Women are the fastest growing prison population worldwide. A documentary team went into the Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility in Dartmouth and the Nova Institution for Women in Truro with art supplies, a music therapist and film equipment to find out why. The result? A feature-length documentary—made in collaboration with inmates—called Conviction. Airing on Documentary […]
FIN
Posted inArts + Music
Review: Murmur is beautifully bleak
Written and directed by Dartmouth-based filmmaker Heather Young, (Dog Girl, Milk) Murmur—which opened this year’s FIN Atlantic International Film Festival—tells the beautifully bleak story of Donna (Shan McDonald), a kind-hearted woman whose loneliness is palpable. She doesn’t appear to have anyone in her life except her daughter, who refuses to answer her calls or texts. […]
Posted inArts + Music
FIN-tastic films and where to find them
This years’ edition of FIN Atlantic International Film Festival offers audiences a heady mix of timely topics, fresh faces, big ideas and big names. With 120 films screening over eight days, it’s impossible to get to all of them—so, here are a handful not-be-missed flicks we’re extra-amped for. Get ready to binge! Murmur The fest’s […]
Posted inArts + Music
Heather Young’s film slays not with a bang but a Murmur
FIN AIFF Opening Night Gala: Murmur Thu Sep 12, 7pm Rebecca Cohn Auditorium 6101 University Avenue $50 The opposite of a silver-set Hollywood dream, Heather Young’s films have both feet firmly planted in reality. She wants to make movies about “a real person, that feels like someone I could meet in my real life—that both […]
Posted inArts + Music
There’s Something In the Water runs deep
There’s Something In the Water Sat, Sep 14, 9:30pm Cineplex Park Lane, 5657 Spring Garden Road $18.50, finfestival.ca Nearly a year after publishing a book on environmental racism, the story has taken on a new life. There’s Something In the Water by Dalhousie professor Ingrid Waldron is now a 70-minute documentary co-produced by Ellen Page, […]
Posted inArts + Music
Film review: Ordinary Days
The Canadian festival entry Ordinary Days—it screened here at FIN—gets a theatrical release this week at Park Lane. Its concept—the same story told from three perspectives, each segment handled by a different director—could’ve played as pointless schtick, but here it’s deployed deftly enough to keep you guessing until nearly the final shot, which doesn’t seem […]
Posted inArts + Music
AIFF 2018: 160 girls fight for justice in The Girls of Meru
The Girls of Meru Sunday, September 16, 1:30pm Cineplex Park Lane, 5657 Spring Garden Road $12.50 ($11.25 stu/sen) finfestival.ca “I just wanted to focus on the case,” says Andrea Dorfman of her documentary The Girls of Meru. She says it multiple times, speaking with empathy and care for the 160 girls she made the movie […]
Posted inArts + Music
Fall for Hopeless Romantic
Gala presentation: Hopeless Romantic Cineplex Park Lane Mall, 6:30pm 5657 Spring Garden Road Saturday, September 15 $22.50 finfestival.ca How might you make a romantic comedy that is funny and honest without being reductive about our experience of love? That’s the guiding question behind Hopeless Romantic, an ambitious locally-made film premiering this week at the Atlantic […]
Posted inArts + Music
Fall for Hopeless Romantic
Gala presentation: Hopeless Romantic Cineplex Park Lane Mall, 6:30pm 5657 Spring Garden Road Saturday, September 15 $22.50 finfestival.ca How might you make a romantic comedy that is funny and honest without being reductive about our experience of love? That’s the guiding question behind Hopeless Romantic, an ambitious locally-made film premiering this week at the Atlantic […]
Posted inArts + Music
Atlantic International Film Festival announces 2018 slate
This morning FIN: Atlantic International Film Festival announced its September lineup, which will kick off with Thom Fitzgerald‘s Splinters, a film the director called his “most Atlantic Canadian” in a speech at the press conference. Starring Shelley Thompson and Closet Monster‘s Sofia Banzhaf, the film is an adaptation of Lee-Anne Poole‘s play and is about […]
Posted inArts + Music
The year in film
Andy Hines’ Grammy nomination The Nova Scotia-born Hines—his father is the photographer Sherman—already has a few awards for his music videos, including an MTV Moon Man. His clip for Logic’s “1-800-273-8255″—a sensitive, six-minute coming-out story starring Don Cheadle and Luis Guzmán—is up for the big time, a Grammy Award, in February. Black Cop This timely […]
Posted inArts + Music
FIN Fest advice: Don’t miss these films
Scanning through the FIN schedule can be an overwhelming task. A decent handful of the festival’s films already have release dates, so you should consider saving those for later and make space in your week for these selections instead: The Child Remains: Michael Melski’s creepy-crawly haunted house film stars the great Quebec actor Suzanne Clément […]