They were branded as witches who needed to be destroyed, usually by fire or drowning. The two films in this program deal with the relationship between religion and mental illness and the attempt to find understanding and solace through God, sadly, sometimes in vain.

A road trip to an amusement park suddenly takes an unexpected turn when the car Liz and her two daughters are driving in breaks down. Cleverly turning this incident into a metaphor for the mother’s emotional state, director Ann Husaini also uses it as a trigger for what follows next. Liz is distraught and waits for the voice of God to tell her what to do. A moving film about a mother with mental illness and her children, trying to understand a God and a world outside of their control.

Ann Husaini is a southerner with roots in India. She grew up in Tennessee and Georgia where she began a career as a film and TV editor. In 2006, Ann completed an MFA in film from Columbia University. The End of Magic, her thesis film, received development awards from Lifetime Television and the Caucus Foundation. She lives in New York City.

Based on a true story, Requiem is a complex portrait of Michaela Klinger and her deeply religious family growing up in Germany in the 1970s. Michaela (played by award-winning actress Sandra Huller) is a young college freshman who suffers from bouts of epilepsy and psychosis. Fatigued by a life of constant medications and doctors, Michaela abandons her meds. Things go from bad to worse when she starts to hear voices and becomes convinced that she is destined to suffer just as one of her most beloved saints. What follows is an almost unbelievable battle for her mind and her soul, pitting God against science. A series of exorcisms are planned to free Michaela from her demons and the result is as poignant as it is enraging.

Using an unadorned approach, Director Schmid captures the immediacy of the story while staying true to a 1970s aesthetic complete with production design, costumes and cinematography.

Hans-Christian Schmid was born in Altötting in 1965 and studied at the Academy of Television & Film in Munich (HFF/M). His breakthrough came in 1995 with his feature debut It's A Jungle Out There (Nach fünf im Urwald). His other films include 23 (1998, German Film Award in Gold - Best Actor), Crazy (2000, German Film Award in Silver), Distant Lights (Lichter, 2003, FIPRESCI Award Berlin 2003, German Film Award in Silver 2003), and Requiem.

Official Selection: Toronto International Film Festival (2006); Berlin International Film Festival (2006), Chicago International Film Festival (2006)

Silver Berlin Bear: Best actress Sandra Huller; Berlin International Film Festival, 2006

Sunday November 11 1:30PM This program is 18A

Experimental Fix - Real World Escape Routes

This group of shorts creates an alternating pattern between dark reality and the attempts to escape from it, which occasionally collide and become simultaneous. In a world too bleak, too unmanageable and too hopeless, drugs, madness or suicide may seem irresistible. Suffering is inevitable, but those choices are not.

These films look at the challenge of finding a way to break a pattern of despair, setting aside cynicism and moving cautiously but hopefully forward. Three escape routes are offered by the filmmakers here. The first is laughter. The second, shared by all of them, is creativity - finding the strength to transform pain into insight through art. The third is always alive and around us in the world… it is beauty. All three can be a beginning.

This short coherent animation makes a case for mental illness as a reasonable response to and retreat from the brutality of the world.

Director Daihiti Hasimoto makes his directorial debut with Naked Ape. Born in 1983, he graduated from Kobe Design University in 2006. He now works for CG Production in Tokyo.

Official Selection: Les Courts des Grand (Canada) 2007; Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival (France) 2007; Hiroshima International Animation Festival, 2006; Festival de Tres Courts (France) 2007; Stuggart Festival of Animated Film (Germany) 2007

From abstract to abject, a sadly simple image is the focus of a bewildered woman's monologue. We listen in to the disjointed thoughts of an Alzheimer’s or dementia sufferer.

Ruth Lakofski trained and worked in architecture, later exploring other arts including writing and video. She is single but has lived most of her life alongside two gay friends, one bipolar who killed himself awhile ago. She lives a creative life, but not a normal one.

Like a sleepwalker, an emotionally empty and dependant woman has all the vitality in her life projected on her by a controlling and aggressive other.

Sacha Fink has been making films and music over the last several years, while studying to become an electronics engineer in order to support this nasty habit. Her work explores themes of supernatural communion and sexual-disorientation.

So old it's new, this technically original animation shows the filmmaker's escape from depression by becoming an artist. Art is looked at from the perspective of the psychological needs it satisfies.

Daniel Barrow is a Winnipeg based media artist working in performance, video and installation. He has exhibited widely in Canada and abroad including the Museum of Contemporary Art (Los Angeles), New Langton Arts (San Francisco) and The Contemporary Art Gallery (Vancouver).

Official Selection: New Fest, Milwaukee Underground Film Festival, World Wide Short Film Festival, Miami International Film Festival

Echoing Michael Haneke's fascination with cruelty and video surveillance, Ugo Sanz subjects us to nine minutes of panic. An examination of malevolent, misguided authority under the guise of psychiatric innovation.

Having lived in Deba (Gipuzkoa), Ugo Sanz moved to Alcala de Henares (Madrid), his current place of residence. Today he combines his film work with a secondary school teaching job. Sanz studied film directing for two years at the Instituto del Cine in Madrid, and is now preparing for his fourth short movie as a screenwriter and director.

