Calgary International Film Festival turns 25 as 2024 fest celebrates local, national and international screen stories

Singing Back the Buffalo, from Cree director Tasha Hubbard, explores North America through the lens of buffalo consciousness and their remarkable return in the 21st century to the great plains, will be screened as part of the 2024 Calgary International Film Festival. (Photo courtesy CIFF)

The Calgary International Film Festival is turning 25.

To mark a quarter-century of showcasing film culture in the city, CIFF offered a peek at some of the films it will be screening when the festival kicks off on Sept. 19.

The popular festival blends local, national, and international content that will be screened at a variety of venues in the city this year, including Cineplex Scotiabank Theatre Chinook, which is stepping in to fill the hole left by the closure of Eau Claire Cineplex.

“I’m really excited about this unique mix of films from all over the world,” said CIFF lead programmer Brenda Lieberman.

One film that should definitely be of interest to Calgarians is Goddess of the Slide: The Forgotten Story of Ellen McIlwaine. The feature documentary from director Alfonso Maiorana that tells the story of a slide guitar legend who hung with Jimi Hendrix and Johnny Winter early in her career, and taught music and drove a school bus in Calgary before her death in 2021.

Ellen McIlwaine was a guitar legend who played with Hendrix in New York, and also drove a school bus and taught music in Calgary, Alberta. Goddess of the Slide: THe Forgotten Story of Ellen McIlwaine, a feature documentary, will be screened as part of the 2024 Calgary International Film Festival. (Photo: CIFF)

Others include Soul’s Road, a shot-in-Alberta feature starring country singer Dallas Smith, The Birds Who Fear Death from director Sanjay Patel that stars Graham Greene,  and Dark Match, a Canadian feature by Lowell Dean that tells the story of a bush-league wrestling company that finds itself involved with a cult leader.

Canadian director Jeremy Xido’s The Bones, follows paleontologists on a quest for fossils that may hold the clue to saving humanity from extinction, while Porcelain War, a co-directing effort by American Brendan Bellomo and Ukrainian Slava Leontyev tells the story of a trio of artists struggling with the moral dilemmas posed by how to respond to the invasion of Ukraine.

Singing Back the Buffalo, from Cree director Tasha Hubbard, explores North America through the lens of buffalo consciousness and their remarkable return in the 21^st century to the Great Plains.

Pride vs. Prejudice: The Delwin Vriend Story from Edmonton filmmaker, actor and playwright Darrin Hagen tells the story of an Alberta man fired for his sexuality who ends up setting a transformative precedent for 2SLGBTQ+ rights worldwide.

Secret Mall Apartment, meanwhile, tells a true story of eight artists who built and lived in a secret apartment inside their local mall between 2003 and 2007.

CIFF runs from Sept. 19-29. For more information and tickets, go here: