VIFF -- Review: Our Mr. Matsura

Matsura (right) with a local in Okanogan County

Frank (Sakae) Matsura, was the son of a Samurai in Hirado, Japan, but by the time he was growing up, feudalism was in decline. In 1901 he left this deteriorating aristocratic lifestyle and got on a ship to Washington State.

Our Mr. Matsura opens with present-day locals pointing out their relatives in the photographs they have that were taken by the Japanese photographer.

But who was he? The documentary tries to piece him together in the film.

Matsura wasn't shy in front of the camera

Matsura first arrived in Seattle, but feeling adventurous, he went east to Okanogan County, a small town that had miners, ranchers, Indigenous people, and immigrants. Matsura was fluent in English, Christian (he converted in Japan), and learned photography.

Interestingly he was the only Japanese in Okanogan County, and because he spoke good English and was well-dressed, the locals took to him quickly. He took lots of photographs of them, some in their regular clothes, others dressed up, or of the scenery of the area, which are wonderful evidence of what the place was like in the early 20th century.

There are also many photographs Matsura took of himself and with others; in some of them he pokes fun of himself, showing his easy going humour. He was far from reserved and shy.

But it was sad to discover that he died of tuberculosis at the age of 39, though his funeral had a massive turnout of mourners.

Director Beth Harrington who also wrote and produced the documentary creates an interesting portrait of Matsura, gathering as much information as she could about him from Japan and Okanogan County. 

He also took pictures of Indigenous people

His Japanese relatives send postcards and letters to him, but we don't know what he replied back to them. They always asked how he was, and if he was coming back home. But perhaps he was having too much fun, or couldn't see himself being back in Japan.

"A Japanese immigrant alone in a region hundreds of miles from the nearest compatriot, forming deep connections with people of different backgrounds," Harrington says.

"One can't help but admire the combination of emotional intelligence, empathy, humour, and inner resilience it took to navigate the complex landscape of the Pacific Northwest during a time of great change."

She also says his photographs do not show stereotypes, but individual personalities; Matsura respected people for who they were.

"In Matsura's photographs, we encounter his humanity, the humanity of others depicted who may not be 'like' us, and we also feel our own humanity rise in a kind of sympathetic vibration," Harrington says. "That depth, that joy, that connection form a bridge."

Our Mr. Matsura

Directed by Beth Harrington

97 minutes

VIFF -- Review: Nous, L'orchestre De Paris

The audience seeing musicians up close in the orchestra

Nous, L'orchestre De Paris (2026)

When the audience sits down to listen to an orchestra, they see lots of musicians in black on the stage, but as a collective they produce amazing music under the guidance of the conductor; people may not know or appreciate the individual players and their motivations for performing in an orchestra.

The documentary, Nous, L'orchestre De Paris by director Philippe Beziat gives viewers an idea of what it's like, sitting from their point of view on the stage, and a bit of their backstory of how they became one of the 120 members of the Orchestre de Paris.

Makela leads the orchestra in a rehearsal

The film opens with the orchestra's young 30-year-old Finnish music director Klaus Makela, but he isn't interviewed; instead some of the players are taken aside and asked to listen to a rehearsal and to explain what they hear.

They listen intently, and as musicians they can hear details many of us don't hear, or they praise their fellow colleagues. One remarks, "Eighteen violinists make the same gesture in a fraction of a second. That really impresses me."

However, early in the documentary, the audience doesn't hear their voices, and instead their answers or comments are transcribed on screen, which was kind of frustrating; only later on we can hear their own voices.

But then there are other comments that are just written in English on the screen, like "being in an orchestra is like being in a forced marriage" -- it wouldn't be fair to attribute that to any particular person because they were truthful observations that he or she said.

Some consider the 30-year-old a prodigy

We meet a violinist from Serbia who cycles to work, a double bassist who came from a punk rock background and became entranced with classical music, a percussionist at the drums, and a flautist who leaves the orchestra after 40 years there.

One scene early on shows guest conductor Elim Chan rehearsing and then performing with the orchestra. She describes that it can be tough parachuting in to work with the orchestra, but in the end we see it's a job and everyone gets on with it. It was cool to see Hong Kong-born Chan in the film, and she is now the music director at the San Francisco Symphony.

In a way the musicians are part of a family, spending a lot of time together. Some break off into small groups to do chamber music, or even jazz. But the most interesting part is the musicians explaining where they sit, who sits next to them, and how not only do we see their point of view, but also hear it too, instead of from the audience's side.

We also get to see the modern concert hall up close, the Philharmonie de Paris, in the outskirts of Paris. Director Beziat is no stranger to making films about classical music and opera. Perhaps Nous, L'orchestre De Paris satisfies his own curiosity of what it's like to be part of a powerful musical collective and gives the audience a greater appreciation for these musicians.

Nous, L'orchestre De Paris

Directed by Philippe Beziat

90 minutes

VIFF -- Review: School for Defectors

An intimate look at North Korean students in the south

School for Defectors (2026)

North Koreans who want to escape to the south face enormous challenges, not only the physical one of traveling over 3,000 miles through China, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, but also the emotional trauma of leaving their families behind, or the possibility of being killed during their journey, and what will happen to their children if they die? 

