Food Films at DOXA Documentary Film Festival

The DOXA Documentary Film Festival runs April 30 – May 10th and within this amazing selection of films there are a selection of films that are Food themed. Here is a selection of these films for your consideration, make sure you get your tickets in advance, check out the site for more information.

Good Things Await

Saturday, May 2, 2015 – 12:15pm

Cinematheque

Who knew cows could be so cerebral? Ostensibly a film about a “biodynamic” farm in northern Denmark, Good Things Await quickly becomes something more akin to Terrence Malick than Green Acres. Phie Ambo’s camera renders the natural beauty of Thorshøjgaard, the farm in question, in vivid detail. Through the film’s lush cinematography and operatic score, we are invited to meditate on the seasons, time, and the interconnectedness of nature itself. This is appropriate, as biodynamic farming is a practice that is as philosophical as it is practical. It promotes a holistic approach to agriculture, treating everything from a farm’s smallest plants to its largest animals as ecologically connected. Natural fertilizers and treatments are used instead of artificial, and livestock is treated with the utmost respect.

Niels Stockholm and his wife Rita Hansen, the octogenarian proprietors of Thorshøjgaard, are living embodiments of the biodynamic philosophy. The fact that their farm provides for the world-renowned restaurant Noma seems almost incidental, as their chief concern is to ensure the continued existence of their rare breed of Danish Red cattle without resorting to the corporatized cattle industry. They are steadfast in their ways, following the natural rhythm of the life they have developed through biodynamic farming despite the disruptions they face from the national government of Denmark. The gentle dance between them, their cattle, and the cosmos is a thing of great beauty, and is sure to entrance all willing to partake.

Le Nez (The Empire of Scents)

Tuesday, May 5, 2015 – 8:30pm

Vancity Theatre

Thursday, May 7, 2015 – 2:45pm

Vancity Theatre

Truffles, wine, perfume, and poop! We experience a huge majority of life through our noses. Intricately tied to emotion and memory, smell is fundamental to determining who we fall in love with, what we remember about our childhood, and how we feel about the world. Kim Nguyen’s extraordinary film Le Nez captures this most intimate of senses through the individual stories of an Italian truffle hunter, a French perfumer, and a Chinese tea expert. even Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield pops in to talk about what outer space smells like. Hint: it’s wild! The profound impact that smell has on human understanding of the world is particularly poignant in the experience of a young woman who loses her sense of smell after being hit by a car. Her boyfriend doesn’t smell the same way and everything is washed of colour and flavour. The return of one scent at a time, beginning with the smell of rosemary, is cause for jubilation. Le Nez takes a distinctly pungent approach to its subject. Witness the varied expressions of people as they get a whiff of ambergris, the legendary sperm whale excrement used in perfumery. This is a film that may have you sniffing the air, or the person next to you, in search for that next fragrant experience.

Sugar Coated

Monday, May 4, 2015 – 12:30pm

Vancity Theatre

Tuesday, May 5, 2015 – 6:00pm

Vancity Theatre

From birthday cakes to Halloween treats, sugar is intimately bound up with almost every part of our lives. At weddings, holidays, and every type of celebration, sugar is the star of the show. We eat it when we’re happy and also when we’re sad. (Who hasn’t pounded back a tub of ice cream to soothe a broken heart?) With over 56 different names for sugar, it’s difficult to spot it, let alone avoid it. All the while, it may be sweetly killing us.

See the full line-up of films in this years DOXA festival here.

By: Richard Wolak

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