Canada
2022
English
Featured in:
VIFF Short Forum: Program 2
Fear, doubt, and loneliness give way to pleasure, empowerment, and reclamation—or, is it the other way around?
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Yunan
In this haunting mood piece, Munir is a middle-aged Syrian writer in exile in Germany. In crisis, he takes himself up to one of the Halligan islands in the North Sea, a suitable place to end it all...
The Secret Agent
Having run afoul of an influential bureaucrat in Brazil’s military dictatorship circa 1977, Marcelo decamps to Recife to live under an assumed name — but he’ll soon come to understand precisely how rampant the country’s corruption has become.
The Mother and the Bear
Johnny Ma’s film stars Kim Ho-jung as a Korean woman who flies to Winnipeg when her immigrant daughter is hospitalized there. This crowd-pleaser plays up cultural differences to hilarious effect and offers a touching take on mother-daughter tension.
The Track
In the middle of a mountain forest above Sarajevo, three boys train for the Olympics in a bullet-ridden luge track abandoned since the 1984 Winter Games. An ambitious, hopeful look at the next generation striving to overcome the sins of their fathers.
Breaking the Waves
Kicking off our 2026 Pantheon series of the greatest films ever made, Lars von Trier's 1996 masterpiece is a devastating melodrama featuring an indelible performance from Emily Watson as the woman whose love for her husband knows no bounds.
Credits
Producer
Kate Fraser, Chris Strikes, Maya Annik Bedward
Screenwriter
Chris Strikes
Cinematography
Ashley Iris Gill
Editor
Maria Todorov-Topouzov
Production Design
Melissa Dawn Bessey
Original Music
Solitair
Director
Chris Strikes
Chris Strikes is an award-winning director and alumnus of both the HotDocs Accelerator Fellowship and the Reelworld E20 program. In 2021, Strikes’ first feature documentary Becoming a Queen screened in five festivals worldwide, winning Best Feature Film at the 2021 CaribbeanTales International Film Festival, the Audience Choice Award for Best International Feature Film at the 2021 Baltimore International Black Film Festival, and was nominated for Best Picture Editing for Documentary at the 2021 Directors Guild of Canada Awards.
Filmography: Becoming a Queen (2021)


