SHORT FILMS
3 movements OF OUTTAKES
directed BY BEATRIZ MEDIAVILLA
Screened in a loop during the festival
2016 / 9 min / dance / Canada
Synopsis
Exploratory short film conceived from the outtakes obtained following the production of the documentary Danse avec elles. In this cinedance, body movement is the principal vehicle for focusing on the themes of roots, exile, letting go, and resilience.
Béatriz Mediavilla is a multidisciplinary artist born in Rouyn-Noranda, where she still lives today, her parents having left Francoist Spain more than fifty years ago. Holder of a master’s degree in film studies, she teaches cinema at Cégep de l’Abitibi-Témiscamingue.
FILMINISTES FESTIVAL
• Screened in a loop during the festival
• Sunday, May 7, 9 pm – Screening followed by a discussion with the co-founders | Outdoor stage
Since 2015, the Filministes Festival organizes screenings of cinematographic works followed by discussions on various contemporary feminist issues.
Babushka
directed By Kristina Wagenbauer
2021 / 25 min / documentary / Canada, Switzerland and Russia
Synopsis
A Canadian director visits her grandmother in Russia after 25 years of separation. Travelling through family memories and those of a country, this roller coaster of emotions invites us into an intimate space for reconciliation.
Kristina Wagenbauer is a Swiss-Canadian filmmaker based in Montreal. Her work has been showcased in more than 100 festivals and was nominated at the Canadian Screen Awards as well as Quebec Cinema Awards.
Blue Garden
directed By Natalie Murao
2022 / 5 min / documentary / Canada
Synopsis
“Why have I never liked tomatoes?” A simple question leads a fourth-generation Japanese Canadian to explore her own family’s history in the incarceration camps, unspoken history of trauma, and hopefully lead to healing in this animated documentary.
Natalie Murao is an award-winning filmmaker from Vancouver, Canada. Her films draw from her Japanese-Canadian heritage and childhood experiences, which include themes of memory and the mundane.
hyphen
directed By Laura Kamugisha
2020 / 18 min / documentary / Canada
Synopsis
Marie-Chantal’s life is split in two. She has lived half her life in Rwanda and the other half in Canada. She is a political refugee.
Laura Kamugisha is a filmmaker of Congo-Rwandan origin based in Montreal. Her films explore notions of cultural identity, memories and intergenerational baggage all through visual poetry.
Dear Nanay
directed By Frances Grace Mortel
2021 / 3 min / documentary / United States
Synopsis
A love letter to her grandmother, this experimental documentary explores the filmmaker’s early memories in the Philippines and her search for refuge from pandemic anxiety and domestic claustrophobia.
Frances Grace Morte is a Filipino photographer, filmmaker, and community organizer. The challenges of being a mother, immigrant, and queer artist of color fuel her commitment to tell and center stories that examine intersectional truths, navigate intergenerational and diasporic identities, and inspire social justice.
ON THE SURFACE
directed By Fan Sissoko
2021 / 4 min / animation / Iceland and Mali
Synopsis
Ada goes swimming in the Icelandic sea and reflects on raising a child in a country that feels nothing like home. As she enters the freezing water, she relives her traumatic pregnancy. Soon her swimming eases. Facing her fears is helping her heal.
Fan Sissoko is a French-Malian artist and filmmaker based in Reykjavik, with a background in social design and visual ethnography. She uses film and audio storytelling as a means to record intimate stories that can inspire social change.
ATÉR
directed By Marie Fages
2021 / 21 min / fiction / France
Synopsis
Sahar tirelessly explores volcanic landscapes to find a rare mineral. But what she finds out shakes her research, her connection with the atmosphere and our Milky Way.
Marie Fages is a nomadic cinematographer and scenographer. Trained at the Roma School of Fine Arts and at the National School of Decorative Arts in Paris, she designs sets for theatre and cinema, and artistic installation in different countries.