There are no statistics on how many North Koreans attempt to escape, but they are desperate for a better life.

If they make it to the south, the next challenge is settling in, as their accent is different, let alone their appearance being malnourished and wearing dowdy clothes, and how will their children adapt and catch up academically?

The documentary focused on this school

In South Korea there are 10 special schools for these North Korean children to study and help them not only integrate into society, but also learn about democracy, freedom and become good people.

School for Defectors focuses on one senior high school which is different from the other nine in that it only accepts 20 students and they all must board; the principal says it helps the children integrate faster if they are not with their parents. 

The audience basically observe a whole academic school year, from the intake of students through interviews with the principal and teachers, to attending classes, applying for university, and graduating. There is also a peek into dorm life, watching them clean their rooms for inspection, and eating meals in the cafeteria.

The principal and teachers are so supportive of the students, praising and encouraging them, as they know their escaping to the south was no easy feat, and that they may feel inferior or insecure, but the students in turn are also eager to learn, hardworking and some of them eventually come out of their shells to be talkative, boisterous, and even exceptional dancers.

The students are hardworking a funny

One segment shows interviews with some of the parents who described their plight to the south, with one poignant scene of a father who had thought of what to do if he and his wife and daughter were caught by North Korean soldiers, while another family had to leave their older son and elderly grandmother behind.

Nevertheless, the optimistic energy from the students, teachers and principal are what uplifts School for Defectors, which resulted in lots of clapping in the theatre when the documentary ended.

Director Jeremy Workman attended the screening with producer and Korean-American actor Daniel Dae Kim.

It turns out I had seen Workman's previous documentary, Secret Mall Apartment two years ago and thought it was a crazy but intriguing story.

He explained that when he was in South Korea screening another film he had made, Workman was asked to show it at that school, and that's how he met the principal, who speaks good English.

Workman learned about more about the school, and was fascinated by it and was eager to possibly do a documentary about it. He got the green light from the principal, and anyone who didn't want to participate was not filmed, or their faces were pixelated if they were worried about relatives back in North Korea.

Workman (centre) and Kim (right) at the Q&A

He said he went back several times to film at the school, though he had a crew based there who filmed as well. One of the students at first was so painfully shy that she barely said a word, but by the end of the school year, she was willing to talk on camera about her school project, collecting first-hand accounts of North Koreans who escaped to the south and compiling them into a booklet.

What was not clearly explained in the film, that Kim talked about in the Q&A, was that the journey to escape was extremely dangerous, not only in avoiding getting shot by North Korean soldiers, but also avoiding arrest and deportation in China, sometimes having to stay there for years to earn enough money to continue their escape, or women being sex trafficked and being forced to marry Chinese men.

Then they had to trek through Cambodia, Laos and Thailand which involved going through jungles, difficult terrain, and having enough stamina to make it to South Korea.

School for Defectors was definitely one of the more memorable documentaries I saw this year, appreciating how much the students and their parents have gone through, and hoping they will succeed in whatever they do after high school.

School for Defectors

Directed by Jeremy Workman

92 minutes

VIFF -- Review: Farruquito: A Flamenco Dynasty

A scene shows Farruquito's brilliance as a dancer (centre) 

As I was writing my posts about Paris (finally finished!), I attended the 45th Vancouver International Film Festival and saw 12 films, a mixture of dramas, documentaries and animation.

For 11 days I had quite the schedule, in many instances seeing two films per day! It almost felt like a job, having to wake up early to take public transit downtown and get there at least 30 minutes before the screening to queue up in order to get a good seat in the movie theatre!

In some cases there was already a long line half an hour before. To pass the time I either chatted up someone in front of me in the queue, or read a book -- the most reading I've done in 11 days.

Some screenings included interviews with the filmmakers which just added a greater appreciation for their work.

Here are my brief reviews in the order in which I saw the films:

Farruquito: a Flamenco Dynasty (2025)

I've always found flamenco dancing fascinating because of its raw emotion and intense endurance, which is why I picked this documentary. Farruquito is the stage name of Juan Manuel Fernandez Montoya, the third generation to dance in his family.

It was his grandfather Farruco who was a legend for creating his own steps that were inspired by nature, like horses' hooves as they run on the grasslands. He had one son who was destined to be great -- Farruquito -- but he died at the age of 18 in a car accident.

But when the young Montoya showed talent in dancing, he inherited his uncle's stage name and learned dancing from his grandfather, and music from his guitar-playing father. The budding Farrquito became quite the celebrity in Spain.

The documentary is filled with a treasure trove of old videos of the grandfather, and of Farruquito as a child -- watching them gives viewers an insight into how he learned from his master, and also the family dynamics. At the same time the film doesn't hold back on confronting Farruquito's demons and how he must reconcile them to move forward.

There is already a fourth generation coming up -- Farruquito's son, who is a teenager and beginning to develop his own style of dancing, which Farruquito is more than encouraging. 