Official Selection: Calgary International Film Festival (2006); International Short Film Festival Interfilm, Berlin (2006); Fantasia Film Festival, Montreal (2006); Worldwide short film festival, Toronto (2006); Miami International Film Festival (2006); Sestao Fantastico, Spain, (2006); Dead by Dawn Scotland’s International Horror Film Festival (2006); Festival Court Metrange, France (2006); Dereel Independent Film Festival, Melbourne Australia (2007)

Dead by Dawn Scotland’s International Horror Film Festival: Cutting Edge winner (2006); Festival Court Metrange, (France): Best short film (2006); Dereel Independent Film Festival (Melbourne, Australia), 2007

In a film difficult to watch, two young Brits self-destruct on drugs and alcohol hitting hit rock bottom very fast… A reasonable person might resolve to drink only milk.

Jesse was born in West London and raised in a creative household on the Worlds End Estate. He studied painting and photography at the Chelsea School of Art & Design.

Co-forming the production company La Famiglia in 2003, Jesse has directed, produced and operated on a number of documentaries including the series, Don’t Hate Me Because, for Channel 4 television. Jesse’s latest short, Much Ado About A Minor Ting, is due for release in late 2007. Mash Up has played at festivals around the world.

Official Selection: Edinburgh International Film Festival (2006); Circuito Off Venice Short Film Festival (2006); The Times BFI 50^th London Film Festival (2006); Cape Town World Cinema Festival (2006); World Wide Short Film Festival, Toronto (2007)

A darkly hilarious film about a corrupt, Kafkaesque world run by fear and greed. Mental health and addiction are portrayed obliquely as the social consequences of a materialistic society.

Shaun Andrews has an extensive background in the arts, including a B.A. with distinction in Film from the University of Alberta. His award-winning short Argent liquide (Cash Flow) is his first independent film. Shaun recently returned from Switzerland where he had been living and working in the film industry for the past five years.

Water is the elegant, obsessive current in a woman's life. With a charged ambiguity, both real and symbolic, she floats into a final dream world. Suicide as peace.

Matthieu–David Cournot was born in France in 1977. After getting his Masters degree in International Law, he decided to work in movies. After graduating from la FEMIS in the Cinematography he worked on such films as Paris je t’aime and the upcoming j’veux pas que tu t’en ailles. He was nominated for a Cinematography award at the Cannes Film festival in 2006 for his work on Bir Damla Su. Voie d’eau is his directorial debut.

Official Selection: VCU Richmond film festival (USA); Sehsuchte (Germany); Festival of Nations, (Austria); Dakhla Festical (Morocco)

Solid acting and good art direction anchor this short drama, in which a father discovers his daughter has committed suicide. His response is primal and mysterious.

Nicolas Roy studied cinema at three different universities in Québec and directed a few experimental short films. Novembre, his first work of fiction, is part of a trilogy and has been presented at several festivals in Québec and France, notably the Festival international du court métrage de Clermont-Ferrand, exploring themes such as family, desolate country and death.

Official Selection : Off-Courts de Trouville, France/ Festival franco-québécois de courts métrages, September 2007; Reel Film Festival, Seattle, USA, September 2007; FCIAT - Espace Vidéo / Festival international de cinéma en Abitibi-Témiscamingue (November 2007); WSFF, Toronto. 2007; Regard sur le court-métrage au Saguenay, February 2007; Festival de Clermont-Ferrand, January 2007; Rendez-Vous du Cinéma Québécois. February 2007.

Awards: Jackson-Triggs Award for Best Emerging Canadian Filmmaker, WSFF, Toronto. 2007

Well paced and visually involving, resampled clips echo fragmented, discordant and purposeless modern lives. The structure itself is a cry for unity, resolution and fulfillment.

Aleesa Cohene is an experimental video artist and picture editor based in Toronto. Her work re-edits found media to build an emotional language through which to explore contemporary political problems. Her videos have shown in festivals and galleries around the world including Rotterdam, Germany, Brazil and Indonesia.

A compelling and compassionate film about prostitution and the drug abuse and poverty that often leave women with no other way out. Original and appropriate animation techniques blend real and emotional realms to convey the shaky, gritty world at its centre, while protecting us from it at the same time.

David and Alex have worked for many years on a variety of television, documentary, video and new media projects. The pair both worked on the 6 part documentary series Red Light Girls filmed in London, Los Angeles and Melbourne, produced by Granada television and shown throughout Europe. Revolving Door is their first animated project together. Currently they are developing their next animated feature length documentary, tentatively called Throwaway Women.

Official Selection: Worldwide Short Film Festival, Toronto (2007)/ Videobrasil, Brazil, (2007)

Awarded: Southern Panoramas 'Contemporary Investigations' Acquisition Award, Videobrasil (2007)

Sweet and sober advice is offered in glowing colour and tender nostalgic images. The end, however, has a chilling ambiguity as the child swims out to sea.

Christian Laurence was born in Montréal, in 1975. After graduating from the Cinema program at the University of Quebec, he founded the Kino’00 collective, a now international community of independent filmmakers (www.kino00.com). He was invited as Artist-in-Residency to numerous festivals in Russia, France, Australia and the USA. He has written and directed over 40 short films and worked on several others as cameraman or editor. In 2006, he edited Denis Côté’s last film, Nos vies privées.

