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VIFF 2025 Shorts Segment Review: Forum 3 – The peripheral core

Jon The Blogcentric1 Comment

One thing about being into cinema is that it will give you a liking for short films. I saw a second segment or forum of shorts at the VIFF entitled The peripheral core. This segment, the third Forum segment, consisted of eight films that are very similar, very different, but tell a lot.

-Resistance Meditation (dir. Sara Wylie): In this documentary, we see a woman (possibly director Wylie) sleeping in bed. As she sleeps, Wylie talks about sleeping and how the time on the clock we follow is ‘corporate time.’ As she lays in bad, we learn she has a disability and she calls her sleep here ‘crip time.’ It’s not just for her sleep, but to rebel against the demands of the capitalist world.

Simply put, this is a five-minute documentary where the filmmaker has something to say. Although I don’t completely agree with her opinion about ‘corporate time,’ I like how she makes her statement in a creative way. It makes sense to present filming of sleeping and her speaking her belief about time, disability and rebelling against it.

-A Very Straight Neck (Japan – dir. Neo Sora): A woman wakes up from her sleep and has terrible neck pain. The dream she has haunts her. Her dream was she was lying face-down on the sidewalk of a busy street and the world passes around her. Even crumbling out of its existence in her mind.

This is a picturesque short film which the focus is on unspoken images and the main character narrating in the background. The biggest quality is the visuals as it adds to the story and creates the mood of what she’s trying to say. Sometimes we can understand the pain she’s going through. Very well done.

-Not Enough for the Love Inside (Brazil – dirs. Marcelo Matos de Oliveira and Wallace Nogueira): Cassio and Otto are both gay couple in Bahia, Brazil and both became blind recently. Cassio is unemployed while Otto is able to participate with a theatre group. Through all that happens in the story and Cassio’s body language, one can’t help but notice the relationship appears doomed to end.

The biggest quality of the film is the body language. I don’t know if both became blind from the same incident or from separate incidents, but you can understand how sudden changes can affect a relationship. The body language in the film is as valuable to the story as the dialogue itself. It creates the negative vibe of a relationship that is starting to fall apart.

-The Sphinx (USA – dir. Jesse Pavdeen): Harold is a young adult locksmith by profession, but he has a problem. He was born without a nose and he needs to wear a prosthetic. His nose falls off during a date, but his date doesn’t mind. She encourages him to come to a party. Things get worse when the people at the party want him to show ‘his true self.’ He takes his nose off and they all laugh. He runs to his estranged mother’s house, but she has the door locked with seven locks. Meeting with his father exposes the secret.

When you have short films, you should expect a bizarre comedy or two. Harold is seen as The Sphinx as The Sphinx itself has its nose missing. I’ve seen stories of missing body parts or weird body parts before, but this comedy does a unique job in showing one young man’s flaw and how the world treats him. Even his mother who has cut herself off from everyone. It’s a bizarre story that’s humorous too.

-Confluence (Canada – dirs. Charlene Moore and Oliver Darrius Merrick King): This is a documentary made by Indigenous members of the Winnipeg Film Group for their 50th anniversary. As images of parts of Winnipeg are shown on screen, the Indigenous members of the Group talk about various topics like their land and colonizing, being an Indigenous person, filmmaking as an Indigenous person and even envisioning the future and pondering ideas of what to film next.

I’m from Winnipeg and I remember the Winnipeg Film Group and how it took a modest area in an office building back in the 1990’s. The Group has grown a lot. This documentary is important because in recent decades, the Indigenous peoples are getting more into the arts and holding their own. Film has a bright future in Winnipeg, but the Indigenous filmmakers show the most promise and most envisioning. It’s good to hear them speak their minds about the topics as we view images of Winnipeg.

-In My Hand (Norway – dirs. Marja Helander and Liselotte Wajstedt): The film begins with a re-enactment of Norwegian Sami activist Niillas Somby waking up in prison with his amputated arm bandaged. Niillas narrated how he spent 21 years in prison and was involved greatly with Sami activism. He also talks of the accidental battery explosion from 1981 that led to the loss of his arm. He also talks of the time he went to Canada cleverly disguised as a white man and with a fake passport. The film ends in the present with present-day Niillas and today’s Sami activists.

This is another film that showcases the racism felt by a nation’s first peoples. In this case, it’s the Sami peoples of the Nordic nations. Niillas Somby tells his story about what it was like to be a Sami activist and of some of the illegal things he did in his life. We hear Somby narrate as the moments are re-enacted in front of us. This is a valuable story in learning about their struggle and has a message worth hearing.

-Cocotte Coulombe, Filmmaker (Canada – dir. Charles-Francois Asselin): Charles-Francois has always known his unmarried deaf aunt Cocotte. He does remember her bringing a film camera to family events. It’s after her death that he discovered she had taken lots of family films. As he watches the family films of hers, he discovers this was they way she communicated her love to them.

