300 kilometres southwest of Halifax lies Sable Island, a crescent moon-shaped sliver of land that seems to have manifested from a fable. Naturalist/researcher Zoe Lucas has called Sable home for four decades, sharing the land with roaming wild horses, fluttering sparrows, and practically imperceptible invertebrates. Joining Lucas for a residency, Jacquelyn Mills, a one-person film team, fully immerses us in the natural wonders of this stunning ecosystem while allowing us to witness an uncommon friendship unfold.
Winner of multiple awards at the Berlinale and Hot Docs, the captivating Geographies of Solitude is one of the year’s most celebrated, accomplished, and innovative documentaries. Utilizing techniques like exposing her 16mm film stock to starlight and hand-processing footage in seaweed, Mills also employs homemade microphones and electrodes to elicit melodies from the island and its animal inhabitants. Sable isn’t so much captured on film as incorporated into the very fabric of this documentary. This is a cinematic experience unlike anything you’ve ever encountered.
Best Canadian Feature Documentary Award, Hot Docs 2022
Canada
2022
English
Book Tickets
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
The Secret in Their Eyes
This month's Talking Pictures screening is a multi-layered, poignant thriller interweaving the personal lives of a prosecution investigator (Ricardo Darin) and a judge, with a manhunt spanning twenty-five years. Stay for cookies, coffee and a chat after!
American Doctor
One of the most powerful documentaries of the year, this puts us smack in the open wound that is Gaza, filtered through the eyes of three American surgeons (of Palestinian, Jewish and Zoroastrian backgrounds) compelled to do their utmost to alleviate harm.
Credits
Executive Producer
Brad Mills
Producer
Rosalie Chicoine Perreault, Jacquelyn Mills
Cinematography
Jacquelyn Mills
Editor
Jacquelyn Mills
Director
Photo by John Ratchford
Jacquelyn Mills
Jacquelyn Mills is a filmmaker from Cape Breton Island, and is based in Montreal. Her works are immersive and sensorial, often exploring an intimate and lyrical connection to the natural world. Her film In The Waves (2017) was awarded the Grand Jury Prize at the New Hampshire Film Festival, Best Medium-Length Documentary at the Montreal International Documentary Festival (RIDM), and Best Documentary and Best Editing at the Atlantic International Film Festival. Her most recent work, Geographies of Solitude (2022), had its world premiere at the Berlinale Forum.