Guest Industry Expert — All Access 2021:

Angela Heck

Managing Director, Whistler Film Festival Society

Angela Heck is the Managing Director of the Whistler Film Festival Society, where she is responsible for the overall operations of the festival, held annually in December, including film and industry programming and the full slate of 11 annual Talent Programs. The festival celebrated its 20th year and was name as an Event of the Year in Playback.

Prior to joining WFF she served as Director of Digital & Strategic Initiatives at the National Screen Institute, and held past roles at Winnipeg Art Gallery Inuit Art Centre, Tactica Interactive (Seed, Weather Gone Wild, Pinkertons, Tiga Talk), CBC Manitoba, University of Manitoba, Quest University Canada and the National Film Board of Canada (Pacific & Yukon studio). She has served on numerous juries and advisory groups including Bell Fund, Leo Awards, Juno Awards and Canadian Screen Awards.

As a producer Angela works extensively in the adventure realm, with productions heading up mountains from Tibet to British Columbia and on the sea in Antarctica. Most recently she produced the documentary Carved in Stone: Sananguaqtit for CBC Gem, three digital shorts for CBC Docs by filmmaker Madison Thomas (Rainbow Ice, Fourth Period Burnout, Declutter), an episode of the prime time documentary series The Explorer’s Club with FlorianFilm (ZDF/arte), and the Canada/US co-venture Soul of the Sea (Blue Ant). Her first film, In the Shadow of the Chief, took home the People’s Choice Award at the Whistler Film Festival in 2003.

She is acting executive director of Jazz Winnipeg and a former board member of WIFTV, DOC-BC and the University of Manitoba.