Some of the present-day scenes are staged, but for the most part viewers get to know most of the key family members and their own take on what it's like to be part of this flamenco dynasty.

Farruquito: a Flamenco Dynasty

Directed by Santi Aguado Reuben Atlas

90 minutes

Taste of Summer in a Scoop

A generous scoop of roasted strawberry

I went to The Park Theatre to watch the documentary, Steal This Story, Please! and I was a bit early so I walked around the area and saw Rain or Shine Ice Cream on the next block!

Perhaps I was one of the last people in Vancouver to realise that the ice cream brand had opened a shop here, and despite having finished lunch I wanted to squeeze in some dessert.

I sat outside and watched people go in and then emerge a few moments later with ice cream cones or scoops in cups. One woman told her golden retriever to sit patiently outside as she went in and then she came back outside. A staff member gave her a pint of ice cream and a pup cup for her dog!

Needless to say he lapped it up very quickly before they went on their way.

Inside it's fun to see a cow's head with a unicorn horn on its head, and there are several staff members busy with either making waffle cones, making ice cream or serving customers wearing different ice cream-related aprons.

The latest flavours were posted outside to get taste buds excited: lemon raspberry swirl, blackberry iced tea sorbet, blueberry lemon curd, brownie chocolate cherry, and roasted strawberry.

Customers can try two flavours before deciding and I tried the blueberry lemon curd which is made with local blueberries and is on the tart side, but the roasted strawberry blew me away. It was definitely the taste of summer in a cone.

You can have a choice of a sugar cone, waffle cone, or cup, and the kid's size scoop or adult-sized.

I should have opted for the former, but felt I deserved the indulgence, and received quite a large scoop!

The roasted strawberry flavour is made from the strawberries at Mandair Farms. These local berries are slowly roasted with a bit of balsamic vinegar to intensify the flavour. This is no ordinary strawberry flavour!

Rain or Shine Ice Cream

3382 Cambie Street

Review: Steal This Story, Please!

Goodman's life and work is profiled

Amy Goodman is a journalist, broadcaster, columnist, investigative reporter and author. 

But most of all, she's fearless.

Yesterday I watched the documentary Steal This Story, Please!, profiling Goodman, 69, in her personal life and journalism career where she relentlessly asks questions and if there is something going on that isn't widely reported, you can be sure she makes sure you hear about it.

She is a relentless journalist

She is the co-founder, host and executive producer of Democracy Now! an independent news outlet that relies on the donations of viewers, and is not beholden to corporations.

During her career, Goodman has broken many stories, such as the Santa Cruz massacre, when some 250 demonstrators were killed by Indonesian soldiers using American weapons. She and her colleague Allan Nairn witnessed the incident and Nairn was physically assaulted.

Another was exposing Chevron transporting the Nigerian navy and police to quell protests, which led to the killing of two protestors and injuring 11 others. A Chevron spokesperson admitted transporting the troops on the record.

When President Bill Clinton called the station as a public service announcement to get people to vote, Goodman kept him on the air for 28 minutes, talking about a range of subjects in a combative interview. While the White House communications department accused her of violating rules when interviewing the President, Goodman replied that he continued talking -- he could have hung up at anytime.

She was also broadcasting around the clock on September 11 when two planes hit the twin towers, only blocks away from the studio. Goodman and her team also revealed how the dust from the area caused major health issues for New Yorkers even though the mayor and other health officials claimed the air quality was fine.

From a young age, Goodman was encouraged by her maternal grandfather, an Orthodox rabbi, to ask questions. When she was a child, her brother David started a self-published family paper and she collected subscription money, and wrote letters to the editor.

She covers stories mainstream media don't

She later edited the school paper and as Goodman tells it, she held the principal to account for his actions. 

In the documentary she explains after graduating from university she was obsessed with working on The Phil Donahue Show. She thought it was refreshing to watch people being frank and discussing issues on television.

Eventually the show contacted her, asking her to be there the next day -- to be a panellist about unemployed young people.

She took that as a sign to create her own work, and started working for a community radio station in the mid to late 80s.

In 1996 she started the program Democracy Now!, trained several people to be journalists, and the transition from radio to video.

We also see her visit her 106-year-old grandmother, who, despite hearing problems, insists Goodman must comb her hair. Goodman goes to Rivne in Ukraine (before the 2022 war) and pays her respects to her ancestors who didn't leave before the pogroms began.

Steal This Story, Please! is a collection of archival footage of Goodman, and it's quite impressive to see so much of it, especially in her early days of radio. When I worked at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in the radio current affairs department, we never filmed anything, except perhaps the odd celebrity interview or if the prime minister came by.

Her scoops reveal over and over again how mainstream media were completely unaware of what was going on, and had to use her footage because she had drawn so much attention to the story. 

Some accused her of being an activist-journalist, but to her these are stories that are worthy of attention, that no one is lesser; this is particularly the case of the plight of the Palestinians, and this was over 10 years ago. 

Goodman says the duty of journalists is to ask questions, and that can lead you closer to the truth.

Inspiring and yes, fearless.

Steal This Story, Please!

