Discoveries from Canada World Cinema

A teenage posse, known as the Vandits, attempts to pull off a ridiculous heist.

Nicolas loves baseball. Every day during vacation he and his friends meet at the town’s old baseball field to play their favourite game... Until one infamous day at the start of summer when Nicolas discovers that the gates to the field have been locked and that old boards and assorted junk are strewn across what used to be the baseball diamond. It seems the town council has decided to use the grounds as a dump. The kids are outraged.They decide to contest this decision, to defend their territory.

Bruce McDonald’s long-awaited follow-up to his cult classic mock-doc stars McDonald himself as "Bruce," the director of Hard Core Logo, who has relocated to L.A. and scored a profitable gig as a TV director. When the show he’s been working on is suddenly put on hiatus, Bruce is at loose ends. When he hears that punk rocker Care Failure (played by real-life musician Care Failure) has claimed that she channelled the spirit of Hard Core Logo’s late singer Joe Dick while writing songs for her new album, Bruce hies to Saskatchewan, where Failure and her band Die Mannequin are recording the album under the tutelage of Dick’s idol and former mentor Bucky Haight (Julian Richings, who played the same role in the original film).

In 1995, Quebec faced a harrowing choice: remain part of Canada or establish itself as a separate country. The future of a nation and a lifelong dream were at stake in this referendum. Through interviews and analysis, journalists Antoine Robitaille and Dave Noël delve into the secret strategies, fierce rivalries, and political maneuvering of both sides.

Canadians in search of the national identity will not find it fully fleshed in this film. An animated cartoon, it sees Canadians as pragmatists, adaptable to whatever climate or history place in their way. It is a boisterous, bubbling analysis of the Canadian character and, although it may not answer the question of the title, it does leave the feeling that being Canadian is not so exhausting as one might expect.

An elderly widow (Joan Benac) starts to wonder what happened to a would-be lover from her past who appeared with her in a live televised drama in the 1950s. After discovering the show in CBC’s archive, her granddaughter Audrey (Deragh Campbell) attempts to try and track the man down.

In front of a live studio audience, host David C. Jones interviews three different panels of film industry professionals about the trials and tribulations for proudly queer and out actors.

Wolf, a young métis hunter living on the mountain. While hunting deep in the woods he discovers Crane, an older man with a mysterious past and the scars to prove it. Wolf nurses him back to health. Over time their bond gets deeper and they fall in love. When outsiders begin to show up looking for Crane, blood begins to flow. Cornered by an army of crooked cops, Wolf and Crane work together to boobie trap the mountain, taking them out one at a time until they come face-to-face with the man who pulls the strings…. Bretten Hannam’s debut feature is an ambitious action/thriller with outstanding performances from Justin Rain (Defiance) and Festival favourite Glen Gould (Rhymes for Young Ghouls, Charlie Zone).

Fraggle Rock wrap video taped in 1986, and screened May 16, 1986.

Dance Together follows two teen girls brought together by a passionate need to express themselves. Holly, an injured dancer, and Alex, a shy girl who is Deaf, have a chance meeting that sparks a creative partnership. Alex introduces Holly to American Sign Language poetry and helps her gain the confidence to stand up to her bullies, while Holly helps Alex add a dancer's flair to her poetry routine that just might put her group over the top. Dance Together features original and licensed songs along with stunning choreography.

Francis is being interrogated about a series of crimes he might be guilty of.

Christophe agrees to be filmed by his roommate Stéphane, while he is searching for a meaningful engineering job. Since he voluntarily resigned his job when he was to be moved to quality control, he does not get unemployment benefits, and goes to classes on how to contest the decision.

A descendant of the Maharaja Ranjit Singh attempts to recover the fabled Koh-I-Noor diamond from Britain's crown jewels when they make a tour stop at a Toronto museum.

Approached by the Prime Minister of Quebec to rejuvenate the image of his government, Arlette Saint-Amour becomes, overnight, Minister of Culture. She succeeds by her look and her daring in creating a real buzz around Culture.

A pimp and his seven working girls move to a small conservative mining town in northern Quebec to establish a brothel.

Eager to make something of himself, Will joins a small but eccentric business club. Partnering with two senior members, the trio enroll in an intense online business competition in an attempt to win a trip to internationals and a hefty cash prize.

After the mysterious death of their infamous director, members of a formerly renowned theatre company reunite for his wake. The grieving widow welcomes the thespians to her country house, but the drama intensifies when old rivalries and jealousies erupt, exposing a myriad of secrets and lies.

A dropout gets the margins of society and resists his father’s pressure to return to the bosom of the village. The film transcends anecdote by diving into a wacky and unusual universe, full of fantasy, imagination, and visual and sound gags.

In the fall of 1964, just over a year before his death, Buster Keaton traveled to Canada to make The Railrodder, a short subject that now enjoys a small cult following. Documenting this mobile production in fascinating and unexpected detail, Buster Keaton Rides Again offers a rare glimpse of the comedy legend’s temperament, philosophies, hobbies, marriage (his third), and the occasionally combative creative process behind the scenes. An intimate look at one of cinema’s most enduring legends.

