ReFrame 2024 FILM Selection
- Sarah Lewis
- Canada
- 2023
- 4 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
“Never forget me, remember me, this is your home.”
"The Rez" is so much more than the pain inflicted by settler-colonialism. Lewis speaks to her greater community, her love for their strength, and the fight they give to keep the community whole. Identity and community are vital; Lewis embraces both without compromise.
- Anishinaabemowin, English
- Terril Calder
- Canada
- 2023
- 6 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
At Aunty Gladys’ funeral, Archer Pechawis heard a tap on the window -- it was a bear named Jesus. This film is an allegory for religious interference, with an aching yet humorous look at estrangement, and mourning for the loss of someone still living.
- Cree, English, French
- Quirky
- Signe Rosenlund-Hauglid
- Norway
- 2023
- 11 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 7:30 PM
- Showplace
A poet uses her voice to excavate the lost home of her childhood.
- Presenting Partner/s: OPIRG Peterborough
- Norwegian
- Quirky
- Simon Brothers, Luke Mistruzzi
- Canada
- 2023
- 17 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 3:00 PM
- Library
Centred on Ontario’s short-lived, but transformational Basic Income Pilot, this documentary sparks curiosity, fosters understanding, and encourages open dialogue about the transformative potential of basic income by combining emotional narratives, real-life impact stories, expert insights and creative visuals.
Following the film, join us for Panel: Impact of Basic Income.
- English
- Mette Carla Albrechtsen
- Denmark
- 2024
- 80 mins
- Sun Jan 26
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
In colorful, sunkissed postcards, A Place in The Sun invites you to join the wonderful and melancholic backstage world of a classic Charter holiday.
- Presenting Partner/s: La Mesita Restaurante
- Arabic, Danish, English, French, German, Russian, Spanish, Ukrainian
- Quirky
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Ibrahim Handal
- Palestine, State of
- 2023
- 10 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
A lonely chair on an abandoned balcony, a photographer watching it days and nights, a strange thing happens that will change the life of the chair for ever.
- Arabic, English, French
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Arun Bhattarai, Dorottya Zurbó
- Bhutan
- 2024
- 94 mins
- Sun Jan 26
- 5:00 PM
- Showplace
Amber, a happiness agent, travels the Bhutanese Himalayas surveying people's happiness. On his remote mountain journey, he searches for fulfillment.
- Presenting Partner/s: Peterborough Greens
- Lindsay McIntyre
- Canada
- 2021
- 17 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
What does it mean to be Inuk? Historically depicted as welcoming and friendly people in remote snowy landscapes, in reality, Inuit live across the globe. Using antique wind-up bears, layered animation, and analogue techniques, McIntyre constructs an animated documentary in an exploration of identity and belonging by Inuit, both in and outside of community.
- English, Inuktut
- Visually Striking
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- A.K. Sandhu
- USA
- 2023
- 19 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 2:45 PM
- Showplace
Sculptor Dana King’s hands and activist Fredrika Newton’s memories come together to build a new monument—a bust of Black Panther Party leader Huey P. Newton for the Oakland community that he loved and shaped. As the sculpture takes form, more than just a face is revealed.
- English
- Inspiring
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Wei Zishuo
- China
- 2024
- 15 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
The film conveys the theme of "love" through the life story of a blind-deaf couple. Facing all kinds of dilemmas, the couple maintain each other between light and darkness.
- Presenting Partner/s: Council for Persons with Disabilities
- Kordo Doski
- Canada, Iraq, Sweden, USA
- 2023
- 90 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Showplace
The inspirational story of The Dalkurd Football Club, a scrappy group of Kurdish refugees in Sweden who defy all odds to climb the ranks of Sweden’s soccer leagues in hopes of becoming champions, and bringing glory and attention to the plight of their stateless people.
Register for the virtual Q&A | Wednesday, Jan 31 at 5:30PM EST
- English, Kurdish, Swedish
- Uplifting
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Michael Mabbott, Lucah Rosenberg-Lee
- Canada
- 2024
- 98 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 2:15 PM
- Showplace
- Presenting Partner/s: pflag Peterborough
- Inspiring
- Janet Harbord
- United Kingdom
- 2023
- 18 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
A film shot in 1957 in at the Maudsley Hospital, London, captures the movements and behaviour of children under observation for atypical behaviour. In the present day, three autistic respondents watch the footage, bringing new and insightful interpretations of the children’s behaviour as they explore the sparse environment of the clinic. Through speculation and identification, with wit and audacity, the responses forge a new soundtrack from an autistic point of view. As the film evolves, it takes on the rhythms and repetitions of the children’s activities, becoming a playful homage to the body language of autism.
