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A Nerd and Foodie’s Guide to the 2024 Vancouver International Film Festival

The selection of films offered at this year’s Vancouver International Film Festival is sure to sate the delight of fans across all genres, and yeah, we gotta visit Tojo’s restaurant too!

Runs Sept 26 – October 6

When the Vancouver International Film Festival offers works that also concern why this city is beloved, that’s because my number one pick is still a place I need to visit one day! And I better have deep pockets since the sushi that’s offered here can be considered by some as perfection. But what’s more important is Tojo, the man behind the restaurant. When he’s been a fixture on television when I was growing up and catching him cook some delicious dishes for morning television viewers, I’m hooked!

But as for what else this festival offers, I offer my nerdy top ten guide. To note, the links go to online ticket sales and show times:

The Chef & the Daruma

The inventor of the California Roll, chef Hidekazu Tojo helped bring sushi to mainstream popularity through his renowned Vancouver restaurant, Tojo’s. The Chef & the Daruma is a mouthwatering film touching on immigration, identity, and reinvention.

Angela’s Shadow

When a socialite visits her nanny’s remote reserve, she discovers her Cree ancestry and delves into her new-found spiritual traditions to save herself and her newborn baby from her husband’s psychotic, and purity-obsessed racism.

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Top Five Animated Films To Look Forward to this Fall/Winter

Just how many animated films getting released world-wide needs to be counted. While I’m still anxiously waiting for White Snake 3, I have this guide to the American made works that will be out soon and later this year.

As my review of Transformers One have shown, not every film is worth checking out. That’s because I’m a die-hard fan of the original and Prime series. When this work completely changes the lore around, it’s fallen out of my list.

Also, there’s two films which have yet to make a North American side debut. They deserve an honourable mention, and nobody should be surprised that White Snake 3 and The Royal Cat, both Chinese animated movies needs to get marketed here. And there’s also Mononoke: The Movie from Japan!

THE WILD ROBOT
Sept 27

The Wild Robot Movie Poster - Animated Films Chris Sanders is back, working at DreamWorks and I couldn’t be any happier. He’s done wonders with fond properties like Lilo & Stitch as well as How to Train Your Dragon. Whether that’s as an illustrator or director, there’s something about his visual style which makes those works stand out. Now that he’s helming this adaptation of Peter Brown’s bestselling illustrated book of the same name, and how he’ll apply his trademark should be exciting.

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After Fantasia 2024, Here’s Where Baby Assassins 3 Nice Days Will Play Next

Good news, John Wick fans! Baby Assassins 3 will be coming to North American theatres in September! It has just as equally stunning fist-to-fist action as the last film, and there’s gun play too!

Once armed with a proper rewatch from first film to the third, I was ready to tackle the aptly named Baby Assassins 3 Nice Days, which made its debut at Fantasia Film Fest. Even after the latest, I had to revisit the prior films to remind myself about what made this slugfest fun. With this latest, the dynamic duo finally get to go on vacation!

This film written and directed by Yugo Sakamoto is an action packed doozy! I’m sure he drew upon some other classic anime girls with guns series when he first fashioned this concept. There’s Dirty Pair and Noir, but I swear, everytime I look at this live-action take, I’m constantly reminded of Laverne & Shirley! The comedy is familiar, even though the world these youths live in are very different.

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[Fantasia 2024] In Sunburnt Unicorn, What is Alls Well Doesn’t Bode Well for Those Scared of the Future

The big question some people may have is with where in the world does the adventure in Sunburnt Unicorn takes place. It can be the Osoyoos here in British Columbia, or somewhere in Arizona–or could it be further?

Sunburnt Unicorn Movie Poster — **North American premiere at Fantasia Film Festival 2024**

Spoiler Alert

Frankie’s got a horn in Sunburnt Unicorn, and he doesn’t know how to use it. That’s because it may well be a car part embedded on his forehead after an accident has stranded him and his dad in a desert. As. for whether the fever dream that comes from being in the dry world for too long is real or not, I’m enjoying the concept! Here, the fauna identifies him as a saviour. Amusingly enough, I can imagine voice actress Diana Kaarina actually wearing a facsimile during recording.

This boy has issues. He’s not thrilled with the fact he’s going to a new school. Based on what I got from the argument they had preceding the crash, this lad was voicing his dissatisfaction. And with both their eyes off the road, just what he’s dealing with is a rather surreal parable concerning why it’s best not to behave; each talking critter he meets represents an aspect of himself, and what he learns to change his and their attitude makes for an interesting film.

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Taking A Quick Look at Fantasia’s Short Film Selection, 2024 Edition

What’s offered here is a brief taste of Fantasia’s Short Film programs. There’s 17 different collections that’s still continuing to play. They may well appear at your local film festival next!

Fantasia Film Festival 2024 - Fantasia's Short Film As Montreal’s most beloved genre film festival enters its last week of celebrating an eclectic range of genre cinema, Fantasia’s short film celebration will have me keeping an eye out on these up-and-coming talents! Although I didn’t view everything in this category, what I saw so far is a great way to see what may get dreamed up to become feature length works in the future!

These filmmakers have come up with some fairly cool concepts. The following reviews do not make up a top five list, but are a sampler of what is there. I’m thankful to those who provided me with a screener, and I wish them all the best.

The True Shape of a Daisy

George MacDonald‘s narrative, “The Day Boy and the Night Girl,” provides the foundation for the cinematic The True Shape of a Daisy, and I’m fairly sure no one has ever compiled this tale into a book. This short story is available online.

What’s presented is a faithful adaptation, where we meet a witch named Watho, who would shape Photogen and Nycteris’ environments. True to their namesakes, one would live in perpetual daylight and the other at night. They don’t get to meet until later, and in this anime, they don’t live in enormous rooms. Instead, they are from a world of contrasts. The girl is from a beautiful forest, and the boy lived most of his life in a dark dungeon.

As an anime by Naoki Arata, I hope what she produced is more than just a tease, but an examination of how opposites can get along.

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In Kizumonogatari -Koyomi Vamp- What’s Next After “Alls Fair in Love and War?” It Doesn’t Look LIke Hate.

If you’re unable to catch Kizumonogatari -Koyomi Vamp- at Fantasia Film Festival 2024, please mark your calenders as it’ll get screenings Aug 28th across North America.

KIZUMONOGATARI movie poster Anyone who hasn’t seen Kizumonogatari, read the Monogatari book series or seen the Bakemonogatari anime, that’s okay! Neither of them really follow the order of the other, and tegarding the former, all three films have been compiled into one huge introduction of this franchise. After watching this neo-gothic wonder known as Kizumonogatari -Koyomi Vamp- (傷物語こよみヴァンプ), I feel inclinced to get caught up!

Here, Koyomi Araragi (Hiroshi Kamiya) is in a heap of trouble. After meeting Tsubasa Hanekawa (Yui Horie), he loses his humanity! At first, I thought he would lose his virginity because the defining moments offers some classic fanservice along with pop culture references; but the first conversation they have is about the ghosts and vampires said to lurk nearby. I knew that sets up the fact he would become a druge! In layman terms, he’s a vampire’s servent. But when he tells his creator, Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade (Maaya Sakamoto), he doesn’t want to remain a vampire, finding a way out will be difficult.

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