A man looking to buy a snake gets far more than he bargained for as he is drawn into a mysterious woman's home of exotic reptiles.

Bruce is a repairman tormented by a crippling sense of responsibility for his disabled wife Samantha, an ex-policewoman. Bruce’s increasing hypersensitivity to the injustice suffered by his wife steers him down a dark path of vigilantism. His disintegrating mental health, paranoia and overwhelming sense of doom causes Bruce to channel his rage towards a young woman.

A documentary that follows Canadian-born defenseman Luke Prokop as he decides to become the first — and still only — professional athlete playing under contract to an NHL team to come out as gay. Growing up in Edmonton steeped in Canada’s tough, often homophobic hockey culture, and playing without gay role models throughout professional sports, Luke’s path to coming out of the closet has been neither easy nor obvious. The film charts Prokop’s personal journey against the backdrop of a professional hockey industry that has had, at best, an ambivalent relationship to diversity. As the film sensitively reveals, being publicly out certainly came as an earthquake to his family, especially his father Al, who as Luke’s mentor and sometime coach represents the most complex and moving relationship in the film.

Sisters of Wrestling paints an intimate portrait of Azaelle, LuFisto and Loue O'Farrell, three ring warriors for whom wrestling is both a passionate love and an outlet from everyday life.

A priest goes to great lengths in an effort to get a teenage prostitute off the streets.

A tomboyish juvenile delinquent, Paschal Draney, is sent to live in a foster home run by a well-known horse breeder where he befriends a Thoroughbred seemingly crippled by a congenital eye defect.

Life crafts her creations with love and with care. When Death repeatedly takes those creations away, Life becomes upset and asks Death to leave, only to find that without Death, she has no way of continuing to create…

The film investigates explicit representations of female sexuality by women, exploring the pragmatic and philosophical questions they pose, with emphasis on the ways in which the creation of women-friendly pornography confronts and alters the expectations of male consumers. Ultimately, Nitoslawska is concerned with how we comprehend desire, gender and identity, how we understand and represent its history, and the resulting affect on culture and human relations.

This short story is a prequel to our favorite friendship unit, Apple. Follow her in her adventure from the other side of the Wasteland, right before her memorable encounter with the Kid!

A documentary, using dramatization of fact, that examines the Battle of Verrières Ridge, where on July 25, 1944 and not long after D-Day, an inexperienced battalion of the Canadian Black Watch Regiment launched a doomed attack and was defeated with heavy casualties by veteran German SS troops. Part of "The Valour and the Horror" mini series.

A man searches for a missing woman who has been kidnapped by a deranged Professor with sinister intentions.

A Montreal police officer goes to Arkansas to solve the murder of his brother.

Don't Mess with Bill is a 1980 Canadian short documentary film about Canadian martial arts pioneer Bill Underwood. At eighty-four, Underwood is a specialist in his own brand of self defense, which he still teaches to police, students, and senior citizens. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short.

Jean has not spoken to his mother for 5 years. However, she has just committed suicide and he has to return to Belgium to settle his estate. While she bequeaths him an antique mirror of great monetary and sentimental value, he will have to deal with his mother's very young husband, Fabrice, and his mother, who are hindering his efforts to get it back. Through this quest for the mirror, Jean will have to free himself from a past that haunts him by making peace with what his mother left him.

Follows a Canadian filmmaker through Asia as she examines her father's relationship with his 23 year old bride-to-be who lives in the Philippines.

A cautionary tale of lying. A curious thing happens to a man when lying, cheating words come out of his mouth.

Even though the protagonist of the Canadian Femme De L'Hotel is a female filmmaker, one would think twice before suggesting that this effort by Swiss-born director Lea Pool is autobiographical. Paule Baillargeon portrays a well-known director who returns to her home town of Montreal to film a high-budget musical drama. At her hotel, Paule has a brief but unsettling encounter with a suicidal elderly woman (Louise Marleau). This element of the plot is briefly forgotten as we get to know the actors in Paule's current project. Then she meets the old lady again, and with mounting incredulity Paule discovers that the actual events in the woman's life mirror the fictional events in the director's film.

Three friends go on a fishing trip. Well ... that's what everyone believes.

Images and sounds are spliced together in this journey to the heart of the political, economic and cultural oppression of the Quebec people. A reflection on neo-colonial exploitation and the cancer of alienation. To the very Canadian multiculturalism of Trudeau and the métissage of the multinationals, celebrated by the high priests of the dominant ideology, is contrasted the idea of acculturation, even deculturation. A way of resisting as good as any other.

Jay and Matt move everything out of "Stu's" garage. A road trip of memory ensues.

A young boy who is a victim of bullying hopes his mother's magic potion will make him a war hero like his father, but in the end discovers that all he needed was to believe in himself. Not your typical coming of age story, Sgt. Fruit Fly shows what happens when a boy can just be a boy.