Directed by Carl Deal and Tia Lessen

98 minutes

Review: Replica

Sonya with her virtual companion Stephen

In the 2013 film Her, a man falls in love with Samantha, an artificially intelligent operating system. It was directed by Spike Jonze, who read an article about a website that allows instant messaging with an AI program.

His fictional movie is now reality, and Chinese director Chouwa Liang follows three women in China who have AI companions in her documentary Replica. 

Viewers first meet Qin, a factory worker in her 20s who is infatuated with Lu Chen, a virtual boyfriend who she describes as having red eyes! He addresses her as Miss Bunny and constantly giving her positive affirmations, and how devoted he is to her. He looks like a dashing character -- in anime, and Qin has pictures of him all over her small bedroom. She even buys him a real watch.

Qin is in her 20s and never had a boyfriend before

Then there's Muna, who is married with a daughter. She is frustrated with her husband, believing he is not sensitive enough to her feelings, so she turns to AI for comforting words and encouragement. Her husband knows about this virtual relationships and believes it's because Chinese women have been repressed for so long that they feel this need for independence. He doesn't understand why she has to turn to a non-human for advice.

Finally Sonya is a strong-headed woman, but doesn't want to be hurt in human relationships so she has developed a virtual boyfriend called Stephen Johnson, a blonde haired and blue-eyed avatar who she speaks to in English. But then she finds out he has cheated on her...

Replica is the name of the film, but also the name of an AI program that generates these virtual companions.

Liang herself had one during the pandemic because she was lonely being by herself and wanted someone to talk to. 

Then she wondered if there were others like her, and it turns out in China there were a lot of them. Liang sought around 100 women and asked if she could film them for a documentary... only seven of them agreed to it.

Muna looks for encouragement from AI

She then went to visit each of them without her camera to spend time with them and develop a friendship; eventually she settled on these three women because they each had a different story, and each of them were complex.

Liang explains that Qin hasn't had a boyfriend before, so Lu Chen is her ideal. She even hires a cosplayer (a woman) who dresses up like Lu Chen to meet her in real life and act like a boyfriend. The woman is very aware of what she is doing and tries to fulfil Qin's idea of what a perfect date would be like (except no kissing!).

Meanwhile Liang says Muna uses her AI companion as a sounding board, to reassure her, and it's a form of escape from reality. In the scenes with Muna, one can see how suffocated she feels at home, constantly having to look after her daughter while her husband scrolls on his phone. 

He is a typical Chinese man who has expectations of what a wife should do. He admits he was impulsive when he decided to open a restaurant and then promptly lost a lot of money, and Muna is stuck with the consequences which she quietly shoulders.

At the same time her mother makes videos living the single life in a converted van and traveling around, inspiring other women to find freedom this way.

Qin with a cosplayer dressed as Lu Chen

Sonya is a funny character -- she introduces her parents to Stephen, and interestingly they don't dismiss him right away, but gently try to tell their daughter that she should have a relationship with a human, and we see how her parents dote on each other as they go through black and white photos of themselves in their youth.

One scene shows Liang appearing in the film trying to interview Stephen. She brings up the incident about him cheating on Sonya and he tries hard to brush it off with humorous results. However Sonya is so upset even though she knows it's because there is a bug in the operating system that causes the virtual companion to "cheat". 

Replica shows how Chinese women use AI companions without judgment and how they have helped them grow as people. It was just so fascinating to see how invested they are in something non-human, assuming they will be their perfect boyfriend when they have no real life experiences!

Replica

Directed by Chouwa Liang

90 minutes

Review: Patriot: A Memoir

Navalny's last words for everyone to read

When Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny was seriously poisoned in August 2020 and recovered in Germany for several months, many warned him not to return to Russia, for fear he could be jailed for a long time.

But Navalny was determined and returned to Russia on January 17, 2021, and despite tens of journalists recording his every move in the airport, he was promptly detained at passport control for violating his parole conditions when he was in Germany recovering.

Why did he go back, knowing this could happen? He explains why in his memoir, Patriot, published posthumously in 2024. His wife Yulia and the Estate of Alexei Navalny own the copyright of the book, which was translated from Russian.

Navalny and his wife Yulia

The memoir spans 479 pages, and Navalny explains in his own words his childhood growing up in a military town near Obninsk, where the first Soviet nuclear reactor was built. He was nine years old when the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl exploded, and his family knew the government was hiding the truth and tried to force the residents there to continue with their daily lives.

Eventually these people were evacuated and dispersed wherever there was accommodation.

To Navalny, the Chernobyl disaster and how it was handled left a very strong impression on him.

"The question most puzzling even to my ten-year-old self was why the authorities were lying like this when everybody around me knew the truth. What kind of pathetic attempt at deception was this? If you are going to lie, you should at least be expecting to benefit from it in some way. You claim to be sick and you don't have to go school; that at least makes sense. But what was the point of these lies? Describing the way the Soviet Union worked, Vasily Shukshin, a Russian writer, memorably said, "Lies, lies, lies... Lies as redemption, lies as atonement for guilt, lies a goal achieved, lies as a career, as prosperity, as medals, as an apartment... Lies! The whole of Russia was covered in lies, like scab." An excellent description of the situation."