- Presenting Partner/s: Trent Valley Archives
- English
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Alisi Telengut
- Canada
- 2023
- 9 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 2:15 PM
- Market Hall
The formation of Lake Baikal is reimagined with the voice of the Indigenous Buryat language.
- Presenting Partner/s: Kawartha Land Trust (KLT), Camp Kawartha
- Mongolian
- Visually Striking
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Karen Cho
- Canada
- 2022
- 88 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 5:15 PM
- Market Hall
All across the globe, Chinatowns are under threat of disappearing – and along with them, the rich history of communities who fought from the margins for a place to belong. Big Fight in Little Chinatown documents the collective fight to save Chinatowns across North America.
- English, French, Mandarin Chinese
- Sarah Grant
- United Kingdom
- 2023
- 14 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 7:30 PM
- Market Hall
Exploring the joy of dance in pop culture, reimagined through fatness.
- Presenting Partner/s: Public Energy Performing Arts
- English
- Inspiring
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Iiti Yli-Harja
- Finland
- 2022
- 15 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
For 18-year-old Finnish–Kosovan Fatu, a simple visit to the grocery store feels as nerve-racking as a lunar expedition. For the first time in his life, he’s wearing makeup in public. Luckily his best friend Rai, a young woman on the spectrum of autism, is there to ferociously support him through the voyage.
- Finnish
- Quirky
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- James Burns, Stevie Salas
- Canada
- 2023
- 98 mins
- Thu Jan 25
- 7:00 PM
- Showplace
In Boil Alert, an Indigenous woman goes on a journey through First Nations reservations to shine a light on the devastating struggle for clean water and discovers herself in the process. This poignant exploration illuminates the human dimension of the water crisis in Indigenous communities, as well as the impact it is having upon Native identity.
Guest in attendance, Q&A with Layla Staats and Joshua Neuman
This film is featured during Opening Night.
Please note: opening night tickets are sold separately, and are not included in the purchase of a Festival Pass.
Opening Night brought to you by

- English
- Inspiring
- Miranda Stern
- United Kingdom
- 2022
- 19 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
One woman’s love letter and final goodbye to heroin, as she attempts to come off the synthetic opiates that have kept her clean for the past six years. This short documentary attempts to reframe some of the stigmas of addiction, and poses the following question: what does it mean to be ‘clean’?
- Micah B Levin
- USA
- 2021
- 38 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
For twenty-five years Keith Wasserman has made and delivered elaborate art mail packages - all in the hopes of befriending his muse. Dear Ani explores what can happen when you present your truest self, and risk total failure. It is an intimate account of psychotic mania, personal mastery, and creative triumph.
- English
- Quirky
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Matthieu Rytz
- USA
- 2023
- 94 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 10:00 AM
- Showplace
This exquisite fly-on-the-wall environmental doc is a gripping and up-to-the-minute tale of geopolitical, scientific, and corporate intrigue. It exposes the destructive machinations of an organization empowered to extract massive amounts of metals from the deep seafloor.
- English
- Visually Striking
- Sean Wainsteim
- Canada
- 2023
- 14 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
After festival rejections, a director revises his intensely personal short film about trauma, suicide, and the Holocaust. He transforms the film into a painful, blunt and funny dissection of itself, and of his own life. Ten years in the making.
Guests in attendance, Q&A with Sean Wainsteim
- English
- Quirky
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Kate Levy
- USA
- 2021
- 22 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 3:00 PM
- Showplace
In the summer of 2020, Detroiters faced unprecedented police violence as they took to the streets to protest the killings of Black people across the country. Detroit Will Breathe provides an unprecedented look into the actions of the police and examines what it means to be part of an integrated movement fighting for Black lives.
- Mariam Ghani
- United States
- 2024
- 120 mins
- Sun Jan 26
- 12:00 PM
- Market Hall
An archival documentary about the real consequences of how we imagine disease.