Official Selection: Off-Courts Trouville 2006; *Best Experimental Short – Worldwide Short Film Festival, Toronto 2007; *Jury Special Mention – Expression en Corto, Mexico 2007

Sunday November 11 7:30PM This program is 18A

Other Visions of Healing: We’ve All Got (A) Rhythm

Many traditional societies do not have psychiatrists and even if they did, large numbers of people could or would not use their services. Instead, these cultures have devised time-honoured methods of helping their members through the illness, pain, trauma and grief they may encounter in their lives.

The films in this program take viewers on a journey along which several different cultures use highly rhythmic music and ritualized dance in their communities as a way to heal and restore the balance within. That the sounds and movements are irresistible should be no surprise. We are, after all, deeply programmed to respond, as even before birth we twist and turn through inner space in time to the beat of our mothers’ hearts -- and our own.

This short film not only shows how thousands of women in Africa and the Middle East use the trance-inducing music and dance of the Zar to cure all kinds of illnesses, it also sets hearts pounding and bodies swaying, preparing viewers for the longer film to follow.

A native of Washington D.C., Mrs. Sayada spent many years in Europe and the Middle East, first as a professional Arabic dancer, then as a film distributor with her husband. Currently she runs her company’s US office, teaches dance and produces Egyptian music albums.

The feature-length drama Pizzicata captures the sights, sounds and customs of a small village in southern Italy during World War II, where a love affair unfolds with tragic results. Dance and music play a central role in the story, as the courting pizzica allows the men and women to express their longing and desire and the tarantata exorcises the “bite of the tarantula” that follows searing grief.

Edaordo Winspeare was born in Klagenfurt (Austria) in 1965. He studied Modern Literature at the University of Florence and graduated from the School of Cinema of Munich (Germany). After his first short film in 1989, A Toilette's Short Story, he directed several documentary films (Il Ghetto di Venezia, 1989 ; San Paolo e la Tarantola, 1990). He directed his first full-length feature film in 1996, Pizzicata, followed in 1999 by Sangue Vivo.

Bogota Film Festival, Brozne Precolumbian Circle, director Edoardo Winspeare (1998); San Sebastian Film Festival, Best New Director, 1996; Molodist International Film Festival (1996)

Monday November 12 1:30PM This program is 18A

Hitting the Streets

City streets… the unforgiving negation of the urban landscape… this is the thread that runs through this year’s community program. Who are the people that call the street home? 133 Skyway, Waiting for a Bullet, and It Ain’t Easy to be a Rockstar are three films that let us into the psyches of those who are homeless and forgotten yet unbeknownst to us, still have hope. Two of these films, 133 Skyway and It Ain’t Easy to be a Rockstar are notable for the fact that they were made to empower those whose story they tell. Facilitated by Big Soul Productions, 133 Skyway provided training and film education to the crew, most of whom were Aboriginal youth. It Ain’t Easy to be a Rockstar is a film about crack - made by crack users.

A spare yet pointed short, Waiting straddles the worlds of illusion and reality and shows that the perception of what is is sometimes closer to the truth than reality itself.

Jamie M. Dagg was born in Timmins, Ontario and worked as a producer and director of music videos before writing, producing and directing his first short, Waiting.

Official Selection: Toronto International Film Festival (2006); Montreal World Film Festival (2006); NSI Film Exchange, Cinefest (2006); Whistler Film Festival (2006)

A raw and visceral portrait of urban homelessness and survival, Skyway tells the story of the friendship between two Aboriginal men, Hartley (played by Derek Miller) and Abel (Terry Barnhart). Hartley’s health is failing. He wants nothing more than to get his guitar back from a pawnshop. Desperate and poor, he must rely on his friend Abel and the compassion of a young woman who works at the pawnshop. With great performances and direction, 133 Skyway is ultimately a film about a man for whom music is survival.

Randy Redroad has written and directed numerous award-winning shorts, including Haircuts Hurt and High Horse, the feature film The Doe Boy and the groundbreaking short, Moccasin Flats. 133 Skyway is his latest contribution to Aboriginal media

David Collins and The All Saints Harm Reduction Group * Canada / 2005 / 25 min / DVD

Between 5 to 10 percent of the Canadian population is addicted to crack - one of the hardest drugs to kick. It Ain’t Easy To Be A Rockstar is a documentary about crack addiction, made by those who themselves use the substance. Featuring a cast of characters ranging from a former paralegal to a street worker, the film provides insight into the minds of those who were seduced by crack and continue to use it for reasons as far reaching and profound as they are.

The All Saints' Harm Reduction Group, a group of current and recovering drug users met at the All Saints’ Church Community Centre on a weekly basis for two years. The group formed a community, supported each other and shared strategies for reducing the harm related to their drug use. As a group project, members Tyson, Carmen, George, Brandy, Dexter, Gillian, Victor and others created this video detailing the life of homeless crack users in the downtown east end of Toronto. They learned to use cameras, conduct interviews and make editing choices. This story is theirs. The group was facilitated by David Collins, who along with being a harm reduction worker in the community, has created over 20 of his own short videos on a variety of topics that include homelessness and drug use.

