If you’re an indie film fan and follow the festival circuit but might have missed the standout movies, the Vashon Island Film Festival (VIFF) is here for you. Consistently, VIFF founder and Vashon Film Institute (VFI) President and longtime island resident Mark Mathias Sayre, who also serves as the CEO of motion picture distributor The Forge, offers a program like no other independent film festival—in a fantastic setting, Vashon Island, Washington—and tickets and passes are affordable!
What makes VIFF a unique experience and a hidden gem for film festival-goers is that it never fails in bringing together talented and rising star filmmakers and storytellers who are eager to share the entire journey of the film experience with you from lively and in-depth on-stage interviews and conversations to enjoying post-film hang outs and events. It’s an accessible festival on every level, and its curation is outstanding providing audiences opportunities to see and learn about films only available to few and select audiences at major festivals in the U.S. and abroad—worth all the planning and ferry ride.
For 2025, Sayre has surpassed his previous festival for VIFF programming, which presents a selection of features and shorts curated by the VFI programming team, led by Lead Programmer Stacey Oristano (Friday Night Lights, Bunheads, and Shameless), all to be screened at the family-operated cultural landmark, the Vashon Theatre.
Sanda Codreanu, Souheila Yacoub, and Noémie Merlant star in The Balconettes, the horror comedy featured as the Opening Night Film of the 2025 Vashon Island Film Festival.
“It’s an accessible festival on every level, and its curation is outstanding…”
The festivities begin with a screening of the Opening Night Film, The Balconettes, Cannes 2024, which is showing out of competition. The horror comedy stars an ensemble cast including Souheila Yacoub, Sanda Codreanu, Noémie Merlant, and Lucas Bravo, with Merlant also serving as writer and director. It follows three women who become trapped in a Marseille apartment during a heat wave, finding themselves caught up in a terrifying ordeal and longing for freedom.
VIFF offers a variety of events for attendees to enjoy that celebrate Vashon Island culture and its community.The coveted VIFF Red Bicycle Awards are a tribute to the island.This year, VIFF will screen screen six narrative and three documentary features, which include:
Laurent Slama’s A Second Life, Tribeca 2025. During the Olympic Games, an unexpected bond develops between a hearing-impaired American and a free-spirited wanderer in the lively streets of Paris.
"…a program like no other independent film festival..."