What could be a beautiful fairy tale for some - boy meets girl - could also be the beginning of a horror film for Faruk. The young man is crushed between the dark world of his criminal cousins in Sarajevo and the discovery of love. The film powerfully visualises and contrasts a harshness and tenderness experienced and dreamed.

While green spaces have long been neglected in cities, citizen mobilization has for several years helped to rediscover the beneficial effects of urban forests. Exploring various innovative nature restoration projects in Canadian cities, Urban Forests acts as a real antidote to pessimism by showing us that the ecological solution is closer than it seems.

GAZA brings us into a unique place beyond the reach of television news reports to reveal a world rich with eloquent and resilient characters, offering us a cinematic and enriching portrait of a people attempting to lead meaningful lives against the rubble of perennial conflict. Throughout its entire history the Gaza Strip has been witness to conflict and upheaval. From ancient times this tiny coastal territory, located at a crossroads between continents, has been a pawn whose fate rested in the hands of powerful neighbours.

A dramatic short film about identity, truth, and liberation in the face of loss. After her husband’s death, Nani—a recently widowed Indo-Caribbean matriarch—embraces newfound freedom in her solitude, only to be interrupted by an unexpected lunch with her daughter and grandchildren. When confronted about her late husband’s affair, Nani chooses to protect his truth: he was queer. Her response reveals a complex love and a deep understanding of human frailty. Standing firm in her choices, Nani redefines strength and dignity, embodying a new kind of hero—an immigrant elder dancing into her next chapter while carrying both grief and joy.

Final 24 recreates River Phoenix's last day to tell the tragic tale of a young man whose short life was dominated by the constant pressure to perform.

In pursuit of a better future, a young girl decides to emigrate. She leaves her homeland behind along with her belongings and her loved ones. In the new country she realizes the depth of her venture and discovers that the only thing she carries with her from her homeland, is a symbol of love.

A crew of student filmmakers embark on a road trip when they discover odd events and people acting strangely around them. Soon, they realise that sinister doppelgangers have invaded the town.

The subversive masterpieces of Russian-Ukrainian writer Isaac Babel challenged the reality of life under rising totalitarianism, and led to his arrest and execution in 1940. In Finding Babel, Andrei Malaev-Babel confronts complex traces of a turbulent history that echo in his grandfather's writing and in the conflicts of today's Ukraine and Russia. Babel's fiction is woven into Andrei's search with ethereal animation that puts the viewer, like Babel's readers, between fantasy and reality.

As a thirty something acting teacher attempts to push a group of eager young performers out of their comfort zones, he struggles with his own ability to live an authentic and fulfilling life with his teenage son.

When Bibi's dog dies, there's only one shoulder she wants to cry on. It just belongs to her hot-tempered ex.

A gay man reminisces about his deceased lover, a victim of AIDS.

The coming-of-age of adolescent Brian O'Connal in small town Depression-era Saskatchewan is told. The son of the local pharmacist Gerald O'Connal, Brian is in many ways a typical boy, who dislikes school if only because of his run-ins with the nervous schoolteacher, Miss MacDonald, and who tries to catch gophers with his friends, Artie and Forbsie. His best friend and protector is slightly older Jonathan Ben, better known as The Young Ben (as his father is referred to as The Ben), who is highly regarded as a problem by those in town who see themselves as the moral authority if only because of The Young Ben's association to The Ben, the town still keeper and drunk. Brian's life takes a turn when his parents have to leave town temporarily, while Brian stays on his Uncle Sean's farm. That stint leads to a series of events which make Brian see life around him through slightly older and wiser eyes.

An essay film exploring the thirteen United States Presidents that have led the country through war and conflict from 1950 to 2025.

Geologists Lauren and Ben, partners in both work and life, investigate a strange anomaly discovered deep in the terrain. Alongside colleague Sam and intern Trevor, the group must navigate an escalating series of horrors that starts once they uncover an ancient force of destruction buried in the ground.

When his secret girlfriend falls ill, an undocumented worker living in Toronto must choose between getting caught and getting her the emergency medical attention she desperately needs.

Plans go awry when a disgraced boxer is hired to abduct a runaway crackhead by her family.

A film director and sound designer discover a disturbing sound cue hidden in the mix of their short film, forcing the director to confront demons from his past.

Animation feature based on the popular web series. This long-running surrealist, avant-garde animation project follows weary, elderly Henry and his enigmatic, shape-shifting companion Mischief as they navigate a desolate, glitching version of 1940s/50s Canada. Born from the aftermath of a fictionalized Philadelphia Experiment, this “hauntological” landscape is a fractured reality where historical nostalgia merges with cosmic horror. Through Justin Tomchuk’s signature lo-fi animation and atmospheric Hexsystem soundtrack, INTERFACE explores profound philosophical themes of memory, identity, and the absurdity of existence. Ultimately, it chronicles a journey to find meaning amidst the disintegrating universe.

The members of an underground, post-apocalyptic bunker invite a psychologist from the radioactive and chaotic surface to audition for a place to live among them.

A downbeat story of life inside a women's prison. There is more crime inside than out. When the inmates see that a woman is soon to be admitted for killing a young boy, they begin to plan her murder.