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The night a mysterious stranger rode into the lonely prairie town of West Sage, no one realized their lives would never be the same.

This minimalist piece of animation explores the origin of life. This film was made as part of the fourth edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.

Billionaire businessman Noel Noel is long on cash but short on social graces; so when he finds himself falling for the fairy Beatrice, he mistakenly thinks he can buy her love with material gifts. It takes a little girl named Zooey, her dog Snooze, and a blue-eyed reindeer to help Noel Noel learn the true meaning of love in this animated Christmas fable that features narration by Leslie Nielson (AIRPLANE, NAKED GUN) and music by French-Canadian songstress Ariane Moffatt.

An ejaculate of sperm swim through a uterus. At the branches of the Fallopian tubes, half go one way and half the other. Down one tube toward the sperm bounces a female head, singing, happily on her way. Four sperm zero in; she panics but can't avoid them. Pow! they hit her full force and disappear into her. The decision she makes and what she does next change the course of her life in a major way.

Teenaged runaway Haylie finds herself stuck on a large boulder in the middle of a back-country cornfield along with Logan, an injured farm boy. The mysterious creatures that are lurking among the crops will attack anything that enters but strangely refuse to venture outside of the corn themselves...

A psychedelic hallmark of early Vancouver experimental cinema. The collage of shapes and textures shot in the back alleys of the downtown east side is set against the found footage of nuclear annihilation.

After an escalation of blunders, Toopy and Dorothy, a comical genie, accidentally make Binoo’s beloved stuffed animal, Patchy-Patch, disappear. The trio immediately set out to find the fabulous land of “The Lost and Found” where Patchy-Patch is surely to be found. Along the way, the group meets twin seagulls looking for their father, and a magnificent Princess who has lost her dance partner. Together, and despite Toopy’s bumbling ways, they will try to find Patchy Patch and their lost loves.

The intertwining fates of two Vietnamese sisters who sustain a wartime relationship through written correspondence.

Director Carrie Haber delves deep into the anxiety, thrill and uncertainty of six aspiring animation artists as they are plunged into the twelve-week trial-by-fire that is the NFB's Hothouse for animation filmmakers.

The legendary Primal, first and mightiest of the Coronet Super Villains, has risen again. To stop him destroying the Multiverse, Matt, Roxie and Gomez must call on the help of both the First Hatter Hero and the Amber Dragon, and even team up with Primal's arch enemy - Lord Tenoroc himself!

A woman looks out across a lake, where each drop of water contains a memory of a pioneer in women’s sports, preserved forever. This film was made as part of the 9th edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.

This short probes the taboos around a very particular second-hand trauma, leading us to a more universal understanding of human experience.

A young girl and an old man are the only ones in a village who believe the old stories about dragons, and then a dragon arrives.

Mostly animated with live-action segments featured throughout, FIDELITY is a comedic drama featuring Dora, a woman in her mid-30s who finds herself stuck in a loveless marriage and stumbling into an affair with another man.

A woman's calm, relaxed life of tea and books is abruptly halted when new neighbours move in.

To the sound of a ramshackle brass band, a world slides towards ruin, carrying with it houses, birds, idols, balloons and whatever is left of reason. Theodore Ushev's Vertical combines expressionistic graphics with a scathing black humour and sense of the absurd.

A clip in the Science Please! collection, Wheel Meets Friction uses archival footage, animated illustrations and amusing narration to explain how the invention of the ball bearing reinvented the wheel.

Medieval times. A jester is heading to the castle, but can't help running into a fruit tree in his path. Again and again. After a while, he lands nose-down and when he gets up, his nose remains stuck in the ground. He gives up, and we see that "wise" people aren't faring much better. He returns to his master, who gives him a replacement nose and sets off on an easier path.

This experimental animated short takes a critical look at consumerism in a material world. Thousands of cut-out ads are presented in increasingly fragmented, rapid succession. The film's disorienting and hectic pace seeks to interrogate the extent to which seductive advertising is a shockingly strong force in shaping our desires, needs, and lives in contemporary capitalism.

The moon is the subject here. Man's fascination with the moon (via animation) is presented, as is the moon's usage in popular culture (from Shakespeare to nursery rhymes to popular songs). Also, superstitions and suppositions associated with the moon is presented. Then scientific research on the moon is shown, followed by plans for (and then a simulation of) an actual trip around the moon.

