One of the newest venues for the Victoria Film Festival features a short by acclaimed local filmmaker Arnold Lim.
The award-winning Korean-Canadian filmmaker director, producer and photojournalist is also executive producer of the Black Press Video Networks. Known for his work on All-in Madonna, The Cameraman and Godhead, his films have screened internationally including at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Lim and fellow Victorian Lukas Hanulak are featured in a series dubbed Short Bursts: Things Fall Apart, shown aboard a whale watching vessel during the 2023 Victoria Film Festival.
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Lim’s award-winning short My Name is Arnold echoes his childhood as a minority growing up in Blue River, B.C.
Released last fall, My Name is Arnold played at the Vancouver Asian Film Festival in Vancouver in November 2022 and won the audience awards for Best Overall Short Film and Best Performance. The same film earned a Canada Council for the Arts Grant ($35,000) and B.C. Arts Council Media Arts Grant ($25,000) in 2021.
In the 16-minute film, a Korean-Canadian boy struggles adapting to his new life after moving with his single mother to a rural B.C. community in the early 1990s.
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The half-dozen titles playing fall under the theme of dysfunction and breakdown. In Hanulak’s Empty Spaces, Debbie returns home to console her sister Aiden after the loss of their father. Wounds of a family dealing with alcoholism and the secrets it harbours are exposed.
Other titles include The Vacation by Jarreau Carrillo, which follows four friends who are stuck in their car after it breaks down on the way to the beach on the last day of the summer; The Red Suitcase by Cyrus Neshvad, about an Iranian teenager who decides to take off her Hijab in a life-changing situation; Great Seeing You by Holly Pruner, where a close friendship fades, the root cause elusive, with Maisie fighting for the bond she shared to the point of delusion; and Hatchback by Riley Sugars, where Vince attempts to dispose of a dead body for the mob but when he reluctantly enlists the help of his dim-witted brother-in-law Ted, things don’t go to plan.
The 2023 Victoria Film Festival runs from Feb. 3 to 12 with more than 100 films including 30 Canadian features and movies from 27 other nations. Buy tickets online at victoriafilmfestival.com.
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