Dairy Boy

Made au CanadaCompetitionShort

A traditional Maritime image: three generations of P.E.I. women wash dishes after holiday dinners. Their after-dinner conversations become revealing when one of their own begins his transition.

Made au CanadaShort

Infamous outlaws The Lily and The Scorpion are on the run after a bank job gone wrong, but as day turns into night, the partners’ trust in each other begins to fray.

Made au CanadaShort

A young woman and her friend are led to a metamorphic realization when they ponder the nature of dreams.

Made au CanadaShort

After deciding to do a Muay Thai competition, a timid, mid-20s Filipino-Canadian woman must train in secret and go against her strict parents, while also falling in love with her coach, who is also a woman.

Made au CanadaShort

A woman turning 30 impulsively gives herself a dramatic haircut moments before hosting her birthday dinner, and it’s fine—it’s totally fine! Bangs is a paranoia-fueled comedy about one woman’s need for recognition and what happens when that recognition never comes.

Made au CanadaShort

Infamous outlaws The Lily and The Scorpion are on the run after a bank job gone wrong, but as day turns into night, the partners’ trust in each other begins to fray.

Made au CanadaCompetitionShort

A traditional Maritime image: three generations of P.E.I. women wash dishes after holiday dinners. Their after-dinner conversations become revealing when one of their own begins his transition.

Made au CanadaDocumentary

Whether wowing 1960s nightclub audiences with her vocal prowess or vanishing from the scene in a haze of rumours, Jackie Shane never failed to leave her mark. Through recorded conversations with the boundary-bursting yet reclusive icon, and the magic of ghostly, gorgeous rotoscope animation, Jackie is restored to us. Encouraged to leave Jim Crow-era Nashville by Joe Tex so that her talent could soar, Jackie Shane brought her R&B sound and daring charisma to adoring fans everywhere from mafia-controlled Montreal to her beloved Toronto, getting kidnapped and turning down a transphobic Ed Sullivan Show offer along the way. Close friends with Little Richard and an opener for the likes of Etta James and Marvin Gaye, Jackie Shane was an It girl in a time when using “she/her” seemed unthinkable. So she had a choice: global superstardom or her own hard-earned authenticity. This is the story of that choice, told through Jackie’s own words, vibrant reenactments, and assessments by contemporary trans figures, with music as the film’s soul. Executive produced by Elliot Page, Any Other Way is a triumph of the documentary form—as polished and impressive as Jackie herself.

Made au CanadaShort

A gay millennial reels after breaking-up with a popular influencer.

Made au CanadaShort

After the 100th 'The Thursday Testo,' (TTT), the tri-languistical references such as the Roman and Korean (Hangeul) alphabets and the Japanese syllabic (Katana) alphabet of the word TRANS on a comedy sketch by Kě.

Made au CanadaCompetitionFeature

In the vein of the Tony award-winning musical Stereophonic, this must-see drama is a Behind the Music-style glimpse of a 2000s Toronto indie band with Fleetwood Mac-like flare ups. With a trans frontman and queer members, The New Normals break boundaries while breaking one another’s hearts. Building off the source material, the novel Heidegger Stairwell by Kayt Burgess, Karen Knox maintains balletic control of multiple perspectives and aesthetics, following how each of the five core members handles firsts: first music video, first phone sex job, first love triangle. Music saves this close-knit crew from quarrels when it’s not causing them, but it’s the in-fighting, the “threads of connection and tension” that keep their audience hungering for more. Will the trans frontman (Lane Webber) stay with his queer girlfriend and songwriting partner (June Laporte) or find a different tune with Lugh (Daniel Gravelle)? Will the band survive or live on only in tribute? These concerns converge in a film charged with envy, creative friendship, and reckless love, and chock-full of pedigreed talent, including co-writing credits from award-winning Canadian writer, Zoe Whittall and festival alumni, Pat Mills as well as original songs from Stars’ Torquil Campbell.

Made au CanadaCompetitionFeatureVIRTUAL EXCLUSIVE

Inspired by true events, in 1970 an unorthodox mother sends her offbeat son from New Brunswick on a wintry cross-country mission past Quebec to retrieve his brother from Toronto after a public sex violation. Antics ensue in the Two-Solitudes atmosphere, bursting with revealing humour about brotherly love and French-English relations. In bravura performances, Alan Cumming plays motormouth Perley—dressed in an ushanka and ascot, taxidermied dog tucked under his arm—and Charlie Creed-Miles is Weldon—a gruff stoic in crooked glasses. These oddball siblings travel through frozen nights and across the language divide as they bicker, break down, and ultimately bond in their journey through central and eastern Canada. Weldon forced to confront the reality of Perley’s homosexuality (and his abject fear of being required to speak French) as he processes a horrific event from their past. After a lifetime of shutting down, a new set of dire circumstances has them opening their ears to hear one another’s stories. Award-winning filmmaker Michael Clowater, a master of wringing humour from pain, never loses sight of Perley and Weldon’s essential humanity among the pratfalls and bigotries, embedding beautiful truths in the film’s engrossing frictions.

Made au CanadaShort

A possessive doctor prepares an ostensibly romantic bath for his narcissistic boyfriend, but after an accusation of infidelity, things take a deeply disturbing turn.

Made au CanadaCompetitionShort

Robin is a young woman who lives alone above a gas station in North Bay. Every night she watches truckers fill their tanks up and munch on pepperettes. Robin has a secret. Robin is a porn addict. Robin can’t feel anything anymore.

Made au CanadaCompetitionFeatureVIRTUAL EXCLUSIVE

Small towns are no place for secrets. Among the churchgoing folk of a Newfoundland fishing village, Eliza leads a double-life: exploring transgressive photography while managing an unspoken romance with a shunned woman and the insistent advances of a married man. Hearsay only two steps behind. Sneaking around the neighbours, Eliza (Michaela Kurimsky) stages increasingly revealing photoshoots in locations both remote and close to home—perhaps too close. With every new post to her 318K Instagram followers, she imperils the careful balance she’s cultivated between her coexistence with fellow villagers, her burgeoning romance with Toni (Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers), and the married man (Peter Mooney) whose desire for her titillates as much as it terrifies. As a church fundraiser she’s helping to organize approaches, so too does a blaze of gossip, and choices are made that could leave her forever shattered. By turns kinky and kind-hearted, Melanie Oates’ second feature explores our wildest selves with a complexity that continues to deepen through to the final striking frame. All the while, embodying a true sense of place, depicting the rough shores and spirited personalities of one of the most isolated—and spectacular—of Canadian locales.