Last weekend, I had the pleasure of attending the Canadian Film Festival. The festival as a whole showcased 16 features and as many more shorts over the course of six days. I caught the final two days of the festival and enjoyed an impressive run of 12 films. Here\u2019s a short round-up in chronological order:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Eel<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n A noir Nova Scotia fishing thriller starring\/written\/directed by theatre favourite Wayne Burns<\/a>, Eel<\/em> is a quick hit of hard genre in an unexpected setting. Immersive lighting deprives the viewer of too much information and gives the low budget short an expansive atmosphere.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A Breed Apart<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n A quiet rumination on fatherhood, community, and getting your footing as an immigrant, this understated feature runs a bit long but lives up to the sterling reputation of its co-directors (Adam Belanger<\/a> & David Lafontaine<\/a>)\u2019s theatre work with a polished look and all round solid execution. Joshua Close is stellar in the tricky leading role bringing surprise humour to the character\u2019s stoic intensity while Stuart Hughes and Michael Hough give standout performances in well written supporting roles.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A Tale of Ira Abbott<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n A very short short that doesn\u2019t last an extra frame, writer\/director Sasha Zvereva shows beautiful restraint in an intimate portrait of care and sacrifice.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Akashi<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Shot mostly in rich high contrast black and white, this festival standout (and multi-award-winner) beautifully flips convention to show memory in vivid colour. Dreamy but clear-eyed, a must-see that deserves a big post-festival life.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Vital<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Pitch dark and unshakeably sad, this short about the organ trade in Iran is unflinching in its complexity.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Ballistic<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n The rules of the Canadian Film Festival state that Canadian filmmakers make Canadian films, regardless of subject matter, setting, or style (Akashi<\/em> is largely in Japanese, still counts), which is why there is room for the universal themes of Chad Faust\u2019s very American drama about a mother who works in the factory that makes the bullets that likely killed her soldier son.\u00a0 <\/span>Starring Game of Thrones<\/em>\u2019 Lena Headey, Ballistic<\/em> feels a bit higher profile than some of its competitors and has the polish to match. Writer\/director Faust gives everyone (most of them Canadian TV favourites) rich, complex material but saves the best scene for himself, delivering the performance of the festival as a tortured army recruiter.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Taco Boy<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n A quiet killer, this sweetly toned short about a little girl who wants to order a birthday cake for her dog is one of the most subtle considerations of grief I\u2019ve ever seen.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A Farewell to Youth<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n A personal story unafraid to be ugly, this feature has some iffy production execution from questionable shaky cam usage to uneven sound editing but the complex (mostly true!) story stands out as one of the festival\u2019s most enduring.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Line She Carries<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Lovely and interesting, this evocative short takes us inside the ever-smaller art of Inuit tattooing and its significance.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Los Rios<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Well executed and complicated despite filming in difficult circumstances, the one feature documentary I saw at the festival took 8 years to complete after running into budget limitations. A small story about migrants evolved into something bigger when the filmmakers encountered the infamous caravan that figured into the 2018 US midterm elections. It\u2019s a testament to Dale Bailey & Ryan Fyfe-Brown\u2019s artistry how well they transitioned the work to meet the story they encountered without oversimplifying.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Leopard<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n My favourite short of the festival, writer\/director Dan Abramovici\u2019s tender and clever film brilliantly combines animation and live action as our teenage heroine Tish (a fabulous Emma Ho) takes on the ultimate nemesis- a pretentious big brother.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Bearded Girl<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Director Jody Wilson\u2019s circus-set feature drags a bit and plays with a few too many obvious metaphors but the film looks beautiful (Teia Dumaresq\u2019s makeup work is some of the best I\u2019ve ever seen) and, unnecessary epilogue aside, it features a highlight last shot.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Last weekend, I had the pleasure of attending the Canadian Film Festival. The festival as a whole showcased 16 features and as many more shorts over the course of six days. I caught the final two days of the festival and enjoyed an impressive run of 12 films. Here\u2019s a short round-up in chronological order: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":57353,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Canadian Film Festival","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[344,2259],"tags":[441,2486,13,1816,561,1289,1725],"coauthors":[1858],"class_list":["post-57320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cinema","category-featured","tag-canadian-film","tag-canadian-film-festival","tag-festivals","tag-film-festivals","tag-indie-film","tag-new-releases","tag-short-films"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myentertainmentworld.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/CFFLogoWebsiteSocialImage-scaled.webp","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":36024,"url":"https:\/\/www.myentertainmentworld.ca\/2016\/11\/featured-project-cest-moi\/","url_meta":{"origin":57320,"position":0},"title":"Featured Project: C’est Moi","author":"Kelly Bedard","date":"06 November 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"A familiar face around Ontario theatre who's worked with The Shaw Festival, The Factory, Convergence, Hart House, First Act Productions and more, Howard J. Davis is making his mark in a different medium these days. 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