- Presenting Partner/s: Artspace
- English
- Sama Pana
- Belgium
- 2024
- 73 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 7:30 PM
- Showplace
- Presenting Partner/s: Watson & Lou, Peterborough Public Library, Take Cover Books Ltd.
- English
- Inspiring
- Josh Izenberg, Brett Marty
- USA
- 2021
- 17 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 5:15 PM
- Showplace
Deep in the Mojave desert, an unconventional field biologist wages a high-tech war against ravens - laser cannons, drones, exploding turtle shells - in a last ditch effort to save the last few desert tortoises from extinction.
- English
- Hopeful
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Laissa Malih
- Kenya
- 2024
- 16 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 5:00 PM
- Showplace
Laissa Malih — the first female Maasai filmmaker — returns to the community her parents left in this deeply personal look at how the lands of her forefathers are being reshaped by climate change.
- Presenting Partner/s: Community Race Relations Committee of Peterborough
- Inspiring
- Chen Sing Yap
- Canada
- 2022
- 7 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
From the disappearing wildlife in his hometown of Owen Sound to the news stories about the melting of Greenland, psychotherapist Anderson Todd tells us how fragmenting ecosystems around the world have affected his psyche and his relationships. Do the realities of collapse necessarily spell paralyzing despair, or is there something positive we can take from this?
Guest in attendance, Q&A with Chen Sing Yap
- English
- Hopeful
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Caitlin McMullan
- United Kingdom
- 2022
- 11 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 12:30 PM
- Showplace
Fitting explores the relationship between the director, an amputee, and her prosthetist during the making of a prosthetic leg. It demystifies an unfamiliar space and asks what it means to create an extension to someone else’s body, questioning prejudice widely seen within our society's consideration of body image.
- English
- Uplifting
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Missy Knott
- Canada
- 2023
- 1 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
“I will not abandon you, like the systems abandoned me.”
Knott’s powerful voice explores her relationship with her identity and culture as she blooms into who she is becoming. This film demonstrates the growing strength of Knott’s Anishnaabe identity.
- English
- Jakob Ossmann
- Germany
- 2024
- 4 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 2:15 PM
- Showplace
What would my dead nazi grandpa say about Gaza today?
- Presenting Partner/s: Faculty4Palestine-Trent University Chapter, Students4Palestine Trent, Nogojiwanong Palestine Solidarity (N2P), Jews 4 Free Palestine
- German
- Adam Mbowe
- Canada
- 2021
- 15 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
Despite the close bond between Adam and her sibling Khadija, there is trauma unspoken between them. In this short documentary, the two hold a conversation where they attempt to find mutual understanding through the winding road of expressing emotions.
- English
- Chief Lady Bird
- Canada
- 2023
- 5 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
Heart Like A Pow Wow explores the depths of grief from an Anishinaabe perspective of love and family. Viewers are called to witness Spirit as they shift to physical form while embodying the love that precedes grief and inevitably foreshadows it.
- English, French
- Yvonne Sung
- Canada
- 2023
- 15 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 5:00 PM
- Showplace
Hello Anson is about Anson Ng, a chef-turned-contemporary artist in Toronto.
- Presenting Partner/s: Community Race Relations Committee of Peterborough
- English
- Uplifting
- Chadi Bennani
- Canada
- 2023
- 19 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 5:00 PM
- Showplace
- Presenting Partner/s: Community Race Relations Committee of Peterborough
- Arabic, French
- Marta Smerechynska
- Hungary
- 2024
- 14 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 12:00 PM
- Market Hall
It's Maria from Kyiv. Seeking a female roommate in downtown Budapest! Cozy apartment, shared bathroom, close to amenities. Rent: 400€ + bills. Drop by to check out:)
- Presenting Partner/s: Amnesty International Peterborough
- English, Ukrainian
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Suvi West, Anssi Kömi
- Finland
- 2023
- 77 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 3:00 PM
- Market Hall
As museums begin to deal with their colonial history, filmmaker Suvi West takes the audience behind the scenes of the museum world, revealing a visual, philosophical, and spiritual realm. She seeks a connection with ancestors through old museum objects, eventually arriving at the collective pain points of the Sámi people.
- Finnish, Other
- Kristine Nrecaj, Birthe Templin
- Germany
- 2024
- 87 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 2:15 PM
- Market Hall
House with a Voice is about six women in a patriarchal society, about six different life stories and one mutual decision: giving up femininity and living as men to gain a voice, to experience personal freedom and to fight for equality. To be a real Burrnesha.