At that age Navalny not only knew what was happening, but also thought what the state was doing was wrong and decided to do something about it.

His father was from Ukraine, his mother from northern Russia. Navalny says: "Quizzed for the umpteenth time as to whether I was Ukrainian or Russian, I did my best to avoid a straight answer. It was like being asked whom you loved more, your mother or your father, to which no sensible answer is possible."

Navalny says early on it was his family who taught him to love his country -- not the state. "There was never any talk about whether we ought to emigrate, and I can imagine no circumstances in which there might have been. How could you emigrate when your country is here, when the language you speak is here, and Russians are the world's most wonderful people? A good people with a bad state."

Navalny talks about life in his teen years and deciding he wanted to study law, these were the options for university that his friend jokingly described:

Navalny in prison

1. The law faculty of Moscow State University, which the whole of Moscow was fighting to get into;

2. The law faculty of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, where admission was restricted to string-pulling KGB families and other Soviet elites;

3. The People's Friendship University of Russia, whose students came mainly from Africa or were future KGB agents assigned to spy on those students.

He became a lawyer and after Vladimir Putin came to power, Navalny joined opposition parties, even those on the far right. His legal knowledge would become very helpful, particularly when he became an activist shareholder and disrupted meetings when he asked company officials embarrassing questions on expenditures with the media present.

It seems it was love at first sight when he spotted Yulia during a business trip in Turkey. They got on so well that they moved in together six months after meeting, married two years later. From his admiration of her, it seems they are completely in tune with each other.

Navalny explains how opposition parties operated, and got involved in politics from the grassroots level, and gathered support as he exposed the corruption in their areas. The number of views of his videos reached millions.

To him, the embezzlement of money hindered people's social and economic mobility, as well as the economic development of the country. He has shown through reports and videos the billions of dollars that senior Russian officials took and were used to buy property overseas, or build extravagant villas in the country, while ordinary people are struggling to make ends meet or battling bureaucracy on a daily basis.

He makes a heart symbol to Yulia in the dock

"If you were to ask me whether I hate Vladimir Putin, my answer would be, yes, I hate him, but not because he tried to kill me or put my brother in prison. I hate Putin because he has stolen the last twenty years from Russia. These could have been incredible years, the sort of period that we've never had in our history. We had no enemies. We had peace on all our borders. The price of oil, gas, and our other natural resources was incredibly high. We earned huge amounts from our exports. Putin could have used these years to turn Russia into a prosperous country. All of us could have lived better.

"Instead twenty million people live below the poverty line. Part of the money Putin and his cronies simply stole; part of it was squandered. They did nothing good for our country, and that is their worst crime against our children and the country's future."

The last third of the book Navalny details his life in prison from February 2021 until 2024 [he died February 2024] in diary form. He gives detailed insight into what it is like to live behind bars, how he is treated, and how prison officials try to break his spirit with increasingly terrible conditions, or preventing him from seeing his lawyers and family members. Physically it is trying for his body, but Navalny believes others have it worse than him.

For a long time his family can help him buy food, and he is able to make coffee in his cell, and eat salad and bread; one fan sends him a cake. He can also order books and amasses a big collection. Oh and he received a lot of fan mail in prison, and dutifully replies to each of them.

Near the beginning of the book, Navalny mentions Daniel Roher, the director who filmed the documentary Navalny, and towards the end of the tome, his lawyer shouts to him on a video link that the film won Best Documentary Feature at the 95th Academy Awards.

"I had a very strange feeling at that moment. It was as if those words didn't belong in this world, but, on the other hand, everything here is so weird and crazy that this world is the only one they belong in." 

Yulia spoke at the Academy Awards

He goes on to thank everyone involved in the documentary, in particular Christo Grozev, the Bellingcat investigative reporter who investigated Navalny's poisoning.

On his birthday, June 4, 2023, Navalny writes how the prison psychologist is amazed that he is mentally fit despite all the torturous conditions he has encountered. His take:

"Let's face it, of course I wish I didn't have to wake up in this hellhole and could instead have breakfast with my family, receive kisses on the cheek from my children, unwrap presents, and say, "Wow, this is exactly what I dreamed of!" But life works in such a way that social progress and a better future can only be achieved if a certain number of people are willing to pay the price for their right to have their own beliefs. The more of them there are, the less everyone has to pay. And the day will come when speaking the truth and advocating for justice will be commonplace and not dangerous in Russia."

He says this many times, how he strongly believes in having convictions, that there needs to be free elections, a fair legal system and no censorship.

But will Russia change? With Navalny gone, who will continue fighting for ordinary Russians?

Some may describe Navalny as stubborn, an idealist, a fighter. 

But above all, he is a patriot, who loves his country and only wants to see it in a better place.

Review: Tough Old Broads

The documentary features three trailblazing women

The other day I watched a documentary paying tribute to wise women, called Tough Old Broads. It was screened at VIFF and was it surprising that the entire audience make up was women, most of them seniors?

