20 years of GEMS, or VIWFF as it once was known. It’s been around for a long time, and this year, Canadian content gets the spotlight most of all. Starting off on March 5, GEMFest takes place in-person at the VIFF Centre, one of the prime spots for festivals (like Rio, Queen Elizabeth Theatre, and a few others). With how long it has lasted, it’s truly something to marvel at. This year has 32 films from 9 countries, although 23 of them are Canadian. For starters (literally), we get One Must Wash Eyes from an Iranian-Canadian filmmaker named Sepideh Yadegar, which is his first feature. Plenty of features and shorts this year along with panels, networking events, and other great things going on.
This all sounded so exciting that I had to talk to Anaïsa Visser about this great festival and learn some more. I then decided I’d have to pop in at one point after this interview to check out the festival, and that’s what I’ll be doing. But first, let me clue you in on what we discussed, so you can learn more about the festival yourself. Then buy some tickets. Seriously, you ought to. Here’s why…
HNMAG: It’s been 20 years and so much has happened since then. To celebrate this momentous occasion, what do you have planned for this year that’s REALLY special?
Anaïsa Visser: We have several great things planned, I mean our festival has been running for 20 years and as such we have been able to find some of the things that work well and we’ve brought back some of those things. We have an opening ceremony and reception for our opening night film, One Must Wash Hands is an amazing piece and really worth coming out for. We have several shorts blocks, lots of great films, we have panels, some of the newer pieces included are GEMS showcase on Sunday which is basically a showcase of pitches by alumni of our GEMS program. We all run talent labs where we help aspiring filmmakers develop their films, and they work with our program directors to develop their projects. Then they’re going to do a livepitch on stage and basically be doing that in front of a jury, an audience, and in that context, potentially win a prize so that’s new this year. We also have an awards show, with some industry awards this year. Kind of a callback to what used to be our spotlight awards, that ran for years and basically had to wind down after the pandemic. We’re excited for all of it, it’s going to be amazing.
HNMAG: What’s the secret to keeping something like this running for so many years?
Anaïsa Visser: It takes a village. It takes an immense amount of community and support of hard work from the staff. It’s intricate, everything has to fit together. I think it’s the dedication and commitment of the team that makes it all happen. We have to consider so many moving parts and it takes a lot of people wanting to be a part of it and wanting to celebrate great film. It starts with submissions, an evaluation commitee, a screening commitee, and there’s like 60 people watching films for a thousand submissions. These people are just watching films, and helping us evaluate what’s worth assessing, what’s fitting with our mission and mandate. Then filtering through these submissions and getting the top submissions to our programmers who are assessing those top films and then making the choice of what actually gets played in the festival. From there, we start to panel our programs and events and like who’s going to be there. I think we spend almost a year each year on all of this, so it’s a big combination of work and a lot of moving parts.
HNMAG: How does one go about finding a village and bringing people on board for such a big deal of a project?
Anaïsa Visser: We’re very privileged in GEMS in that we have a beautiful community of women and gender-diverse people that want to really help sort of amplify our message and keep the legacy of 20 years of a festival, and 36 years of this organization. It’s been around for a long time, so keeping the legacy of this organization and festival going is something that a lot of people just want to see happen. People love to be asked, and love to get involved. It’s not terribly difficult, it just takes finding the right folks, and at the right time. In the last couple of years, it’s just been reaching out to folks saying “Hey, I think this is up your alley.” and I’ve been privleged to be in the film industry for a decade, so I’m fairly well connected and I was able since being in this role to bring my community into GEMS. It’s finding where people fit in and making room for everyone.
HNMAG: How long have you been involved on the team for? Was there a favourite year you had working on GEMfest?
Anaïsa Visser: I’ve been involved for 2 years in this role and then I did a year as a festival director and a couple of years on the board. This is my second year as executive director and it’s the 20th anniversary and I think I was just finding my footing last year and this year I was thinking of doing it my way compared to what was before. So I’ve allowed myself to take the reins, face challenges, and reinvent some things. I’ve had really great support from my board chair and my staff so it’s been a really fun and exiciting experience to get to make some changes this year.