This documentary is great at telling its story. Cocotte’s family films play in the background as Charles-Francois tells his story of Cocotte and his recent discovery of the films. It’s an intimate story of how a film maker himself learns how home videos were not just a hobby for Cocotte, but also the means for a deaf family member to show her love to them. It was nice to watch.

-We Were The Scenery (USA – dir. Christopher Radcliff): In 1978, Hoa Thi Le and Hue Nguyen Che were Vietnamese refugees in a refugee camp in the Philippines. During that time in that same place, Francis Ford Coppola was filming Apocalypse Now and wanted to use the refugees as extras for the film. Le and Che rewatch Apocalypse Now and during the scenes, they point themselves out and mention of other people they knew personally as their appearances come on screen.

This is one documentary one would not expect. Most of us who saw Apocalypse Now probably never bothered to notice the extras were from a Vietnamese refugee camp. It was great to hear the story of how a couple who are married were those very extras and they saw it as just a way to make some extra money. It’s also a smart choice the director had them tell their story in Vietnamese. Although they are now American citizens, telling their story in Vietnamese only adds to this documentary.

And that was my experience with the short films from Forum 3: The peripheral core. Interesting how with this forum, five of the eight films were documentaries. Although I prefer watching live-action, I still found the documentaries intriguing to watch. Whatever the documentaries had to say, they said it well in their own way. For the live-action, they were unique to watch as well.

VIFF 2021 Shorts Forum: Programme 3

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I had already fulfilled one of my VIFF goals of seeing a segment of short films when I saw MODES 2. However I was hoping that for short films, I would see something less experimental and more in the lines of either documentaries or live-action storytelling. I had my opportunity when I saw the shorts segment entitled Programme 3. They were seven films by Canadian directors that were all unique in their films and their messages.

-Flower Boy (Canada – dir. Anya Chirkova): It’s summer. Nav is a musical dreamer. He plays music from piano to guitar to his analog synthesizer at parties. His girlfriend Sarah is a painter who has artistic dreams of her own. She even painted a portrait of Nav with a flower instead of a head. For summer income, Nav works at a laser tag ground where he does the typical duties and the co-workers talk of how much they hate the job and the boss. As the months pass, Nav grows further in love with Sarah, but knows summer will end and he will be heading to college in another province. Also during the job, the 60 year-old boss shows Nav that he had music dreams too, as a rock ‘n roll drummer. The boss shares with him his passion. As summer ends, he makes a decision that a surprise to all.

This is a nice picturesque story. The images do as much of the storytelling as the dialogue. The story is pretty much a celebration to any and all artistic dreamers. Even for those who eventually went on to pursue real jobs. Those who’ve had artistic dreams of their own when they were young can identify with this story of see themselves in some way somehow. This also works well for me because I had dreams of being an actor when I was younger and, well, I turn 50 next September. It’s a reminder of no matter how old you get or even how successful you are at your real job, the dream never dies. Even if it’s in an against-all-odds profession, it’s still worth it to chase the dream and never stop dreaming!

-Things We Feel But Do Not Say (Canada – dir. Lauren Grant): Genevieve is hurting, but does not make it obvious. Later we learn what’s been hurting her. The pregnancy that’s supposed to be, isn’t. It’s a miscarriage. She tries to keep it inside, even to her husband, but you know it’s going to come out. She goes with him to the doctor’s appointment and tries to keep a poker face about it, but you know it will come out. Then it does. She then returns back to her work, greeted warmly by her friend, and carries on with her day.

This isn’t just a story about a miscarriage and the hurt one feels. It’s also about trying to hide emotions and go about daily life, even though one is hurting inside. The body language actually does more telling about the story and Genevieve’s feelings than the dialogue. That’s what the film is for the most part. About unspoken feelings we hold deep inside.

-Tla-o-qui-aht Dugout Canoe (Canada – dir. Steven Davies): Joe martin is a 66 year-old man from the Tofino First Nation. His profession is making dugout canoes: canoes made from trees that are dug out from the trunk. He is skilled from teachings from his late father. The skills he uses to make the canoes, like the hand-carving and painting, are centuries-old traditions passed on from his people. The skills and canoes were scorned upon by the Canadian government decades ago who had a system to assimilate the Indigenous people, robbing them of their culture and language and sending them to Residential Schools where they were abused and neglected mercilessly. Joe is now free to make his canoes. His daughter Tsimka uses the canoes he made to take visitors on tours of Clayoquot Sound.

