A program of shorts that introduces daring new voices in Canadian cinema. Personal, playful, provocative, and self-financed, these films offer the freedom to express boldly through practices rooted in filmmaking among friends.
This short film program includes the following films:
Please Love Me
Lea Rose Sebastianis, Canada, 2024 (10 min)
An ecstatic ’one-reeler’ following the last days of a tap-dancer before her final performance.
Inspired by Lea-Rose Sebastianis, I cast her in Paying For It as Kitty, the sex worker who Chester Brown has his first paid tryst with. Fearless and generous, Lea Rose is part of ’The New Toronto Bizarre’ community of indie filmmaking disruptors. She’s had starring turns in In a Violent Nature, Pee Pee Poo Poo Man, The All Golden, and Castration Movie Anthology II. Her directorial debut, Please Love Me is a buoyant, freewheeling odyssey starring Lea Rose and her real-life bestie Moira Brown, with cinematography by Katerina Zoumboulakis. Pure energy cinema.
Sook-Yin Lee, DIY: Making Movies curator
Notes of a Crocodile
Daphné Xu, Canada, 2024 (18 min)
News of a half-constructed building full of crocodiles brings a Chinese woman to Phnom Penh. She walks along the Mekong River in search of a lost friend.
Daphné Xu was studying urban design when she switched to filmmaking and excelled in documentary. I discovered Daphné through Huahua’s Dazzling World and its Myriad Temptations (2022), her brilliant doc portrait of a rural Chinese social media influence. We became friends and I acted in one of her shorts (in-progress) in which Daphné’s muse, her mom, was the location scout and costume designer! In Notes of a Crocodile, Daphné takes on narrative storytelling for the first time, shooting on an iPhone and incorporating real-life events that she and actor/friend Lai Yuqing encountered in Cambodia.
Sook-Yin Lee
His Smell
Kalil Haddad, Canada, 2023 (14 min)
Sebastian’s roommate is away for the weekend.
Phenomenally talented Palestinian Canadian filmmaker Kalil Haddad recently earned his master’s degree in film studies under Professor John Greyson at York University. Kalil’s collaborators include Sophy Romvari (Blue Heron), whose short films he edited while at York. Kalil’s inimitable style showcases strong camera and editing choices. He has a knack for evoking visceral feeling and intensity. His Smell and The Beautiful Room Is Empty are among his early works. Intimate and unflinching, they introduce his vital perspective in queer cinema.
Sook-Yin Lee
The Beautiful Room Is Empty
Kalil Haddad, Canada, 2020 (20 min)
Marie, a retired elementary school principle, must confront spaces both concrete and virtual, as she attempts to navigate the ghosts of her childhood.
Phenomenally talented Palestinian Canadian filmmaker Kalil Haddad recently earned his master’s degree in film studies under Professor John Greyson at York University. Kalil’s collaborators include Sophy Romvari (Blue Heron), whose short films he edited while at York. Kalil’s inimitable style showcases strong camera and editing choices. He has a knack for evoking visceral feeling and intensity. His Smell and The Beautiful Room Is Empty are among his early works. Intimate and unflinching, they introduce his vital perspective in queer cinema.
Sook-Yin Lee
The First Female Indigenous Pornographer
JL Whitecrow, Canada, 2025 (14 min)
A mockumentary that blends and bends archival, pornography, re-enactments, and the only existing interview with Audrey Little-breast, “the first Indigenous female pornographer,” as she refuses to be labelled or represented as anything but herself.
I was first enthralled by JL Whitecrow when I saw her tear up the stage with her punk band Slutcode. I cast her in Paying for It in the role of Angelina, a sex worker. Based in Toronto, she is Muskrat clan, originally from Seine River First Nation, Treaty #3. An academic, stand-up comedian, pole-dancer, punk rock queen, and filmmaker, JL does it all. Another graduate of York University who studied under John Greyson, Jamie’s graduate thesis film is The First Indigenous Female Pornographer. It’s a funny, feminist take on Indigenous identity, which features our mutual pal and peer, acclaimed actor, author, and filmmaker Andrea Werhun, who starred as Denise in Paying for It.