One by one, patrons and staff alike are succumbing to an unknown virus and acting very strange. The customers at The Khaki Barn seem much pastier than usual. Wyatt finds a human thumb in his taco. Coach Halder has taken to biting customers, and Caitlin's new boyfriend has turned pasty gray and has really nasty breath - eww! And we won't even mention what becomes of poor Pokey the Panda. It doesn't take the gang long to realize what's happened - the mall has been overtaken by ZOMBIES!

The story of four children from around the world who try to rescue the sun from an evil sorcerer.

Please stand clear of the doors... This very short surreal hybrid of stop-motion and 2D animation is a story about a dream about a train, inspired by found sound of a Toronto subway car. Produced as part of the 11th edition of the NFB’s Hothouse apprenticeship.

Mary recounts to her daughter Eva the childhood story of when Mary and her father fell through the ice on a frozen pond.

In March 2002, a state TV signal in China gets hacked by members of the banned spiritual group Falun Gong. Their goal is to counter the government narrative about their practice. In the aftermath, police raids sweep Changchun City, and comic book illustrator Daxiong (Justice League, Star Wars), a Falun Gong practitioner, is forced to flee. He arrives in North America, blaming the hijacking for worsening an already violent repression. But his views are challenged when he meets the lone surviving participant to have escaped China, now living in Seoul, South Korea.

Clinging to control after a broken marriage, an overbearing mother begins to lose her grasp on reality.

Tony Hawk's Boom Boom HuckJam arrives in the town of Lincolville and bumps a crummy circus. The evil circus ringleader, Grimley, exacts his revenge by kidnapping Tony and jacking the HuckJam. Tony's only hope is a bunch of local skater punks.

A stranger comes to a peaceful village bearing gifts that bear a terrible price.

A gentle tale of love told in halting words. A film about healing after profound loss. John and Michael pays homage to two men with Down's syndrome who shared an intimate and profoundly loving relationship that deeply affected the filmmaker. Animated with clay backlit on glass, the film shimmers like stained glass in motion. Narrator Brian Davis, also intellectually challenged, brings the men alive with great sensitivity. The audience shares in the various emotions that infuse their everyday living. John and Michael, by its artistry, rises above society's traditional ideas around disability, sexuality and death. When the heart is touched, differences melt. Love is what defines humanity.

Robin is Santa's biggest fan. It's Christmas Eve and Robin has hatched a plan to stow away in Santa's sleigh and hitch a ride to the North Pole. Won't Santa be surprised! But it's Robin who’ll be getting the surprise. Robin is about to find out that you should never meet your heroes.

In this short animation, Oscar®-winning director Chris Landreth uses a common social gaffe - forgetting somebody's name - as the starting point for a mind-bending romp through the unconscious. Inspired by the classic TV game show Password, the film features a wealth of animated celebrity guests who try (and try, and try) to prompt Charles to remember the name. Finally, he realizes he will simply have to surrender himself to his predicament.

A man sets a ping-pong ball into motion and it becomes fruitful and multiplies.

The story began in the 1860s in London, England. For as long as he could remember, twelve year old Tom Canty had dreamed of being a Prince. Whenever he was not begging for money for his cruel father, Tom played "being Prince" with his friends. Tom Canty and Prince Edward, the soon to be king, bear a striking resemblance to one another and decide to swap places. Unfortunately, the once innocent trick turns into a nightmare, and the Pauper and the Prince become desperate in their struggle to prove their real identity before it is too late and the Pauper is crowned King.

A mysterious ship has sailed into Pippi's hometown and the Captain turns out to be her father...

A young "incel" man embarks on a futuristic jerk-off session.

A polar bear must try his luck finding a job in the big city when the last of his Arctic ice environment disappears. It’s hard fitting into the human world, however, so this bear finds a more creative solution to his predicament. This film was made as part of the 8th edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.

A musical exploration inspired by various pictorial movements of the first half of the 20th century. Animated on the Spinae, a pinscreen created by Alexandre Noyer.

Two rival robotics companies in the future release their latest creations at a robotics convention, claiming each to be the latest and greatest in technological advances. Mega Stellar Company's release is a robot boy named Romie-O, while Super Solar Cybernetics has released a girl robot named Julie-8. Unforeseen to each of the company's creators, is how each of the advanced robots soon falls in love with the other.