Monday November 12 7:30PM This program is 14A

How does a child come to terms with the fragility of a parent? How do they make sense of the immensity and the deep divisions of the world around them? Where do they find hope? Sweet Mud and No me Gustan Los Peces de Colores (I Hate Goldfish), the films that make up this program, are beautifully rendered stories of loss and redemption as seen through the eyes of a child.

Sofia is a quiet, young girl with a lot of sass and a habit of killing her pets. The latest is her goldfish, which she flushes down the toilet. Her pet killing sends her straight to the psychiatrist’s chair, where she does little but frustrate the man and fiddle with her Rubik’s cube. She is convinced that all will be right with her world if she can solve this one, stubborn puzzle.

Yolanda Barrasa (Spain, 1970) is a European scriptwriter and director. She has studied with such script masters as Miguel Machalski (Million Dollar Baby), Fernando Castets (The son of the bride), Linda Seger and Syd Field, and worked herself as script teacher in San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba's ECTV.

She has directed two short films, two social documentaries and several audio-visual projects for concerts, stage plays and performances. Her last project is a contemporary version of classical Spanish theatre in which her audio-visuals play a key role. She is currently working as a filmmaker and scriptwriter in the social profile production company "Diversidad visual". At the same time, supported by Nekkofilms, Barrasa is co-writing with José Luis Fernández Puentes her new project "Los alveólos de la tierra" (The alveolus of the Earth), a screenplay about Clara Campoamor, the first Spanish congresswoman who campaigned for the women's right to vote in Spain in 1936. This project was selected in the European Films Crossing Borders under San Sebastian International Film Festival 2007.

In the utopia of an Israeli kibbutz in 1974, 12 year-old Dvir is steadfastly preparing to become a man. His bar mitzvah is close at hand and God is testing him with many trials. His father is dead, his brother is preparing to go to the army, and his gentle and lovely mother, Miri, is drowning in a sadness no one in the community quite understands. While life in the kibbutz seems idyllic, Sweet Mud probes beneath the surface and reveals a collective unwilling to accept any deviations from a stringently defined norm. Miri desperately wants to escape her oppressive life and hope comes in the form of her lover Stefan, who comes to visit from Switzerland. But soon he is cast out of the kibbutz and the loss of him shatters Miri. The young Dvir does all he can to help her, hoping that his love can be her grace.

Director Dror Shaul based this film on his own childhood memories of growing up on a kibbutz, which gives the film its intimacy. With beautiful cinematography and haunting performances, Sweet Mud is a deeply moving story about a boy who finds deep within himself the unbounded strength and compassion of the finest of men. A film not to be missed.

Dror Shaul is a film and commercial writer living in Tel Aviv. He grew up on a kibbutz. Following his military service he moved to Tel Aviv where he got his first job in the film industry as a production assistant. In 1999 he wrote and directed his first short film Operation Grandma, that won the Israeli Academy Award. In 2003 Dror participated in the Sundance Directors and Screenwriters Labs with Sweet Mud.

Official Selection: Toronto International Film Festival (2006); Berlin International Film Festival (2006); Sundance International Film Festival (2007); Toronto Jewish Film Festival (2007); Berlin International Film Festival (2007)

Awards: Jury Prize for World Cinema, Sundance Film Festival (2007); Glass Bear, Berlin International Film Festival (2007)

Tuesday, November 13 1:30PM This program is 14A

Many young people ask this question. One in eight will actually need treatment for mental illness or addiction, yet many few understand the complexities or vagaries of these afflictions. Programmer Seth Bernstein has provided a series of shorts that are an eclectic and story-driven exploration of mental health and addiction. From the darkly comedic Happy Now to the more serious documentary Into the Abyss, and the excellent short Soft, the films in the Senior Youth program cover a range of subjects and paint a comprehensive picture of some of the issues young people may face.

Robert Hofmeyr was born in Johannesburg in 1978 and graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts. He is currently a computer consultant in Cape Town. The Dune Runner is his first short film.

A darkly comedic take on consumer culture and the pharmaceutical industry, Happy Now is the story of Lance Campbell, who escapes from a testing facility run by the fictional drug giant, Zexler.

Brooks Hunter was born in Rutland, Vermont. He is currently residing in Toronto and working on a slate of new projects with his production company, Robanzo Pictures. Brooks specializes in directing and editing corporate videos, music videos and short films. After graduating from Sheridan College in 2005 in Media Arts, he worked for various production companies in Los Angeles, Cannes and Toronto. He is now focusing on creating increasingly more advanced material to enhance his vision and future opportunities.

In a cabin deep inside a forest, a man sits at a table contemplating his meal. To consume or be consumed? That is the question. In Ahul (Eaten), Elad gives us a well-constructed story of a man battling the voices and the dark, layers of reality that live inside his head.

Elad Rath is an advertisement and music video director. His long lost dream was always to make horror and fantasy films. In a country with no industry or market yet explored for horror and fantasy films, Eaten is the first of its kind in Israel. Elad is now writing the first Israeli horror TV film.

A trip to the local grocer for a carton of milk triggers an ugly incident of bullying and more importantly, a painful confrontation between a father and his son. Buried memories are never far from the surface in Soft, a powerful, dramatic short about a subject that all of us know in one form or another.