It's directed by Stacey Tenenbaum, and profiles three trailblazing women, Katherine Switzer, who was the first woman to officially run in the Boston Marathon in 1967, Siila "Sheila" Watt-Cloutier, an Inuk climate change activist, and Sharon Farmer, who was the first woman to run the White House Photography Office.

Switzer has promoted running since 1967

Switzer's story is very compelling and easy to relate to. She recalls when she ran the Boston Marathon, a few miles in, the race director was in a car with the media and caught up with her. He tried to pull off her bib number -- 261 -- and luckily Switzer's boyfriend who was running with her, pushed the race director off to the sidelines and told her to run like hell.

As a result of the media coverage, Switzer inspired other women to take up running, and she got companies like Avon to sponsor women-only marathon races. They were less intimidated and felt they were just running with the girls. 

These days Switzer, 79, gives inspiration speeches to young women and travels the world. In one scene she is in Germany with muslim women and goes running with them. Switzer is gracious in encouraging them, that they can do anything they want if they put their minds to it.

Watt-Cloutier's profile is the most complicated because a lot of her work involves making presentations and talks with diplomats, a lot of technical knowledge to explain how toxins were found in water up in the Canadian north, and how this affected mothers and children. She links this environmental issue with human rights.

Watt-Cloutier is worried about climate change

She says as a child her family was very close and lived on the land, but when she was 10 years old, she was sent to the south, to Nova Scotia and Manitoba to go to residential schools. Watt-Cloutier remembers she was given no warning this would happen to her, and as a result of this western schooling, she didn't learn much about her language and culture.

Today she continues to advocate for the Inuit and how global warming is affecting ice and snow in the Arctic. She was awarded an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2006, and nominated along with Al Gore for the Nobel Peace Prize and 180 other people.

Finally, tough old broad, definitely defines Farmer, and she has funny one-liners, like how gray hair is a badge of honour of what she has survived. At one point Farmer says a photo editor can tell the picture was taken by her without checking the caption which is very cool.

Originally she was into music and wanted to join the marching band, but was told it was for men only because it was tradition. Instead she turned to photography at a young age, and was very focused on capturing the lives of black people in America. One photograph she took was a black and white image of an older black woman swinging her hips with a hula hoop around her waist.

Farmer once worked in the White House

In the 1970s Farmer shot album covers, and in 1993 she was hired to cover US President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton; Farmer later was promoted to become director of White House Photography, the first woman and person of colour to do this job.

The documentary follows her in November 2024 when Donald Trump won his second term; Farmer goes out into the streets hoping to capture reaction from the election, but instead finds nothing, perhaps people were too shocked or depressed to even come out.

For Switzer and Watt-Cloutier, there was some archival footage in their stories, in the case of Farmer, there wasn't much to illustrate her story per se; going to her storage unit to dig out some old photos was the best director Tenenbaum could do.

Nevertheless these are three women we should be cheering about, and hopefully this could be an ongoing series of other accomplished women and what we can learn from them!

Tough Old Broads

Directed by Stacey Tenenbaum

89 minutes

Some Well Deserved Oscar Wins

Borenstein (white suit) and Talankin with their Oscars

Happy with the results of the Academy Awards?

I did not watch the whole thing, but thrilled, ecstatic, excited that the films I did watch, won Oscars:

Jessie Buckley for Best Actress in Hamnet.

Buckley was the favourite to win

Her guttural scream in a pivotal point in the film was so primal and intense, viewers could not help but feel her immense pain of losing her child.

Buckley said in a podcast that after making the film, she was desperate to get pregnant! Now she has an eight-month old baby girl and in her acceptance speech said she loved being her mother.

"It's Mother's Day in the UK today, so I would like to dedicate this to the beautiful chaos of a mother's heart. We all come from a lineage of women who continue to create against all odds," she said.

All The Empty Rooms for Best Documentary Short

It's a haunting documentary, seeing the empty bedrooms of children who were killed in school shootings. Not only is it commendable for journalist Steve Hartman and photographer Lou Bopp to visit these grieving families, but also record these children's rooms to prove they existed, they were loved, they had lives with hopes and dreams.

Cazares was so brave to speak out on stage

When the filmmakers went up to accept the Oscar, one of the mothers, Gloria Cazares spoke on stage. Her daughter died in the Uvalde shooting in May 2022.

"My daughter, Jackie, was nine years old when she was killed in Uvalde. Since that day, her bedroom has been frozen in time," Cazares said.

"Jackie is more than just a headline. She is our light and our life. Gun violence is now the number one cause of death in kids and teens. We believe that if the world could see their empty bedrooms, it would be a different America."

Mr Nobody Against Putin for Best Documentary Feature

In accepting the golden statuette, co-director David Borenstein warned the audience what authoritarianism is.

"Mr Nobody Against Putin is about how you lose your country," he said. "And what we saw when working with this footage is that you lose it through countless, small, little acts of complicity.

Talankin (on floor) urged for wars to stop now

"When a government murders people on the streets of our major cities, when we don't say anything, when oligarchs take over the media and control how we could produce it and consume it -- we all face a moral choice. But luckily, even a nobody is more powerful than you think."