A prairie landscape undergoes a metamorphosis: rural idyll to over-urbanized dystopia. Director Anne Koizumi laments the changing face of her hometown of Calgary in this critique of the bacteria-like spread of suburbia and exurbia. This film was made as part of the third edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.

In the collection Science Please!, the first clip, entitled The Wind, explains the phenomenon of the wind with the help of archives, animation and narration.

Seven characters, who are not connected with each other, live a restless day in the district in renovation of a busting city. Each one pursues a distinct aim and nobody pays attention to the others. A rag doll passes from the hands of one character to the other's. And their ways criss-cross until they finally meet and unite.

Layering real-life details with an otherworldly magic, Thanadoula recounts the story of an end-of-life doula brought to her calling through the loss of her beloved sister.

A fantastic funny animal cartoon featuring geopolitical bullying, social unrest, worker revolt, and some tasty yellow cakes.

Tintin buys an old model ship at a flea market as a gift for Captain Haddock, who tells him about the exploits of a famous ancestor related to it. Then, Tintin learns that it is not an ordinary model ship.

Narrated as a letter to a mother, this short film traces the emotional undercurrents of leaving home and adjusting to a new environment, blending inner transformation with the changing landscape.

This ultra-short film proves that walls are real and borders are imaginary with an animated critique of long-term detention for minors in immigration centres.

Envious of his northern counterpart, the Anta Claus of the South Pole embarks on a penguin-powered journey to uncover the secret of a flawless Christmas. Along the way, he learns that the true spirit of the holiday lies not in perfection but in the lovable community of oddballs he left behind.

Hypersensitive recounts the turbulent, surrealistic journey of a young woman struggling to understand her unique take on the world. Drawing on her own childhood memories as well as her fertile imagination, filmmaker Martine Frossard paints a compassionate portrait of a woman on a quest for healing in a society with little tolerance for difference. Rich in symbolism inspired by plant life, her film is a heartfelt plea for us all to take greater heed of our emotions, even the most painful ones—reminding us that to be sensitive is to be alive.

An Animated short film about the man was transforming into Paper Man

In this children's video a little girl asks a little pine tree to stay green through the winter to remind people of spring. The little tree must disobey King Winter to stay green. He gets thrown into King Winter's dungeon. Anneka sets off to save her friend with Piney, the pinecone gnome, and Little Acorn.

After years of suppressing her inner child, Indigo, an elderly woman struggles with the cyclical war of the declining imagination via the rise of rationality, to revitalize her spirit before death.

Before he was a global icon of adventure, one 14-year-old Bear Grylls was a pretty ordinary kid – until he was recruited into the Secret Ops Squad, a covert search and rescue organization run exclusively by kids.

An animated cartoon to help children explore why and how animals move as they do. A little boy discovers that he cannot compete with a monkey, a snake or a horse by imitating the way they move. He can only outdistance them when he climbs into a vehicle that can travel in any environment, proving that while other animals are trapped by their environment, humans, the inventors, aren't.

This animated short by Claude Cloutier is a pictorial account of an attack on Canadian soldiers during WWI. On the edge of the battlefield, recruits are dreading the order to attack. At the signal, a young soldier leaps into a hell of fire and blood where the earth engulfs both the living and the dead. Blending archival images and Cloutier’s hypnotizing brushstroke, the film is a dazzling illustration of the futility of war.

Two agents of the Geo Society are sent to a far away land to seek a legendary emerald hidden deep beneath the jungle.

Swashbuckling heroes, cool sidekicks, exciting adventure, and trecherous villains fill The Count of Monte Cristo in this hip animated musical based on the original classic. From the first rousing sailor's song to the last duel, it's a story your family will treasure forever. The magic begins in France in 1815 where Edmond Dantes is to marry his true love, Mercedes. But three jealous scoundrels betray their betrothal and frame him for robbery. Years later, after a daring escape from the frightening Chateau D'If prison, Edmond returns to France to seek his revenge disguised as the mysterious Count of Monte Cristo!

A myopic woman walks, then boogies, through a wintry urban landscape, her world view altered suddenly by a beat from within herself, transporting her to a rich and lush place full of green foliage. Animated in stereoscopic stop-motion, Winnipeg filmmaker Megan Turnbull's film creates a magical, miniature world entirely of out paper sculpture and pure invention. This film was made as part of the 6th edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.