This is one of two documentaries that’s part of ‘indigiDOCS.’ This allows the canoe maker to tell his story of his craft and how it’s important to him and his people. At a time when Indigenous peoples are going through Truth And Reconciliation and working to take back what was stolen from them in the past, like their languages and cultural rites, this is an important documentary. You learn of the skill of how it’s important for the maker and his people and why it’s worth keeping alive and worth passing on to generations.

-News From Home (Canada – dir. Sara Wylie): It’s March 2020. A daughter makes a phone call to her mother. She has anxiety and she’s scared. She doesn’t know what to do. She wants to fly back to be with her mother, but her mother advises it’s not a smart idea. This breaks the daughter’s heart. She’s scared and frustrated to tears. She just doesn’t know what to do. Another phone call some days later. The daughter again calls the mother. The daughter doesn’t have the same frustration she had during the first phone call. She reassures her mother she’s calmed down, if imperfectly. The mother says things of reassurance. It ends with a friendly goodbye.

This is a film that consists of recorded phone calls, home movies, and the images of the rooms inside the hose where the calls took place. No actors or people present. One thing we should not forget is it’s in March 2020 when the COVID pandemic hit Canada and all these social restrictions and isolations started taking place. There was a lot of fear among people about what would be next. I too anticipated this could be the next Influenza. This film captures the moment. Even reminds us of our own first moments of dread when this all started. However it also shows the moment of relief and reassurance over time. It even shows the close bond of family. It’s that bond with someone who reminds us things will be fine that we all need.

-Indigenous Dads (Canada – dir. Peter Brass): The film is a documentary. It’s an interview of four Indigenous fathers from across Canada and of various Indigenous Nations including Brass himself. Two are fathers of two, one is a father of four, and one is a father of one. All of them share their feelings of what it was like when they became a father for the first time, both positive and negative. All four talk about how fatherhood made them grow and change as men. All talk of their love for their children. They also all talk of how they teach their children of what it is to be Indigenous and how they even remind them of the racism they can face. They also all talk about their hopes and dreams for their futures and what they want their children to grow us to be.

This is an important documentary short. It’s very inciteful. This shows a side of being both a father and being Indigenous that we rarely see. It’s an eye opener to this subject. It reminds you of the immense responsibilities these men have to face and are willing to face head-on, despite how hard it is. They speak their hopes, their joys and their fears. There are times of great emotion as well. I’m really glad I saw this.

-Srikandi (Indonesia/Canada – dir. Andrea Nirmala Widjajanto): Anjani, a young girl in Indonesia, is about to start college. This comes in the aftermath of the death of her father and as her mother is about to sell the house. Something her daughter is out protesting over. Soon, her daughter discovers something. She comes across her father’s puppet studio. Her father’s profession was the traditional Indonesian puppetry of Srikandi. She discovers she has been taught the skills of Srikandi by her father, even though Srikandi is traditionally forbidden o females. Anjani makes a decision about her career path to her mother. Her mother is not happy with it as it won’t guarantee a steady income, but Anjani is firm in her decision as he is days from leaving for Jakarta.

This is a student film from a Vancouver Film School student. Andrea Widjajanto is born and raised in Indonesia and came to Vancouver to study film. This is another film about artistic passions burning inside one’s self. This is also as she faces the heartache of the death of her father and the time in one’s life where she’s reached the college age and now preparing for a path she is to pursue for the rest of her life. This is a good film as it involves an artistic puppetry few people from outside Indonesia know about. It also reminds you that this desire to pursue your dream with the pressure from others to pursue something more bankable and steady is universal. It transcends cultures and borders. The dream to pursue one’s dream is universal. Despite the story taking place half a world away, one can relate to the story.

-Together (South Korea/Canada – dir. Albert Shin): It’s a seaside motel in South Korea. Two strangers who met online with fake names, a young-adult female who goes by the name Happy Virus and a middle-aged male who goes by Rabbit Doll X, are there. They are here for one reason: a suicide pact. Both have a cooking element and chemicals ready to do the job. During the time there, they talk about their lives and what they’ve been through. They take an interest in each other and even laugh and have a mini-party of just the two of them. It gets to the point the woman feels she can’t go through with this.

This is a story by Korean-Canadian director Albert Shin that treads on a serious subject matter. It’s of a common thing in South Korea of the type of suicide pact where two strangers with suicidal feelings meet online to commit their suicide together. Shin taps into human feelings as well as ethics and morals. In the end, he delivers a story that goes from potentially tragic to life-affirming in the end.

Overall these seven shorts have their differences, but they share a lot in common. All are from either Canadian directors or students in Canada. Some are documentaries or docudramas, while some are live-action. Most are in English while two are in different languages. All speak a message about the human spirit and human feeling.

Each of the seven films of the VIFF Shorts Segment Programme 3 either contain an aspect of life that we can all relate to or they will open our eyes. All of them are valuable to watch. I’m glad I had the chance.