• Home
  • About PIF
  • Contact Us
  • Follow us on Twitter
  • Add us to your Facebook

Search

  • Festival
    • Apply for Green Screen Award - Deadline August 5th, 2011
    • 2011 Sponsors
    • 2011 Children & Youth Program
      • Festival 2010 Children's Program Animation Workshop
    • 2011 Industry Day
    • 2011 Jury & Awards
    • 2011 School Program
    • 2011 Ticket & Box Office
    • 2011 Venues & Accomodation
    • Festival Highlights 2010
    • Media
    • News
    • Schedule 2010
    • 2010 Silent Auction
    • Photo Gallery
  • PIF 365
    • Special Events
      • Past Events
    • PIF'ed Newsletter
      • PIF'ed Newsletter April 20th, 2011 Earth Day Edition
      • PIF'ed Newsletter April 6th, 2011
      • PIF'ed Newsletter March 15 2011
      • PIF'ed Newsletter March 8 2011
      • PIF'ed Newsletter February 17, 2011
      • PIF'Ed Newsletter February 7, 2011
      • PIF'ed Newsletter January 13, 2011
    • Archives
      • 2010 PIF'ed Newsletters
        • PIF'Ed Newsletter April 1, 2010
        • PIF'Ed Newsletter April 19, 2010
        • PIF'Ed Newsletter May 03, 2010
        • PIF'Ed Newsletter May 26, 2010
        • PIF'Ed Newsletter June 1st, 2010
        • PIF'Ed Newsletter Jun 22, 2010
        • PIF'EDd Newsletter July 28, 2010
        • PIF'ed Newsletter July 23, 2010
      • Festival Archives
        • 2008 Film Festival
        • 2007 Film Festival
        • 2006 Film Festival
        • 2005 Film Festival
        • 2004 Film Festival
        • 2009 Film Festival
          • 2009 Schedule
          • 2009 Children & Youth Programs
          • 2009 Festival Special Events
            • 2009 Festival Eco Exchange
            • 2009 Festival Panels & Programs
            • 2009 Festival Silent Auction
            • 2009 Festival Spotlight
          • 2009 Jury and Awards
          • 2009 School Program
        • 2010 Film Festival
          • 2010 Press Releases
            • Press Releases 2009
          • 2010 Children & Youth Programs
          • 2010 Festival Special Events
          • 2010 Film Jury & Awards
            • 2010 Jury and Awards
            • Eco Hero Awards
            • Film Awards
          • 2010 School Program
          • 2010 Ticket & Box Office
          • 2010 Venues & Accommodation
            • Accommodation
          • Industry 2010
            • Green Market
            • Green Pitch
          • Press Kit 2010
            • Press Kit 2009
      • Film Archive
      • Viewing Archives & Educational Resource Library
    • OTF/PIF Environmental Film Festival School Touring Program
    • Touring Program
    • Best of Planet in Focus Museum Tour
    • Mixed Greens Monthly Screening
    • Green Screen Program
    • Youth & Teacher Resources
  • Youth & Educational Programs
    • Youth, Camera, Action! Summer Video Program
      • YCA! Screening Room
        • YCA! 2007
        • YCA! 2009
        • YCA! 2010
      • YCA! Portable Program
    • Youth & Educational Resources
    • GreenSceneZ Toronto
      • GreenSceneZ Toronto 2009
  • Support PIF
    • Advertising
    • Donate
    • Sponsorship
      • 2010 Sponsors
  • Resources
  • Blog
Home | PIF 365 | Archives | Festival Archives | 2005 Film Festival