LES FILMS DU 3 MARS
• Screened in a loop during the festival
• Tuesday, May 9, 6:30 pm – Screening followed by a discussion with Alliah Fafin, Omar Elhamy and Houman Zolfaghari
Les Films du 3 Mars (F3M) promotes Quebec and Canadian auteur films nationally and internationally. From ideation through the final cut and onto the screen, they put their expertise toward helping their members market and distribute their work.
AMANI
directed By alliah fafin
2021 / 17 min / fiction / Canada
Synopsis
In this tale, halfway between reality and fantasy, a mysterious narrator tells us the story of Amani, a young boy passionate about dance who finds himself hostage to a new reality.
Alliah Fafin was born in Rwanda and raised in Burundi until the 1993 civil war. She left Quebec in 2016 for Chad, where she worked with UNICEF on the production of several videos illustrating the problems encountered by local populations, Nigerian refugees and Central African returnees. Her first short film Amani was inspired by her experience in Burundi.
THE ROSES OF DAMASCUS
Directed by Gabriel Gonzalez Guirola & Yasmina Touzani
2019 / 11 min / animation / France
Synopsis
An exile seeks refuge, the spectator confront himself to the different spaces of memorie’s refugee : Camps and barbed, the journey in a sea, a ceaseless walk.
Born in Guatemala, Gabriel Gonzalez Guirola arrives in France in 2007. He spends a year in fine arts school in Toulouse where he discovers stop motion films. Since 2017, he works in many projects around puppetry and animated forms.
Yasmina Touzani was born in Toulouse, from a Berber immigrant mother who passed on to her the love of letters. The co-production of The Roses of Damascus with Gabriel allowed her to discover the world of animation and to broaden her artistic horizons.
THE ROOM
directed BY SAMI MERMER & HOUMAN ZOLFAGHARI
2019 / 19 min / fiction / Canada
Synopsis
Two trajectories of exile intersect for a short moment somewhere in a simple room, where two men, two strangers, will finally be able to face their own destinies.
Sami is a filmmaker from Turkey. Also a director of photography, he has worked in the film industry for more than ten years.
Houman Zolfaghari is a filmmaker, poet and mathematician in search of the story of the world through cinema, worlds and images.
foam
directed By OMAR ELHAMY
2020 / 28 min / fiction / Canada
Synopsis
In the peak of summer, a carwash languishes. More than a job, the carwash has become a surrogate family to the small group of men. When Hakim returns to work after serving time, what was supposed to be a long awaited reunion between the workers quickly spirals into chaos.
Omar Elhamy was born and raised in Egypt. Established in Quebec for a few years now, he is a director, writer and editor. Foam (2020), his latest short film, was a part of the International Short film Competition at the 70th Berlinale.
i am here
directed By ALLEN FOROUHAR
• Screened in a loop during the festival
• Wednesday, May 10, 6:30 pm – Screening followed by a discussion with Allen Forouhar
2022 / 46 min / documentary / Canada
Synopsis
Who says every trip has a destination? Intercut stories of five people from different countries who have taken the difficult path and made the decision to leave their homeland.
Born in Iran, Allen Forouhar grew up, like most of his contemporaries, in the stifling political and ideological atmosphere of the Iranian regime. In 2017, he was able to leave Iran and embarked upon his career as director in Montreal.
Collectif Femme, Vie, Liberté – Montréal
Friday, May 12, 4 pm
Screening followed by a discussion with Leila Ebrahimi Fakhari
The collective Woman, Life, Freedom of Montreal is a solidarity group with the fight for the rights of Iranian women. As part of Cuisine ta ville, the collective will present a selection of three short films by Canadian-Iranian Leila Ebrahimi Fakhar.
BARAYÉ
directed By Leila Ebrahimi FakharI
2 min / dance
Synopsis
A music video created for “Baraye”, a popular song by Shervin Hajipoor, released only a few days after the death of Mahsa Jina Amini and instantly becoming the anthem of Iran’s “Woman, Life, Freedom” revolution. Hajipoor was arrested for writing the song, whose lyrics are compiled from tweets posted by people explaining why they were fighting the Iranian regime.