- Presenting Partner/s: Trent Centre for Aging and Society
- Albanian, English
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Melanie La Rosa
- USA
- 2023
- 73 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 5:15 PM
- Showplace
How to Power A City provides a front-row seat to communities battling fossil fuel dependence by bringing solar and wind projects to their hometowns. Filmed in six locations, the stories reveal how a diverse cast prevailed against myriad obstacles such as indifferent politicians, technical impasses, public ignorance, cost, and natural and manmade disasters. It is a solutions-focused climate story.
Guest in attendance, Q&A with Melanie La Rosa
- English, Spanish
- Hopeful
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Roman Liubyi
- Ukraine
- 2023
- 84 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 10:00 AM
- Showplace
On July 17, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was shot down by Russian forces over eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board. The attack was immediately questioned and obscured by the Russian government and media. As evidence piled up, the reality only became more shocking and incredible.
- Dutch, English, Russian, Ukrainian
- Ella Glendining
- United Kingdom
- 2023
- 87 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 5:15 PM
- Showplace
While navigating daily discrimination, a filmmaker who inhabits and loves her unusual body searches the world for another person like her, and explores what it takes to love oneself fiercely despite the pervasiveness of ableism.
- English
- Inspiring
- Kelly Zemnickis, Cass Gardiner
- Canada
- 2023
- 9 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 12:30 PM
- Showplace
Janelle Niles is a Black, Mi’kmaw, two-spirited woman from Sipekne’katik First Nation in Nova Scotia and a stand-up comedian. Despite a tumultuous upbringing, Janelle embraces her biracial experience and queer identity, using stand-up to usher in a new era of inclusive, Canadian comedy.
- English
- Uplifting
- Rob Viscardis
- Canada
- 2023
- 18 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 5:15 PM
- Showplace
For twenty years now, Kirby, who has an intellectual disability, has been living on his own and is thriving in his quaint little house on a colourful small-town street. He is surrounded by helpful neighbours and a unique support network that understands the power of community and belonging.
Guest in attendance, Q&A with Rob Viscardis
- English
- Uplifting
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Philippe Falardeau
- Canada
- 2023
- 178 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Library
From director Phillipe Falardeau, one of Canada’s most successful and acclaimed contemporary filmmakers, Lac-Mégantic investigates one of the worst oil train tragedies in history, a foreseeable catastrophe ignited by corporate and political negligence. The next Lac-Mégantic is not a matter of if, but when.
- English, French
- Megan Durnford
- Canada
- 2023
- 7 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 8:00 PM
- Market Hall
Montreal priest Father Claude Paradis believes that all lives are worthy of respect. So in 2014, he created an annual ceremony to celebrate the lives of the “unclaimed.” Thanks to Father Paradis’ compassionate gesture, these people are granted a final moment of dignity.
Guests in attendance, Q&A with Megan Durnford
- English
- Inspiring
- Laura Sky, Mustafa Al-Taiar
- Canada
- 2024
- 18 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 2:15 PM
- Showplace
Each Sunday, a diverse group of determined demonstrators in Belleville stand in support the Palestinian People who are suffering and dying under occupation of the state of Israel.
- Presenting Partner/s: Faculty4Palestine-Trent University Chapter, Students4Palestine Trent, Nogojiwanong Palestine Solidarity (N2P), Jews 4 Free Palestine
- English
- Conor DeVries
- Canada
- 2023
- 29 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 5:00 PM
- Market Hall
- Presenting Partner/s: Peterborough Bicycle Advisory Committee (P-BAC), B!KE: The Peterborough Community Bike Shop
- English
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Richard Mejeh
- United Kingdom
- 2024
- 25 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
In London, a city farmer battles to preserve her community’s green sanctuary in the face of soaring costs of living.
- Presenting Partner/s: GreenUP
- Charly W. Feldman
- Germany
- 2023
- 88 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 12:30 PM
- Showplace
Sara Mardini, once a competitive swimmer in Syria, became Europe’s most celebrated refugee after saving 18 people’s lives. After working as a rescue volunteer in the Mediterranean, she is accused of people smuggling and faces a 25-year prison sentence. We follow her fight for justice and journey of self-discovery against the backdrop of Europe’s refugee ‘crisis’.