Simon Ellis graduated from Nottingham Trent University (Fine Art BA Hons) in 1995, specializing in Still Photography. He has written and directed many short films and music video since then, resulting in 400+ screenings on the International festival circuit, several awards, various invitations to festival juries, and a number of retrospective programmes worldwide. He is currently in post-production on his first feature film.

Awards/Festivals: Message to Man Film Festival: Best Short Fiction; Worldwide Short Film Festival: Best Live Action Short; Hamburg Int’l Short Film Festival: Audience Award; Best Live-action short, Toronto Worldwide Short Film Festival

Two old friends hack and yak about a life spent smoking cigarettes. If you need a reason to quit, this film might be a good one.

Ken Wardrop was born in Ireland and graduated from the Irish National Film School in 2004. His short films include the award winning Dampened Spirits, Useless Dog, and Ouch. His short film Undressing My Mother has received over 20 international awards including the Prix UIP at the 2006 European Film Academy Awards.

In this gritty, realistic, UK film, two young students on a search for drugs get more than they could have imagined.

Jesse was born in West London and raised in a creative household on the Worlds End Estate. He studied painting and photography at the Chelsea School of Art & Design. Co-forming the production company, La Famiglia in 2003, Jesse has directed, produced and operated on a number of documentaries including the series Don’t Hate Me Because, for Channel 4 television. Jesse’s latest short, Much Ado About A Minor Ting, is due for release in late 2007. Mash Up has played at festivals around the world.

Documentary filmmaker Matt Hogue introduces us to Ritchii, a 22 year-old musician and artist who also has schizophrenia and suffers from fetal alcohol syndrome. Ritchii has been in and out of care facilities, misunderstood by the system, on and off medication and yet he remains, in spite of the hardships put to him, a resilient and thoughtful man who finds peace in crowded places.

An intimate short documentary portrait of Chris, a young artist, and his reflections on life and his struggle to create art after undergoing surgery to remove a life threatening brain tumor and his subsequent diagnosis with mental illness. With an unparalleled passion for creating, and insightful reflections on how his experiences have shaped his work, Chris confronts traditional images of ‘madness’ and art and invites his audience to share his recovery through his work.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - or the DSM as it’s known in the trade - is the Bible on “Madness.” The Waiting Room is a brilliantly funny, tongue-in-cheek send-up of the idea of personality disorders, asking how much of these are labels or social constructs? After meeting some of the folks in The Waiting Room, it could be put forth that the difference between a personality and a personality disorder is simply nothing more than an entry in a book.

In 2003 Mona Ruijs was the recipient of Student Achievement Award at Open Channel in Australia. In 2005, she won the Sony Australia Script Writing Award and Most Innovative & Daring Production. Mona has had her films screened in Australia, Japan, Germany, Austria, Canada Lithuania, Croatia, the U.S.A and Holland.

In My Father’s Idea of Heaven, director RM Vaughn gives us a short film about a large subject - the relationship between father and son. Deeply personal yet unsentimental, Vaughn invites us to connect the dots ourselves, giving the film its lingering potency.

RM Vaughan is a Toronto-based writer and video artist. His latest book, Troubled: A Memoir in Poems, will be published by Coach House Books in April 2008.

Jared Mitchell is a Toronto novelist, editor and internet artist. His web-based stories on www.photonovella.com have been viewed by over 5 million people worldwide.

Official Selection: Global Super 8 Day. Squeaky Wheel, Buffalo NY. May 13, 2007; Splice This! Toronto, 2006

A moody and sombre tale of post-traumatic stress disorder, Homecoming is the story of a young soldier returning home from war. The soldier is as unprepared for the reception that awaits him as his father is about his condition. A quiet tale of ache and desperation.

Connie Diletti is a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She was the co-Producer of Lipstick & Dynamite. Piss and Vinegar: The First Ladies of Wrestling (2005), which screened internationally and won the “Best Storytelling in a Documentary” Award at the Nantucket Film Festival.

Tuesday November 13 7:30PM This Program is 18A

When children kill, is there always a reason? Do they have a personality disorder? Does bullying ever justify murder? What happens when a secret killer grows up and has children of his own? Wrestling with the larger questions of justice, redemption, evil and youth violence, this program brings you two eye opening documentaries, which like windows, let you gaze into the hidden depths of the human psyche.

In the Shadow of Feeling attempts to bare the heart of the “psychopath.” Jumping off from the chilling story of a young boy who strangles two classmates, this insightful documentary traces the history of psychopathy in modern Western culture. It looks at parenting styles, examines the ways in which personality disorders are fictionalized in film and TV, and exposes how these fictions have produced stereotypes of “psychopaths” that have in turn created a culture of fear and ignorance. Counteracting this meta-narrative are interviews with the young killer, whose admission that he feels “nothing” is both disarming and disturbing.

Bryan Law is a graduate of the 2005 Film Production Program at Confederation College in Thunder Bay. During his studies he wrote and directed four short films and one documentary. The film In the Shadow of Feeling is his first non-student production.

In the life and times of Bob Bechtel, he is by all accounts, a kind and gentle father to his two adult daughters, a loving and supportive husband to his devoted wife, and a dedicated educator to his psychology students at the University of Arizona. Now in his seventies, is Bechtel who he said he was?