SEPIDAR
directed By Leila Ebrahimi FakharI
10 min / documentary
Synopsis
Based on true stories from a notorious women’s prison in Iran. Sepideh Qolian tells the story of three inmates and their daily struggle.
L’heure de l’exécution
directed By Leila Ebrahimi FakharI
10 min / dance
Synopsis
This choreographed video tells the story of a woman who accidentally kills her rapist while attempting to defend herself. She is tried for manslaughter, found guilty and executed by the judicial authorities of the Islamic Republic.
FEATURE FILMS
All screenings are followed by a discussion with the director and/or guests
ESSENTIELS
directed By KY VY LE DUC
Tuesday, May 9, 9 pm | Outdoor stage
Screening followed by a discussion with Ky Vy Le Duc, Sonia Djelidi and Sarah Champagne
2022 / 52 min / documentary / Canada
Synopsis
This rigorous documentary investigation reveals the reality of asylum seekers and temporary workers who hold precarious jobs. These people are struggling to obtain the right to settle here permanently. Why?
Ky Vy Le Duc’s parents arrived in Québec as Vietnamese refugees in 1979. For years now, he has made original documentaries that have captured the interest of new audiences. Since 2019, he has been a member of the Young Leaders Committee of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
TAJAMUL’S WORDS
directed By DOMINIQUE CHOISY
Wednesday, May 10, 9 pm | Outdoor stage
Screening followed by a discussion with Tajamul Faqiri-Choisy
2021 / 118 min / documentary / France
Synopsis
Tajamul Faquiri-Choiy fled his war-torn Afghanistan on foot all the way to France. Now 20, he makes the journey backwards, from Amiens to Kabul, with his adoptive father, to tell the story of how he became a refugee.
Dominique Choisy is a director and writer.
SEULS
directed By PAUL TOM
Thursday, May 11, 5:30 pm
Screening followed by a discussion with Paul Tom and Afshin
2021 / 82 min / documentary / Canada
Synopsis
Scared for their lives, Afshin, Alain and Patricia left their home countries, without their parents. As unaccompanied minors, they had to start over in Canada, in hopes to live a better life. Mixing real-life footage and animated sequences, Seuls is a tribute to hope: how can a child manage to reinvent himself or herself in a new country, after having left everything behind?
Paul Tom was born to Cambodian parents in a refugee camp in Thailand. His signature themes are the construction of identity; family ties; and all things to do with the intimate, fragile and priceless aspects of human beings.
Une histoire sur le goût de la langue
directed By HÉLÈNE CHOQUETTE
Thursday, May 11, 9 pm | Outdoor stage
Screening followed by a discussion with Hélène Choquette
2022 / 76 min / documentary / Canada
Synopsis
An ode to Quebec’s French language, the film traces its unusual trajectory, from the Conquest of 1759 to the present day.
Documentary filmmaker Hélène Choquette has garnered multiple awards both here and abroad. Her work takes an honest, sympathetic look at otherwise voiceless people around the world and their realities.
CHILDREN OF FIRE
directed By Beatriz Pizano
Saturday, May 13, 6:30 pm
Screening presented by Shahrzad Arshadi
2022 / 80 min
Synopsis
Children of Fire offers an intimate portrayal of the Kurdish female freedom fighters that hosted Shahrzad Arshadi and Anna Chatterton in the mountains of Kurdistan in 2018. Co-created with a mix of verbatim theatre and first-person confessional, this play follows the journey and layered relationship across cultures between Shahrzad and Anna, and asks what is at the heart of living bravely as a woman and activist.
Beatriz Pizano is a director, playwright, and an actor with more than twenty years of experience on stage, film and television. She is the 2009 winner of the prestigious John Hirsch Prize for Direction from the Canada Council for the Arts.
