VIFF is poised to reassert its foothold in nonfiction programming with 84 documentary features – including 40 premieres – aiming to satisfy Vancouver’s insatiable appetite for truth.

‘Documentaries reflect the change in the way the world is viewing things,’ notes VIFF director Alan Franey, confident that the festival fare will fulfill the voracious demand from the West Coast’s ‘doc-ies’, and pleased to give big-screen time to films that might not otherwise be seen outside the home.

One-third of VIFF is nonfiction programming, and this year docs from China are particularly relevant, Franey says.

‘China is so prominent, as countries deal with the issue of environment and human rights,’ says Franey. ‘And we’re also seeing subject matter dealing with the effects of the too-heavy hand of justice, health care and health in general, and the rise of personal documentaries – kind of like a MySpace confessional.’

Getting festival directors to name favorite films is always like pulling teeth, and Franey is no exception. However, after much poking and prodding, he nods to China’s Bing Ai, a world premiere chronicling 10 years in the life of a Chinese peasant woman who refuses to move from her home by the Yangtze River’s Three Gorges Dam Project.

Franey also tips his hat to Canada’s Up the Yangtze, a farewell ferry cruise trip up the Yangtze by Ontario-born filmmaker Yung Chang.

The fest director says another must-see is Taxi to the Dark Side (U.S.) by Alex Gibney of Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room fame, who uses the disappearance of a Kabul taxi driver at the hands of the U.S. military to question American interrogation practices. He also makes special mention of Salud! (U.S.), Connie Field’s view on the Cuban medical system and its work in other developing countries, and Autism: The Musical (U.S.), which follows five kids with autism over the course of a year as they write and stage their own musical production.

With 40 documentary premieres, Franey admits VIFF is different from other Canadian festivals.

‘I think a lot of festivals are afraid of programming [docs],’ he says. ‘In the mid-’80s they didn’t draw flies, and [other programmers] still shy away from them. But we have a high batting average because these films are made for the right reasons. They’re not driven by a Hollywood blockbuster mentality, and they’re not only political. Every year I screen these films it is a novel experience, a sociological experience.’

New this year is the Arts & Letters series, with 16 films covering a diverse group of musicians, including Mozart, Anita O’Day and Scott Walker, Swiss experimental yodelers, Basque experimental percussionists, and Argentine Chamamé instrumentalists, along with stories about writers and artists.

‘We’ve found that Vancouver audiences are very responsive to films with arts and music content; they do well year round,’ says Franey.

Also popular are Canadian docs served up by Canadian Images programmer Terry McEvoy. ‘It gets harder every year to pick the films,’ says McEvoy. ‘With the democratization of filmmaking, because of the accessibility of production equipment and technology, we’re seeing more and more people getting their hands on cameras and making films that are both deeply personal and international in scope.’

Films making the Canadian lineup are: Bryan Friedman’s The Body Builder and I, a National Film Board copro about the director’s estranged relationship with his 59-year-old muscle-bound father; L’esprit des lieux, in which Catherine Martin contrasts Gabor Szilasi’s 1970s photo of Quebec’s Charlevoix region with images from today; Jason Young’s Inside Time, a profile of renowned bank robber and heroin addict Stephen Reid; Let’s All Hate Toronto, Albert Nerenberg’s and Rob Spence’s cross-country examination of why most Canadians despise Hogtown; The Suicide Tourist, Oscar and Gemini-Award winning director John Zaritsky’s film about euthanasia in Switzerland; and five world premieres from B.C. directors (see story, p. 25).