- Leanne Allison
- Canada
- 2023
- 15 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 10:00 AM
- Showplace
What does it mean to lose a colour? Losing Blue is a cinematic poem about what it means to lose the otherworldly blues of ancient mountain lakes, now fading due to climate change. This short documentary gently asks what it might mean to forget that the ethereal blues of these lakes ever existed.
- English
- Visually Striking
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Josiane Blanc
- Canada
- 2023
- 12 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 12:30 PM
- Showplace
After noticing too many cases of sexual violence going unreported or unpunished within their own schools, 23 teen girls decided to take matters into their own hands to make meaningful changes to school board policy across Québec.
- French
- Marlene Millar, Philip Szporer
- Canada
- 2022
- 48 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 12:30 PM
- Library
Dive into the resonant universe of Montréal-based choreographer and philosopher Zab Maboungou, of Franco-Congolese origin. For over thirty years, she has galvanized the contemporary dance scene with her radically regrounded conception of time, the body, and the self. Her political history, artistry, and pioneering research have empowered other African artists around the world.
Guests in attendance, Q&A with Philip Szporer and Marlene Miller
Join us for a workshop with the creators of this film.
Performing Arts Documentary with Mouvement Perpétuel
- English
- Uplifting
- Raquel Sancinetti
- Canada
- 2023
- 15 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
Each week, two friends born 67 years apart share their life stories in the living room of a seniors' residence. When Raquel finds a way to bring Madeleine with her on a road trip to the sea, the result is a journey that plays with reality and fiction and brings a reflection on life, death and the certainty that there is always something to learn along the way.
- French
- Quirky, Uplifting
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Amy Miller
- Canada
- 2023
- 85 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 2:45 PM
- Showplace
Manufacturing the Threat is a thrilling and emotional film, which examines a deeply disturbing episode in Canadian history when an impoverished couple was coerced by undercover law enforcement agents into carrying out a terrorist bombing. Further, viewers learn that this case is far from unique in the context of Canadian intelligence.
Guests in attendance, Q&A with Amy Miller
- English
- Robyn Adams
- Canada
- 2024
- 3 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 2:15 PM
- Market Hall
A short film highlighting Indigenous beadwork, prairie landscapes and relationship to the land.
- Presenting Partner/s: Kawartha Land Trust (KLT), OPIRG Peterborough
- English
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Karsten Wall
- Canada
- 2023
- 22 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 10:00 AM
- Market Hall
Able to navigate by reading the Earth’s magnetic field, at home on land, air and water, geese straddle the territory between ancient instincts and the contemporary world. Combining beauty, humour and profound empathy, director Karsten Wall’s exquisitely observed film essay follows the daily life of these iconic animals to reveal a deeper message of continuity and connection.
- Robert McCallum
- Canada
- 2023
- 94 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 5:15 PM
- Showplace
Based on the life and career of legendary Canadian children’s entertainer Ernie Coombs—or, as he is more commonly known by millions of fans, Mr. Dressup, this documentary celebrates the origins and history of one of Canada’s most beloved CBC children shows, which enriched the lives of five generations. This film celebrates the expansiveness of gender, and has special connections to the Nogojiwanong community.
Guest in attendance, Q&A with Greg Floyd.
- English
- Inspiring
- Marilyn Knott
- Canada
- 2023
- 6 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
“You have the love and respect of your grandparents, and eventually that’s what you become.”
Knott explores her beginnings with family and love through their connection to one another, Land, water, plants, and animals. There is loss and reconnection, while also building courage “to take back my life.” The spiritual cycle continues.
- Anishinaabemowin, English
- Kurtis Watson
- Canada
- 2024
- 82 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 12:00 PM
- Market Hall
A trove of home video tapes spurs a filmmaker to investigate repressed parts of his past and come to terms with his own identity. A search for the cause of his father’s sudden suicide turns into a cathartic journey of reconnection and healing.
- Presenting Partner/s: CCRC, B!KE: The Peterborough Community Bike Shop
- English
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Patricia Franquesa
- Spain
- 2024
- 64 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 10:00 AM
- Showplace
Trapped in a digital blackmail labyrinth after her computer is stolen, director Pati documents the real-time persecution as a way of survival.
- Presenting Partner/s: foxpress.design
- Spanish
- Visually Striking
- Virtual / Hybrid (Ontario only)
- Marg Knott
- Canada
- 2023
- 5 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
“Using my hands are very important to me.”