Suddenly choosing to reveal a secret he held for fifty years, Bechtel exposes another side to his personality. Who was the man in 1955 that went on a calculated killing rampage through his college dorm in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, killing a fellow classmate? Filmmaker Macky Alston captures Bechtel’s frank confession, but the viewers are left to answer the tide of questions about crime and punishment, murder and redemption.

Macky Alston is a teacher and filmmaker of award-winning documentaries, including Discovery Films’ The Killer Within. His debut film, Family Name, won the Freedom of Expression Award at the 1997 Sundance Film Festival. Alston also serves as director of Auburn Media, a division of the Center for Multifaith Education at Auburn Theological Seminary in New York City.

Official Selection: Toronto International Film Festival (2006); Sydney Film Festival (2007); Atlanta Film Festival (2007)

Wednesday November 14 1:30PM This program is PG

Many young people ask this question. One in eight will actually need treatment for mental illness or addiction, yet many few understand the complexities or vagaries of these afflictions. Programmer Seth Bernstein has provided a series of shorts that are an eclectic and story-driven exploration of mental health and addiction. From the darkly comedic Happy Now to the more serious documentary Into the Abyss, and the excellent short Soft, the films in the senior youth program cover a range of subjects and paint a comprehensive picture of some of the issues young people may face.)

A humorous look at the complex dynamics of a mother/daughter relationship, My Nose is the filmmaker’s personal story of an unhappy trio - herself, her mother and her nose. Mom thinks the nose is suspect and needs some plastic surgery. Daughter wonders what changing it will do. Will she change, and more importantly, how will changing the organ affect her feelings toward the mother who gave her the apparatus in the first place?

An Emmy award-winning filmmaker, Gayle has made documentaries for TV, and produced news and reality shows including America's Most Wanted (FOX TV), New Attitudes (Lifetime series), and The Rosie O'Donnell Show (NBC). Her film, A Dog's Life: A Dogamentary premiered on HBO/Cinemax. Her feature film Look Who’s Ticking was a winner of the AIVF Screenwriters Mentorship program and is current in development.

Meet four Nova Scotia teenagers. Vincent is addicted to fast food, Greg hides behind his jokes, Kat is obsessed with beauty products and a bullied Raya retreats to her room. Generation XXL follows these four overweight adolescents at home and school, then goes with them as they attend a fit intervention program aimed at improving their self-esteem. As the kids struggle against junk food and soda pop, inactivity at the computer and with video games, peer pressure and relationships with their parents, we learn that weight loss is far more complex than simply getting off the couch.

Director Teresa MacInnes brings to Generation XXL her expert eye as a seasoned filmmaker and her sensitivity as a former social worker. Since 1988 she has directed more than a dozen documentaries for television, which have been broadcast nationally and internationally and garnered awards at many film festivals. Other directing credits include the documentaries Hope for the Future (2006), Teaching Peace In A Time Of War (2004), Learning Peace: A Big School With A Big Heart (2002), Waging Peace: A Year In The Life Of Caledonia Junior High (2001), Lost (1999).

Official Selection: Student Choice Award - Sprockets International Film Festival (2007)

Robert Hofmeyr was born in Johannesburg in 1978 and graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts. He is currently a computer consultant in Cape Town. The Dune Runner is his first short film.

Wednesday November 14 7:30PM This program is 14A

Labels and definitions are a cramped geography indeed, suggesting a static and all encompassing nature. Canvas, State of Mind and Fear/Less the three films that make up this program, defy a simple picture of people who live with schizophrenia. State of Mind a documentary short about the courageous and spirited Bill MacPhee, publisher of Schizophrenia digest, offers an insightful and truthful portrait of a man living with a mental illness that for years was seen as unequivocally debilitating. MacPhee proves that a man is more than a label. In Fear/Less and Canvas, the filmmakers present two families who come to terms with the impact of schizophrenia on their lives. Joseph Greco, the director of the feature film Canvas, who’s own mother had schizophrenia, gives us a deeply personal film that straddles two realities—harrowing and hopeful. In State of Mind, a short documentary, we meet a mother and son who speak candidly and emotionally about overcoming this mental illness and the myths that surround it.

Bill MacPhee has spoken to God. He’s walked toward upcoming traffic and he’s asked Scotty to beam him up. But Bill is much more than the sum of his parts—one of which is schizophrenia. The publisher of Schizophrenia digest, Bill is an extraordinary man and an advocate with a mission—to prove that even in the shadows rests a tangible and attainable form.

Mark Ashdown has worked as a writer, producer, and director (“Third Rail Ronnie”), “Last Call Kitchen”) for over a decade. He is currently involved with a tight group of media artists on a few feature length documentaries that delve into the lives of extraordinary individuals and the actions they take.

What exactly is schizophrenia? How does it manifest itself? Who are the people it affects and what are their stories? In Fear/Less the filmmaker separates fact from fiction through interviews with mental health professionals and the story of the Bigelow family who know first hand what it means to live and survive and manage the impact of Schizophrenia.

Born in Ottawa but living in Toronto since 1996, Thompson has worked in the independent and mainstream film and television industry for several years. Fear/Less is her second short documentary and third short film. Her aim is to couple engaging story telling with positive social change.