HNMAG: I remember it used to be called VIWFF. But there was a change to be more inclusive. Have you found that it increased submissions and improved the festival?
Anaïsa Visser: The submissions have been pretty consistent throughout, I don’t think I’ve seen a big change. I think that engagement was a little bit lower last year, I think people were testing us to see if we’d be just as good. Because we had a name-change and also a big change in staffing, I think people saw what we did last year and wished they had gone and they’re starting to pay attention, wanting to come back and be a part of it again. We’ve already sold out our opening night so we’re excited and hopeful that what we did is paying off in an amazing festival.
HNMAG: And with all the events going on, is there going to be overlap or are they coordinated evenly throughout the days?
Anaïsa Visser: There’s a bit of overlap, people have to pick and choose what they’re wanting to do. Partially because we’re a small team, and one thing I did notice last year was that we were having really long days and it’s a big priority for me as a director to make sure we don’t work long days. I think that in this industry, and the festival, and non-profit, we have the ability to prevent that. We’re doing shorter days. But as a result, we have programming that’s happening at the same time, and VIFF Centre has a small theatre and a big theatre. With things happening simultaneously, I’ve tried to plan it so there’s something for different audiences in things happening. So if you’re more like in the industry side, you’re going to an industry thing, and if you’re more into watching films, you’re going to screeners. It’s never like industry and film at the same time, it’s one or the other. Hopefully something for everyone at any given time.
But those aren’t the only GEMFest events, there were pratically some that happened beforehand. For starters, there was something called Reel Talks which happened prior. There have been some other things that happened prior at least year’s festival too, so I kind of had to ask.
HNMAG: There will also events like Reel Talks that happened in advance. Was their purpose to promote the upcoming film or was there more to it than that?
Anaïsa Visser: A Reel Talk is basically an artist talk that we do virtually, and last Tuesday we spoke with Karen Chapman who’s the director of The Village Keeper, which is one of our films this year. One of the reasons we did that is because Karen is based not in BC, and will not be in attendance at the festival. So this gave people a chance to hear about her work, and also because it’s Black futures, we kind of wanted to give people an additional opportunity to engage with her work. It was kind of a two-fold for people to get experience, and get a tease on what this film is about.
HNMAG: And what was it like balancing out all the content that came in?
Anaïsa Visser: Very difficult, we have an incredible team of programmers. We had the same programmers last year and we were so pleased with the selection last year. We always felt it was really challenging to narrow it down because we have such a small festival. At the end of the day, we have so many screeners but not many theatres. We only have a limited amount of programming possibilities, although this year we have two screens but we’re really just staying within that 8 hour window of work hours. We’re trying to keep it really reasonable for ourselves. It’s hard because we’re aspirational and we want to be bigger, but still want to be healthy and good to ourselves. But I think that our programmers this year did such an amazing job this year selecting films that feel like there’s something in it for everyone. We’re not a festival with a specific genre, we’re not a festival with a specific style, we’re really just here to spread the word that women and gender-diverse people can tell their stories. They can be of any genre, style, and they can have any kinds of emotional threads that you can pull at, and it doesn’t have to be about being a woman or gender-diverse. It can be about anything. You can have films about baking, or struggles in relationships, or wanting to buy a lamp. There’s just so many different scenarios and they’re all valid. They’re all entertaining and relatable, so that I think the programs have done an amazing job of giving every film that comes into our bars gets a really fair consideration and gets watched. At the end of the day, it’s what’s going to appeal to audience that we’re going to see here in Vancouver and giving something for everyone so it’s not just a one-note festival.
HNMAG: A lot of Canadian content this year as well, I noticed, especially along with local filmmakers. What was the process like getting so many together for a special presentation?
