There will be 97 nominees in 21 categories vying for Golden Sheaf Awards at this year’s Yorkton Film Festival (YFF) not including craft awards.
Juries from across Canada weeded through more than 200 entries to come up with the slate of films that will grace Yorkton screens between May 26 and May 29.
“We had a tremendous response in submissions this year, and I have to thank our jury heads for the work they put into adjudicating those submissions,” said Randy Goulden, YFF executive director.
“There is a terrific group of nominees this year, and we’re beginning the process on adjudicating our craft juries, so I think we’re going to have some very interesting films for the people of Yorkton to come out and see in May.”
The festival kicks off May 26 with the latest from North Battleford filmmaker Brian Stockton. The Sabbatical is a comedy starring James Whittingham and Laura Abramsen about a burnt out photography professor who goes on sabbatical only to find himself embroiled in a mid-life crisis involving a free-spirited, young, female artist. It was filmed entirely in Regina.
The film won an honourable mention at the 2015 Whistler Film Festival and is also a selection for 2016 Canadian Film Fest in Toronto, which starts today.
“We’re thrilled to be bringing this film to our audience this year,” Goulden said.
Critic Greg Klymkiw gave the effort three-and-a-half stars.
“A new gunslinger has ridden his horsy into Schlub Babe Movie Town packing mega-six-shooters fully loaded with this great cinematic tradition,” he wrote. “Brian Stockton’s very funny feature film The Sabbatical even manages to take a few steps into, shall we say, “mature” territory. Closer to stories where schlub-babe relationships remain unrequited, is not unlike any Woody Allen comedy sans boinking, and then replaced with the mind-matched intercourse on display in such schlub-babe masterworks as Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation.
“The biggest distinction of all is that Stockton’s film is not set against the backdrop of New York or Tokyo or anything even remotely considered smoothly urbane, but rather in the Canadian prairie city of Regina.”
The juries are still out on the craft categories, but expect Stockton to be one of the directors to get a nod.
The 2016 festival will kick off Thursday with the perennial High School Day and will, of course, feature the wildly popular Lobster Fest on the Friday night. The awards will be handed out Saturday at the gala.
Panels include festival favourites such as the Creative Saskatchewan Networking Lunch, Meet the Broadcasters and Pitch-O-Rama.