PIF 365

  • Special Events
  • PIF'ed Newsletter
  • Archives
    • 2010 PIF'ed Newsletters
      • PIF'Ed Newsletter April 1, 2010
      • PIF'Ed Newsletter April 19, 2010
      • PIF'Ed Newsletter May 03, 2010
      • PIF'Ed Newsletter May 26, 2010
      • PIF'Ed Newsletter June 1st, 2010
      • PIF'Ed Newsletter Jun 22, 2010
      • PIF'EDd Newsletter July 28, 2010
      • PIF'ed Newsletter July 23, 2010
    • Festival Archives
      • 2008 Film Festival
      • 2007 Film Festival
      • 2006 Film Festival
      • 2005 Film Festival
      • 2004 Film Festival
      • 2009 Film Festival
      • 2010 Film Festival
    • Film Archive
    • Viewing Archives & Educational Resource Library
  • OTF/PIF Environmental Film Festival School Touring Program
  • Touring Program
  • Best of Planet in Focus Museum Tour
  • Mixed Greens Monthly Screening
  • Green Screen Program
  • Youth & Teacher Resources
1% For the Planet

1% for the Planet is an environmental alliance whose members give back 1% of their sales to environmental organizations worldwide.

2005 Film Festival

Planet in Focus is Canada’s most acclaimed International Environmental Film and Video festival. Our annual film fest showcases compelling documentaries, animation, dramatic features, shorts, and experimental works that celebrate, question, and establish varied ways of viewing the state of our world.

Planet in Focus’ 7th annual festival will be held November 1 to November 5, 2006 presenting films from across Canada and around the world. This year we are launching a new “Spotlight Programme,” beginning with “Toronto in the Moving Image from the Dawn of Cinema to the Present.”

Submit your film for Planet in Focus 2006. Earlybird Deadline: April 15. Final Date for submissions: June 1, 2006.

2005 Film & Video Choice Selections

The Real Dirt on Farmer John
Opening night (USA)

Director Taggart Siegel and Farmer John will be in attendance.

Directed award winning documentary films including Split Horn: The Life a Hmong Shaman In America, Blue Collar and Buddha, and Heart Broken in Half.

Canadian Premiere

A roller-coaster ride through the life of maverick farmer, John Peterson who presided over the near death of his family farm. Tracking the life of Farmer John interspersed with home movies of his childhood, Taggart Siegel takes us through the demise and transformation of a traditional American, Midwestern family farm through the eyes and words of playwright and farmer John Peterson. In a moment of crisis, John copes with depression, travels to Mexico and gets creative producing the play Ember Days on the contemporary farmers’ plight and yet he resurrects himself as an organic farmer. Throughout, he contends with slander, arson, a Sheriff’s investigation and allegations of murder and devil worship. You’re never sure what’s around the corner in this must see award winning doc! – R.S.

Taggart Siegel has produced many films including Destroying Angel, The Beloved and The Disenchanted Forest for National Geographic Television.

AWARDS FOR BEST FEATURE DOCUMENTARY

San Francisco International Film Festival – Golden Gate Award
Newport International Film Festival – Grand Jury Award
Nashville Film Festival – Reel Current Award (selected by Al Gore)
Nashville Film Festival – Grand Jury Award
Chicago International Documentary Festival – Audience Award
Slamdance Film Festival – Audience Award
Wisconsin Film Festival – Audience Award
Wisconsin Film Festival – Grand Jury Award
Santa Cruz Film Festival - Director's Award
Inspiration Film Festival – Grand Jury Award
Inspiration Film Festival – Audience Award

Rio Arriba (Up Stream)
Ulises de la Orden, Argentina, documentary, 72 min., 2004
(Spanish with subtitles)

Canadian Premiere

A personal, reflective journey of history, self-discovery and recovery. Filmmaker Ulises de la Orden explores the economic, cultural political impact of European focused monoculture on the land and people of the Andean hillsides of Argentina. De la Orden grandfather was a manager at a sugar mill that hired Indigenous labourers. He begins by asking “what land and lifestyle did the labourers leave in order to work at the mill?” Travelling by plane, train, bus, foot and donkey upstream he searches for the answers. Truth and testimony survive atop the Andean steppes. The indigenous descendents of the original mill workers relate stories of land theft, forced labour and cultural loss. Beautifully shot and rhythmically edited with a reflective narrative that measures the loss of habitable, sustainable culture against the material gains of a colossal capital expansion. – M.S.L.

