• Winner: Parasite by Bong Joon Ho

• Winner: Coup 53 by Taghi Amirani

• Winner: Red Snow by Marie Clements

• Winner: Haida Modern by Charles Wilkinson

Presented by the Lochmaddy Foundation. A $5,000 prize awarded to one of the issue-oriented documentary films in the Impact competition.

• Winner: Resistance Fighters by Michael Wech
• Jury comments: “It was incredibly challenging to pick one film from such a powerful diversity of selections – each issue was compelling and every film crafted skillfully. From the hopeful solutions presented in The Pollinators, to the wonder of The Great Green Wall, to the powerful empathy displayed in The Whale and the Raven, each of the films nominated challenged assumptions about this world and the power we have to act in it. No film more so than our Award winner, Resistance Fighters (Germany, director Michael Wech) whose urgency and concise storytelling moved us to do our part as Jury Members to amplify its message.”

Presented by RBC and Cineplex. A $5,000 prize given to an individual whose work as an activist and storyteller advances social impact agendas and changes the way we think and act in the world.

• Winner: Peter Nelson, director of The Pollinators

The WIFTV Artistic Merit Award is presented to a Canadian produced or co-produced feature film at VIFF 2019 directed by a woman.

• Winner: The Whale and the Ravenby Mirjam Leuze (Germany/Canada)
• Jury comments: “This is a story that demonstrates the parallels between the social structures of whales and the Gitga’at First Nation on Gil Island in Northwest BC. The Whale and the Raven brought the viewer into a sacred place, a place that embraces an Indigenous way of being that also has an urgent message we ought to heed.”

In addition to announcing the festival’s award winners, VIFF has also released its schedule of repeat screenings. Below is a full list of VIFF Repeats coming to Vancity Theatre:

• Amanda (dir Mikhaël Hers)
• Beyond the Visible – Hilma af Klint (dir Halina Dyrschka)
• Children of the Sea/Kaijuu no Kodomo (dir Watanabe Ayumu)
• Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains/Chun jiang shui nan (dir Gu Xiaogang)
• Escher: Journey Into Infinity/Escher: Het Oneindige Zoeken (dir Robin Lutz)
• Human Nature (dir Adam Bolt)
• Jordan River Anderson, the Messenger (dir Alanis Obomsawin)
• Lara (dir Jan-Ole Gerster)
• The Laundromat (dir Steven Soderbergh)
• Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom (dir Pawo Choyning Dorji)
• Melancholic (dir Tanaka Seiji)
• The Men’s Room (dirs Petter Sommer, Jo Vemund Svendsen)
• A Seat at the Table dirs David Nash, Simon Mark-Brown
• Still Human (dir Chan Olivier Siu Kuen)
• The Whale and the Raven (dir Mirjam Leuze)
• Who You Think I Am (dir Safy Nebbou)
• Yuli (dir Icíar Bollaín)

Visit viff.org for information on these screenings and other festival news.