Knott recounts her history, intertwined with her family and community through a motif of hands that work and create. Highlighting her mother’s highly skilled, detail-oriented, and artful moccasin-making, Knott continues that work of care. To love is to touch, forming a connection with the earth, and those you care for.
- Cree, English
- Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Bilal
- Norway
- 2024
- 95 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 2:15 PM
- Showplace
For half a decade, Basel Adra, a Palestinian activist, films his community of Masafer Yatta being destroyed by Israel's occupation, as he builds an unlikely alliance with an Israeli journalist who wants to join his fight.
- Presenting Partner/s: Faculty4Palestine-Trent University Chapter, Students4Palestine Trent, Nogojiwanong Palestine Solidarity (N2P), Jews 4 Free Palestine
- Luke McManus
- Ireland
- 2022
- 99 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 8:00 PM
- Market Hall
Those in power write the history. Those who struggle write the songs. North Circular is a documentary musical that travels the length of Dublin’s North Circular Road, from the Phoenix Park to Dublin Port, exploring the history, music and streetscapes of a street that links some of the country’s most beloved and infamous places.
- English
- Inspiring, Visually Striking
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Paul B. Preciado
- France
- 2023
- 98 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
In Orlando, My Political Biography theorist, critic, and curator Paul B. Preciado takes Virginia Woolf’s classic novel as a starting point for a bold, joyous reflection on the nature of contemporary trans life and a celebration of queerness.
- French
- Quirky, Uplifting
- Paul Robert Wolf Wilson, Rush Sturges
- USA
- 2022
- 9 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 12:30 PM
- Showplace
When the largest dam removal project in history begins, a group of Indigenous youth learn to whitewater kayak in hopes of becoming the first people to paddle the restored river from source to sea. The film gives viewers a bird’s eye view of an unforgettable group of youth training for the adventure of a lifetime.
- English
- Uplifting
- Lina Lyte Plioplyte
- USA
- 2022
- 95 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 2:45 PM
- Market Hall
Periodical tells the unexpected story of the human body by exploring the marvel and mystery of the menstrual cycle, from first period to last. Lina Lyte Plioplyte’s innovative documentary uncovers shocking truths, challenges taboos, and celebrates the end of centuries of societal stigma.
Related VIRTUAL WORKSHOP: Period Poverty & Advocacy | Tuesday, Jan 30 at 7:00PM EST - Pre-register now!
- English
- Uplifting
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Isa Willinger
- Germany
- 2023
- 102 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 2:45 PM
- Market Hall
Our planet is permeated with plastic particles. This film follows several people who deal with the disposal of plastic, as well as its production. In the process, the system that causes the mountains of plastic to grow becomes apparent.
Register for the Virtual Q&A | Wednesday, Jan 31 at 10AM EST
- English, German, Swahili
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Radek Ševčík
- Slovakia
- 2023
- 14 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 8:00 PM
- Market Hall
On October 12, 2022 a terrorist attack in Bratislava results in the death of innocent LGBTQ+ people. There is no political response. Through intimate interviews, Poisoned Well explores the emotional toll of fear and self-defense in the face of widespread homophobia.
- Czech, Slovak
- Tonje Hessen Schei
- Norway
- 2023
- 80 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 8:00 PM
- Showplace
The Countdown to Armageddon has begun. As biblical prophecy fuels political power, American Evangelicals threaten U.S. democracy and push for the Apocalypse in the Middle East. With close-quarters journalism, this feature documentary takes a deep dive into power and policy, and investigates the dangerous consequences of a fusion between Evangelical Christianity and American politics.
- Arabic, English
- Sabrine Keane, Kate Dumke
- United States
- 2024
- 81 mins
- Sun Jan 26
- 10:00 AM
- Showplace
Preconceived explores the pervasive presence of crisis pregnancy centers throughout the US, and their role in furthering the anti-abortion movement.
- Presenting Partner/s: OPIRG Peterborough
- English
- Agniia Galdanova
- USA
- 2023
- 101 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 8:00 PM
- Market Hall
Gena, a Queer artist from a small town in Russia, dresses in otherworldly costumes made from junk and tape, and protests the government on the streets of Moscow. She stages radical performances in public that become a new form of art and activism. The performances—often dark, strange, evocative, and Queer at their core — are a manifestation of Gena’s subconscious. But they come at a price.