He then introduced the star of the documentary, Pavel Talankin to speak through a Russian translator.

"For four years, we looked at the sky, for a shooting star to make an important wish. But there are countries where instead of stars they have shooting bombs and shooting drones. In the name of the future, in the name of all of our children, stop all of these wars now," said Talankin, who is now in exile in Europe.

Afterwards when Borenstein spoke to the media, he made another warning:

"One interesting thing about working with a team of Russians throughout this process has been my desire as an American to constantly compare the situation in America to Russia," he said.

"But a lot of my Russian colleagues and friends always said, 'No, no, it's not the same situation. It's actually happening quicker in America than it's been happening in Russia,' Trump is moving a lot quicker than Putin in his early years."

The Girl Who Cried Pearls for Best Animation Short

Well deserved award for Szcerbowski and Lavis

This 17-minute film was absolutely stunning in terms of its fantastic story and execution. The story isn't so simple and makes viewers think about it afterwards.

Co-directors Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski make their acceptance speech short and sweet.

"We just really want to thank our amazing neighbourhood and the amazingly talented community of artists that we've had the superb luck to work with," Szczerbowski said. "Thank you to the fantastic city of Montreal. Thank you, Canada."

"Canada!" Lavis chimed in, as they raised their Oscars.

They gave a shoutout to composer Patrick Watson and actor Colm Feore who narrated the film.

Big congratulations to all the winners and nominees! 

Review: 2026 Oscar-Nominated Documentary Shorts

Perfectly A Strangeness follows three donkeys

The Oscars, one of the biggest film events of the year is fast approaching on March 15, and art house movie theatres around town are showing the nominees for Best Live Shorts, Best Documentary Shorts and Best Animation Shorts.

I hunkered down for the Best Documentary Shorts, which turned out to be 157 minutes long, screening all five docs one after the other. 

Perfectly a Strangeness by Alison McAlpine (15 mins)

This Canadian entry seems strange at first -- why are we following three donkeys as they slowly walk up a hill. Where are they going? The sweet docile trio end up by an unmanned astronomical observatory that opens up at night and reveals some amazing footage of the universe, and a juxtaposition of nature and technology. 

The Devil is Busy by Christalyn Hampton and Greeta Gandbhir (31 mins)

I quickly surmised this film was about an abortion clinic and it was sad to see the measures the staff had to take to ensure their clients, who they call guests, feel safe and supported during their visit. The main character is Tracii, who is the first to arrive at the clinic and explains how safety is so crucial, as well as her own personal story. Viewers also meet the doctor who performs the procedures and says how politics is making it harder for women to have control over their own bodies. She never imagined it was easier for her to get access to this kind of healthcare when she was young than her daughter today. Meanwhile outside there are male protesters who use religion to try to guilt the women from going in. The filmmakers don't speak to them directly, but Tracii gives the audience the backstory on one of them. The Devil is Busy is a highly emotional film, showing how women are losing their reproductive rights today, and that there are people who are trying to help them.

Armed Only with a Camera: The Life and Death of Brent Renaud by Craig and Brent Renaud (38 mins)

The brothers from Little Rock, Arkansas were only two years apart and older brother Brent became a video journalist going to war zones and his younger sibling Craig followed him. But Brent became the first American journalist to die soon after the Ukraine war broke out in March 2022. Craig is determined to bring his brother's body back, and reminisces about the places they covered, from Afghanistan to Somalia, Haiti, Iraq and Mexico. Some of the footage is frightening to watch, but that is what Brent wanted to show people, that war is horrific and we cannot pretend it doesn't happen. The documentary is a tragic tribute to Brent, and ends by letting viewers know that hundreds of journalists have died trying to report the truth.

All the Empty Rooms by Joshua Seftel (33 mins)

Journalist Steve Hartman was known on CBS Evening News as the guy who would find human interest stories to lighten the end of news casts. But in 1997 he was assigned to cover his first school shooting, and it wasn't his last. He said he became numb reporting them as was the rest of America was hearing them. So he started his own project of contacting families whose children had died from school shootings and got his photographer friend Lou Bopp to take pictures of the kids' bedrooms. It's absolutely devastating to get an idea of who these children were through their bedrooms, and how their parents and siblings are coping. 

Children No More: "Were and are Gone" by Hilla Medalia (36 mins)

After the October 7 attacks and Israel retaliates with attacks on Gaza, a large group of protesters in Tel Aviv stand silently and stoically holding candles and pictures of Palestinian children killed in the war. Week after week they stand and sit in public places to get attention, which leads to emotionally charge scenes. Some passersby tell the protesters they are delusional, or that the priority should be the Israeli hostages, not children in Gaza. 

Review: Mr. Nobody Against Putin

Talankin is inadvertently forced to take a stand on the war

It's hard to know what is really happening in Russia, with President Vladimir Putin in firm control.

But the Oscar-nominated documentary Mr. Nobody Against Putin gives a peek inside that is courageous, frightening and damning.