Director Joseph Greco gives us a powerful portrait of a small, loving and over wrought family dealing with the instability of schizophrenia in Canvas. Mary, played by Academy award winning actress, Marcia Gay Harden, is a fun and eccentric mother whose bouts of paranoia and delusion threaten to destroy the family that she has so carefully built. Her ten-year-old son Chris (Devon Gearhart) is adrift in a sea of confusion and rage that he cannot articulate. His over worked father, John (Joe Pantoliano) works tirelessly to pay for Mary’s treatment and has little time to give his son who quickly loses his way.

With excellent performances by all the leads, Canvas, is a very moving film about strength, commitment and the love a family can find even in the darkest of hours.

Joseph Greco graduated from Florida State University’s School of Motion Picture, Television and Recording Arts. His documentary The Ghost of Drury Lane won Best Film Short at the Houston International and Fort Lauderdale International Film Festivals. His follow-up, Lena’s Spaghetti, won Best Short Film Award at the Columbus International Film Festival. After graduating from film school, Joseph worked under Oscar-winning director James Cameron during the making of Titanic. His comedy script, The Big Secret, was a winner in the Script Magazine/Open Door Screenplay Competition, and he has produced and directed several projects for the Walt Disney Company. Canvas is his feature film debut.

Thursday November 15 1:30PM This program is PG

The perfect body, the perfect face, are they just a quick jog and nip and tuck away? What is really at the heart of this search for perfection that all of us feel the pressure of? The Junior Youth Program gives us the disease and possibly its antidote, with three films, Generation XXL, My Nose and The Dune Runner.

A humorous look at the complex dynamics of a mother/daughter relationship, My Nose is the filmmaker’s personal story of an unhappy trio—herself, her mother and her nose. Mom thinks the nose is suspect and needs some plastic surgery. Daughter wonders what changing it will do—will she change and more importantly, will changing the organ affect her feelings toward her mother who gave her the apparatus in the first place!

An Emmy award-winning filmmaker, Gayle has made documentaries for TV, and produced news and reality shows including America's Most Wanted (FOX TV), New Attitudes (Lifetime series), and The Rosie O'Donnell Show (NBC). Her film, A Dog's Life: A Dogamentary premiered on HBO/Cinemax. Her feature Film LOOK WHO'S TICKING, was a winner of the AIVF Screenwriters Mentorship program and is current in development.

Meet four Nova Scotia teenagers: Vincent is addicted to fast food; Greg hides behind his jokes; Kat is obsessed with beauty products and a bullied Raya retreats to her room. Generation XXL follows these four overweight adolescents at home and school, then goes with them as they attend a fit intervention program aimed at improving their self-esteem. As the kids struggle against junk food, and soda pop inactivity at the computer and with video games, peer group pressure and their relationships with their parents , we learn that weight loss is more complex, than simply getting off the couch.

Director Teresa MacInnes brings to Generation XXL her expert eye as a seasoned filmmaker and her sensitivity as a former social worker. Since 1988 she has directed more than a dozen documentaries for television, which have been broadcast nationally and internationally, garnering awards at many film festivals. Other directing credits include the documentaries Hope for the Future (2006), Teaching Peace In A Time Of War (2004), Learning Peace: A Big School With A Big Heart (2002), Waging Peace: A Year In The Life Of Caledonia Junior High (2001), Lost (1999).

Official Selection: Student Choice Award - Sprockets International Film Festival (2007), Best Documentary Award - ViewFinders International Film Festival (2007)

Thursday November 15 7:30PM This program is 18A

Queer Madness

The 2007 Queer Madness programme explores gender identity, highlighting the social and personal difficulties faced by trans- people in being and becoming who they are. A society and culture that regulates gender into binary expressions of either female or male has a lot to learn from the brave people featured in these films.

GenderPunk documents the struggle of a teenage trans-boy’s attempt to make sense of personal questions of gender, boyhood and the nature of identity. Taking the form of a video journal, Claro Cosco explores the limitations of mainstream notions of gender and identity.

Claro Cosco is a student artist working in video and other media. His work has been screened at Sprockets, Half-Cocked, Lennox Contemporary Gallery, herland festival, and Hot Docs, where it won 1^st Place in the Youth program. His video interests range from the socio-political to non-linear abstracted imagery and narrative.

Official Selection: Hot Docs International Documentary Film Festival (2007), Sprockets International Film Festival (2007), Youth Award: Sprockets International Film Festival (2007)

26-year-old Madison is in the process of becoming a girl and Vivien, her glamorous, apple-martini-drinking 80-year-old grandmother, has taken on the job of advising her on all things feminine.

Filmed over three years and culminating in Madison’s sex reassignment surgery, Madison's gender metamorphosis unfolds as a journey of self-discovery, with several surprises along the way.

Madison’s family in rural New Brunswick struggles to accept her new role in the family as a daughter instead of a son, and a sister instead of a brother. Her mother must go through her own transition, grieving the loss of her son, while rallying to support her new daughter. And Madison’s best male friend soon becomes much more than that, as they both discover that love can transcend even our own expectations.

Sometimes funny, sometimes painful, this sweet coming of age story is ultimately a personal and profound exploration of what it means to be a woman.