Sook-Yin Lee
Various
Canada
English
Book Tickets
Sunday April 19
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Canadian Film Showcase
Canadian Film Showcase features returning festival favourites, brand-new premieres, free screenings on National Canadian Film Day (April 15), and a specially curated program by Sook-Yin Lee (Paying for It).
Agatha's Almanac
Shot over six years on vibrant 16mm film, Agatha’s Almanac is an artful documentary portrait of filmmaker Amalie Atkin’s octogenarian aunt, who has fashioned herself an endearingly simple and self-sustaining lifestyle on her Manitoba farm.
The Art of Adventure
The unbelievable adventure story of how painter Robert Bateman and ecologist Bristol Foster drove a Land Rover from Africa to Australia in 1957, developing a love of nature to last a lifetime. An inspirational love letter to the adventure of life itself.
Follies
After two kids and 16 years of marriage, François and Julie decide to open up their relationship in a bid to rekindle their dwindling sex life. A painfully hilarious and brutally honest depiction of love, sex, and intimacy in the age of the internet.
Castration Movie Anthology 1: Traps
Louise Weard's underground movie is a talk-a-thon in two chapters and four hours: a sex worker contemplates having her testicles removed, and a movie production assistant pitches himself right out of a job, and other misadventures in Vancouver life.
Modern Whore
In director Nicole Bazuin's cheeky, stylized documentary, Modern Whore-memoirist Andrea Werhun (Paying for It) recounts her experiences as an escort and stripper in Toronto, debunking misconceptions about the world’s oldest profession.
Intimate Moments: Short Films by Brendan Prost
Vignettes of loneliness, desire and fleeting connection, immerse yourself in the short, bittersweet films of Brendan Prost — who will also be filming proceedings for potential inclusion in his self-reflexive doc, The Performance of a Lifetime.
Winter Kept Us Warm
Often described as the first LGBTQ+ film ever to screen at the Cannes Film Festival, David Secter's lovingly observed portrait of a burgeoning queer romance came at a time when homosexuality was still illegal in the country
Last Wedding: Jubilee Screening with Bruce Sweeney
Named the Best Canadian film of 2001 by the Vancouver and Toronto Film Critics, Bruce Sweeney's third feature took a wry look at contemporary relationships through the experiences of three thirtysomething couples whose relationships are about to implode.
4 or 5 Things I Want You to Know About Me (An Essay)
Carl Bessai's playful Godardian riff on actors and acting gives us a portfolio of dramatic portraits and monologues focused on half a dozen female performers at different points in their journey. It's a grab-bag of a film, sparky and specific.
Paying for It
Talk about a hall of mirrors! Sook-Yin Lee wittily adapts the graphic novel of the same name by her ex-boyfriend, Canadian cartoonist Chester Brown, about the end of their relationship and Brown's subsequent decision to start paying for sex.
Dead Lover
A foul-smelling gravedigger's romance ends in tragedy, spurring her to attempt a resurrection through a madcap series of science experiments. Grace Glowicki and Ben Petrie’s film is a zany DIY horror that zaps fresh life into Mary Shelley's classic.
Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner
When Atanarjuat displaces Oki, the Chief's son, by winning the hand of the beautiful Atuat, his brother Amaqjuaq pays the ultimate price. This cautionary tale showcases the consequences of putting personal desires ahead of community needs.
Parsley Days
Kate is ambivalent about her relationship with Ollie. While he's undeniably a great guy, she's curious about what else the world might hold. But when she discovers she's pregnant, breaking up becomes a little more complicated. A magical realist delight!
Outrageous!
Two misfits find love and support in this cult classic and landmark for Canadian queer cinema. Determined to retain her freedom after being treated for schizophrenia, Liza grows equally committed to seeing Robin realize his potential as a drag performer.
Love & Independence
A program of shorts that introduces daring new voices in Canadian cinema. Personal, playful, provocative, and self-financed, these films offer the freedom to express boldly through practices rooted in filmmaking among friends.
Endless Cookie
Are you ready for the most Canadian comedy of recent years? It's a documentary about half-siblings sharing stories, but it's mostly about interruptions, digressions, diversions, and free pizza. It's also animated, but you probably already noticed that.