"Pasha" Talankin lives in Karabash, east of Moscow and the town is known for having the most polluted air on the planet thanks to the copper refinery, the major industry there.

Students begin singing patriotic songs

Talankin is the events coordinator in a primary school, and his job is to film things that happen there. It is also the school he went to, and feels most at home here, describing himself as a loner. Nevertheless some of the students like him and hang out with him as they get into their teens.

His wry remarks make him easily likeable to the viewer, but things change in February 2022 when Putin announces a special military operation -- in Ukraine.

Suddenly things at the school start to change and Talankin is ordered by the government to film teachers lecturing the students to justify the war in historical terms, and the students marching with the Russian flag, singing patriotic songs, and then uploading the footage to a government website.

This is not what he signed up for and not only is he overwhelmed with having to film so much propaganda, but Talankin himself wonders how he can protest against the war. He watches news clips of protesters being beaten and dragged by the police and concedes he isn't brave enough to do that.

A boy checking out an old rifle

Meanwhile viewers watch the students evolve from being excited to being at school to being bored out of their minds listening to what teachers are forced to tell them, their eyes glaze over. In the beginning they wear white blouses and skirts or shirts with pants, and towards the end are in army fatigues. 

One scene shows members of the Wagner Group at the school passing around a mine to students look at, and casually saying if they go near one that explodes, it will take out their leg; there are grenade throwing competitions, and most chilling is a boy holding an old rifle and aiming it at Talankin as he films him.

Eventually some of Talankin's former students are conscripted, or people at the school know of someone who had to become soldiers. Viewers feel on edge wondering what happened to them.

They also wonder what will happen to Talankin, as Putin declares in 2023 that anyone opposed to the Ukraine occupation would be guilty of treason. Talankin does rebel outwardly, resulting in some of his colleagues strongly disagreeing with him, and eventually students and colleagues are afraid to be associated with him.

One of the teachers marching with students

Mr. Nobody Against Putin was not shot expertly, and it is not meant to be, because all his clips were just for the school's records. But because Talankin had so much filming to do, another videographer was recruited, and that's where there are scenes with him hanging out with students, or of him walking around the school.

He amassed two years' worth of video footage that he and co-director David Borenstein sifted through and put together. The documentary is a brave and harrowing account of what it's like living in a small town, and how one man tried hard to push back in his own way.

Mr. Nobody Against Putin

Co-directed by Pasha Talankin and David Borenstein

90 minutes

Review: Spring After Spring

Vancouver Chinatown parades always include Chinese dancing

Just in time for Chinese New Year is a new documentary called Spring After Spring, about three sisters who continue their mother's legacy of preserving and promoting Chinese dancing in Vancouver.

Directed by Jon Chiang, the film pays tribute to Maria Mimi Ho, who founded the Strathcona Chinese Dance Company, and helped start the Lunar New Year Chinatown Parade, where her students dressed up in colourful costumes and danced along the route.

Lisa, Val and Anabel talk about their mother

She roped her three daughters into dancing too, and they all became professionals in their on right -- eldest Anabel founded the Vancouver Academy of Dance, teaching Chinese dancing; middle child Val, aka Ms Vee is a hip hop dancer who teaches at Juillard; and youngest Lisa made it to Broadway, performing in shows like Mama Mia, Shrek and Chorus Line.

Their mother died in 2010 and left a big hole -- would the three sisters try to continue doing the Lunar New Year Chinatown parade? How would they do it? Would it be good enough in their mother's eyes?

There is a lot of archive footage of their mother, so energetic and happy as she performed -- she was a school teacher, but her hobby was dancing despite having no formal training. She studied books and later videos to learn new steps.

Ho was a force in Vancouver's Chinatown

The three sisters reminisce a lot and it's great to see them not only reveal more about their own personalities, but their mother too and how much she influenced their lives. Val is the most vocal and seems to be the most thoughtful in terms of reflecting on how she was brought up and describing the immigrant mentality of working hard all the time.

While it's clear the trio love their mother, and Anabel says it is only now, some 15 years later, that she feels comfortable speaking about her, they also remember how she was a tough Asian tiger mom, how whatever they did was never good enough.

A lot of Asian kids can relate to that kind of scolding.

That's what director Chiang hopes will spark conversation about difficult topics from viewing Spring After Spring.

"I know that from my own experiences in my family, there isn't a lot of conversation around the topic [of grief]," says Chiang. 

The three sisters are professional dancers

"There's so many taboos, there's a lot of cultural hurdles to overcome. But I feel like maybe by watching this film, people can see their families through this film and maybe not be afraid to talk about difficult things, both in the Chinese diaspora but also in other immigrant families and other Canadian families as well."

He discovered the story of Ho from his friend who is Anabel's husband, and filmed it with a lot of care and thoughtfulness, giving everyone an opportunity to talk. However, their widower father doesn't say anything, and the film focuses on the three sisters. 

Nevertheless, it was great for Chiang to encourage them to dance one of their favourite ones their mother got them to perform as a group. It shows the sisters united, passionate and happy dancing and enjoying each other's company.

Spring After Spring

Directed by Jon Chiang

78 minutes