Girl Inside is co-produced by Maya Gallus & Justine Pimlott of Red Queen Productions, a company they formed in 2002 to explore provocative subject matter outside of the mainstream. Together they created, produced and directed Punch Like A Girl, the critically acclaimed six-part reality series on amateur women’s boxing. Punch Like A Girl was broadcast in Canada and the U.S. and was nominated for two Gemini Awards for Best Direction in 2003.

Official Selection: Hot Docs International Documentary Film Festival (2007), DOXA (2007), Atlantic Film Festival (2007), New Fest (2007), Frameline (2007), St. John’s International Women’s Film Festival (2007)

Friday November 16 1:30 PM This program is 14A

Many young people ask this question. One in eight will actually need treatment for mental illness or addiction, yet many few understand the complexities or vagaries of these afflictions. Programmer Seth Bernstein has provided a series of shorts that are an eclectic and story-driven exploration of mental health and addiction. From the darkly comedic Happy Now to the more serious documentary Into the Abyss, and the excellent short Soft, the films in the senior youth program cover a range of subjects and paint a comprehensive picture of some of the issues young people may face.)

Robert Hofmeyr was born in Johannesburg in 1978 and graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts. He is currently a computer consultant in Cape Town. The Dune Runner is his first short film.

In a cabin deep inside a forest, a man sits at a table contemplating his meal. To consume or be consumed? That is the question. In Ahul (Eaten), Elad gives us a well constructed story of a man battling the voices and the dark, layers of reality that live inside his head.

A trip to the local grocer for a carton of milk triggers an ugly incident of bullying and more importantly, a painful confrontation between a father and his son. Buried memories are never far from the surface in Soft, a powerful, dramatic short about a subject that all of us know in one form or another.

Awards/festivals: Message to Man Film Festival: Best Short Fiction; Worldwide Short Film Festival: Best Live Action Short; Hamburg Int’l Short Film Festival: Audience Award; Best Live-action short, Toronto Worldwide short film festival

Two old friends hack and yak about a life spent smoking cigarettes. If you need a reason to quit, this might be a good one.

In this gritty, realistic, UK film, two young students on a search for drugs get more than they could have imagined.

Jesse was born in West London and raised in a creative household on the Worlds End Estate. He studied painting and photography at the Chelsea School of Art & Design. Co-forming the production company La Famiglia in 2003, Jesse has directed, produced and operated on a number of documentaries including the series, Don’t Hate Me Because, for Channel 4 television. Jesse’s latest short, Much Ado About A Minor Ting, is due for release in late 2007. Mash Up has played at festivals around the world.

Documentary filmmaker Matt Hogue introduces us to Ritchii, a 22 year-old musician and artist who also has schizophrenia and suffers from fetal alcohol syndrome. Ritchii has been in and out of care facilities, misunderstood by the system, on and off medication and yet remains, in spite of the hardships put to him, a resilient and thoughtful man who finds peace in crowded places.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - or the DSM as it’s known in the trade - is the Bible on “Madness.” The Waiting Room is a brilliantly funny, tongue-in-cheek send-up of the idea of personality disorders, asking how much of these are labels or social constructs? After meeting some of the folks in The Waiting Room it could be that the difference between a personality and a personality disorder is simply nothing more than an entry in a book.

In My Father’s Idea of Heaven, director J.M Vaughn gives us a short film about a big subject - the relationship between father and son. Deeply personal yet unsentimental, Vaughn invites us to connect the dots ourselves, giving the film its lingering potency.

RM Vaughan is a Toronto-based writer and video artist. His latest book, Troubled: A Memoir in Poems, will be published by Coach House Books in April 2008.

Jared Mitchell is a Toronto novelist, editor and internet artist. His web-based stories on www.photonovella.com have been viewed by over 5 million people worldwide.

Official Selection: Global Super 8 Day. Squeaky Wheel, Buffalo NY. May 13, 2007; Splice This! Toronto, 2006

November 6-15, 2008

2007 Festival Program

Films At a Glance (212KB PDF)

Festival Panellist

OPENING NIGHT GALA

Thursday November 8 7:30PM This program is 18A

Desperately Seeking Normal

Stephanie Anne – “Going Home”

oil on linen 24 x 30

Artists statement and bio

Friday November 9 1:30 pm This program is PG

The Art of Mental Health

Friday November 9 7:30PM This Program is PG

Saturday November 10 1:30PM This program is 14A

**Kathleen Mullen, Jane Kim, Chris McCarrol * Canada / 2007 / 2min / BetaSP**

Saturday November 10 7:30PM This program is PG

Sunday November 11 1:30PM This program is 18A

Experimental Fix - Real World Escape Routes

Sunday November 11 7:30PM This program is 18A

Other Visions of Healing: We’ve All Got (A) Rhythm

Monday November 12 1:30PM This program is 18A

Hitting the Streets

Monday November 12 7:30PM This program is 14A

Tuesday, November 13 1:30PM This program is 14A

Tuesday November 13 7:30PM This Program is 18A

Wednesday November 14 1:30PM This program is PG

Wednesday November 14 7:30PM This program is 14A

Thursday November 15 1:30PM This program is PG

Thursday November 15 7:30PM This program is 18A

Queer Madness

Friday November 16 1:30 PM This program is 14A