Anaïsa Visser: Yeah, it was really important to me this year to go very intensely for local and Canadian content. The rationale behind that was in celebration of our 20th anniversary, I wanted to showcase local and Canadian because that’s the reason we’re still here. The primary audience that comes to see our films are the local filmmakers and local film community, so it’s a celebration of their work and their support. I just wanted to really drive that home and remind them that even though it’s an international festival, it is all very much about them and celebrate them. We toned down the international submissions a bit and with understanding that there’s lots of international shorts still. Definitely kept the portion of Canadian films higher this year. It also just happened we got some amazing Canadian submissions. It always depends on what comes in. There was some intent as well that I want people to come to our festival and feel like that sense of community. That they’re watching something that was done by someone sitting next to them. I think that in Vancouver especially it feels kind of far for our international filmmakers to come here and celebrate with us and we’re not a big festival that can afford to fly filmmakers out from faraway places. So for our 20th anniversary, we really want to make sure people are coming in, watching our films, and sitting next to filmmakers and hearing from filmmakers.
HNMAG: With making Gender Equity more common in the film industry, have you found this festival has helped do so and even get filmmakers much further?
Anaïsa Visser: I think it really has. I think if you imagine its been 20 years, people gathering in community over a shared set of values and mission, and talked to each other between films and finding shared interests and working together on something. Then projects get started, films get made, and relationships start from there. Our festival attracts a lot of filmmakers because that’s who our community really is. It’s very much those kinds of relationships that start at GEMFest, go on to be long-term career relationships. I love to imagine that across the span of 20 years there have been so many Canadian films that have been made out of relationships started at GEMFest.
HNMAG: When accepting submissions from filmmakers, what do you look for in terms of content?
Anaïsa Visser: I think that understanding what our mandate is, is the most important piece. Understanding that we’re there to support stories by and for women and gender-diverse filmmakers. We’re really thinking about what it means to be gender-diverse, those stories have the strongest chance of getting into the festival. We’re also very much thinking about equity, what someone intended as a filmmaker over the final product. We want it to look and sound good, but we really value intent before anything else. If you make something that really speaks to a community and is from an individual voice with an individual experience, than it has a really strong chance of getting in, especially if it’s from a woman or gender-diverse perspective. That can be from anywhere around the world, and it kind of broadens the horizons from what a diverse perspective can be, but it means a lot. You’d be suprised how many submissions come in that are not that at all.
HNMAG: What’s your biggest desire for GEMfest to achieve?
Anaïsa Visser: I want to fill seats (laughs). I just want people to come out, it’s really difficult in Vancouver, people decide what they’re doing on the day. If it’s nice weather, than it’s tough for us. People don’t come to the theatre, and people are flaky. I love the city, and the people in it. I love that they’re flaky, I probably am as well. But I want to see people supporting independent film and small festivals, and people understanding that coming out and sitting in a theatre for an hour or hour and a half makes a real difference to an individual’s life because they will be sitting in that theatre and be so appreciative that you came out and supported their film. It will actually motivate them to continue in their career, and move on from the self-doubt and imposter syndrome. I think my biggest wish is that people show up and are there to support the filmmakers.
HNMAG: And do you hope to see more filmmakers for next years?
Anaïsa Visser: Yeah, and I’d love to see sustainability in this kind of event. I’m in touch with a lot of festival organizers in Vancouver and it’s really challenging. I think that funding for small festivals is so precarious, we’ve got 1 year cycles of grants, and grants continuosly go away, fall apart, get reduced. So we’re constantly struggling to make ends meet, and still do it every year. The fact that GEMFest has existed over 20 years is nothing short of miraculous because it’s really really really tough. When we think about 20 years, it’s a REAL achievement because it means that people have been working, struggling, and trying REALLY VERY hard to keep going. It’s not a no-brainer, it’s not the revenue from film submissions and ticket sales pay for it. It barely covers anything, so if you think about how these ecosystems don’t function because of how expensive this city is and how to put on an event, I think it’s really important that people consider trying to support these kind of events and really think about the importance of supporting arts events and small festivals because it does wonders for artists and community. It’s really difficult to sustain.
Anaïsa speaks from experience being a filmmaker herself, especially when she went to screeners and the room was mostly empty. Chances are we’ll see more people at this one with word getting out thanks to articles like this one. Now go get some tickets, and if you’re lucky, you’ll run into me there at one particular event. Can’t tell you which one, it’ll be tricky to scope out which day, but easy to find me. I have a trademark look, after all.