Ulises de la Orden earned a degree in Cinematography at the Universidad del Cine in Buenos Aires. The numerous projects that he has worked on include Seven Years in Tibet, Evita, Patagonian of British Descent, and Balnearios. Rio Arriba is Ulises’ first solo endeavour.

 

Birdpeople
Eduard Erne, Germany, documentary, 92 min., 2004
(German and French with subtitles)
Canadian Premiere

Over four years, twenty biologists, dropouts and adventurers raised the birds in Jacques Perrin Winged Migration. The Birdpeople became birdparents following and “raising” the migratory birds on their transcontinental journey’s. But this fascinating film is about human behaviour and the transformation of those who “imprinted” themselves on the birds. Birdpeople will make you wonder about the human environment the birds had to adjust to in the making of Winged Migration. Was it nature, art, or artifice? – C.T.P

Eduard Erne studied directing at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. He has worked as an actor and director in Vienna and the TAT (Theater am Turm) alongside Elke Lang and Ulrich Waller. Erne has lived in Frankfurt am Main since 1985.

 

Travels by Tricycle
Wang Dongdong, China, documentary, 42 min., 2004
(Mandarin with subtitles)
Canadian Premiere

Travels by Tricycle is a charming and fabulist adventure borne out of love. 74-year-old Wang Yimin is cycling across China on a custom built tricycle trailer with his 98-year-old mother sitting in the back. She has yearned to see China, but never had the opportunity to leave her small apartment. Pedalling along busy highways, up steep dirt hillsides, through thick rain storms and into crowded markets he travels with a fortitude and emotional stamina that does not lapse. For over a year, Wang and his mother trek across their country in a simple tour motored by filial devotion. Modern, industrial China serves as the backdrop for a journey rooted in Confucian principles. – M.S.L

Wang Dongdong was born and raised in Harbin, China where he also started his filmmaking career at the Heilongjian Television Station, producing and directing numerous documentaries. He has received national acclaim for such films as GrowingUp, Xue Xia’s Three Days, Maliyasuo’s Winter, and The Happy Life of Miao Oing’s Family. He is currently working on his doctoral degree in Harbin Institute of Technology.

 

Heavy Metal
Neil Diamond & Jean-Pierre Maher, Canada, documentary, 48 min., 2004
(English with French subtitles)

In Northern Quebec, a major mining disaster has been secretly devastating the people and the environment for over forty years. Seeking community redress, Cree environmentalist Joseph Blacksmith and American geologist Chris Covel compile an environmental report, and attempt to put a stop to the lethal heavy metal pollution. Samples are collected from the areas in which the mines are operating as well as from people’s hair – extremely toxic levels of arsenic, cyanide and mercury are found. Blacksmith and Covel overcome hurdle after hurdle, to complete their report—we are there when the report is delivered to the Quebec National Assembly. And then, a terrible tragedy occurs – and a controversial deal is made. Vital, gritty and hard-hitting. – R.S

Neil Diamond has directed a number of powerful productions on the Cree - Cree Spoken Here, Indian Posse: Life in Aboriginal Gang Territory andDab Iyiyuu 2. He has also also written articles for the The Nation.

Jean-Pierre Maher has worked for 15 years in film production and was nominated for a Gemini award for the best series on youth for the Origins of Human Aggression : The True Story and La Paix des braves et Visages de la violence. Both Directors recently received the 2005 Rigoberta Menchu Prize for Heavy Metal.

 

2011 Planet in Focus Special Events

 

Listings of our upcoming special events...

Read More

 

Best of Planet in Focus Museum & School Tour

Planet in Focus is visiting Natural History Museums across Canada & schools across Ontario!

  

Read More

Donate Through Canada Helps

Donations Made during the Festival will be put towards our School Program.
 

Read More


© Copyright 2009 Planet In Focus International Film & Video Festival | Terms Of Use | Privacy Policy

Design by