- Russian
- Inspiring, Visually Striking
- Katja Esson
- United States
- 2023
- 86 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 7:30 PM
- Showplace
Miami is ground-zero for sea-level-rise. When residents of the historic Liberty Square public housing project learn about a $300 million revitalization plan for their neighborhood, which has long suffered from disinvestment, they know that this sudden interest comes from the fact that their neighborhood is located on the highest-and-driest ground in the city. Now they must prepare to fight a new form of racial injustice - Climate Gentrification.
- Presenting Partner/s: The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), Community Race Relations Committee of Peterborough
- English
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Neil Diamond, Catherine Bainbridge
- Canada
- 2024
- 104 mins
- Thu Jan 23
- 7:00 PM
- Showplace
Red Fever follows Cree co-director Neil Diamond on his journey to find out why the world is so fascinated with the stereotypical imagery of Native people that is all over pop culture.
Opening Night festivities begin at 6PM with a catered pre-show reception downstairs in Showplace’s Cogeco Studio. At 7PM on the main stage ReFrame and celebrated artist Alice Olsen Williams will officially open the 2025 festival. Following the screening of Red Fever, director Catherine Bainbridge and producer Ernest Webb, co-founders of Rezolution Pictures, will join audiences for a livestreamed Q&A. The evening will end with live musical performances by Missy Knott (Singing Wild Rice Girl) and James Mixemong.
- Presenting Partner/s: Kawartha Truth & Reconciliation Support Group
- Cree, English
- Uplifting
- Panu Suuronen
- Finland
- 2024
- 83 mins
- Sat Jan 25
- 5:00 PM
- Market Hall
- Presenting Partner/s: 4th Line Theatre
- English, Finnish
- Quirky
- Virtual / Hybrid Available
- Nicola Zambelli
- Italy
- 2022
- 80 mins
- Sat Jan 27
- 5:15 PM
- Market Hall
At the gates of the Negev desert, a group of young Palestinians fight against the Israeli military occupation. The "Youth of Sumud” - youth of steadfast perseverance - try to return to their people the land that was taken from their families, restructuring the ancient cave village of Sarura. They face aggression with nonviolent action, defending themselves from rifles with their video cameras.
Guest in attendance, Q&A with Nicola Zambelli
- Arabic, English, Hebrew
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Kimberly Reed
- United States
- 2024
- 15 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 12:00 PM
- Showplace
- Presenting Partner/s: OSSTF - District 14, pflag Peterborough
- English
- Inspiring
- Maximilian Armstrong
- USA
- 2023
- 27 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 12:30 PM
- Showplace
An organic farmer in Maine sets out to transform the prison food system. Filmed over the course of two years, Seeds of Change chronicles the intersecting stories of lifelong farmer Mark McBrine and several incarcerated men as they grow their own food from a five acre prison garden unlike any other.
- English
- Hopeful
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Rakel Aguirre
- United Kingdom
- 2022
- 69 mins
- Fri Jan 26
- 3:00 PM
- Showplace
Thalia is an artist, banner-maker, and one of the original marchers and founders of a women-only peace camp against nuclear weapons. In this film, Thalia shares the untold story of the longest feminist protest in British history, and reflects on how collective action changed the lives of the women of Greenham Common and inspired several generations.
- English
- Uplifting
- Watch in Virtual Theatre (until Feb 4th)
- Jeff McKay, Takashi Iwasaki
- Canada
- 2023
- 7 mins
- Sun Jan 28
- 12:30 PM
- Market Hall
This is a playful, poignant & very memorable live action animation, where humans take from forests whatever they desire - leaving nothing. Shitty Little is critical of a prevalent attitude in western culture that says there is no inherent value in nature, that it must be taken and shaped into a product for sale to have worth.
- English
- Quirky
- Agnieszka Zwiefka
- Poland
- 2024
- 84 mins
- Fri Jan 24
- 12:00 PM
- Market Hall
After her mom's tragic death on the Polish-Belarusian border, 16-year-old Kurdish girl Runa has to become a mother for her 4 younger brothers. A partially animated coming-of-age story in the times of a global refugee crisis.
- Presenting Partner/s: Amnesty International Peterborough
- Polish
- Virtual / Hybrid Available