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Sikiitu film image, director Gabriel Allard Gagnon

Sikiitu

A coming-of-age story in the small Arctic village of Ivujivik, where teenage Ali would rather spend his time dreaming of being a hip-hop superstar instead of going hunting with his dad.

Award: Festival Regard Canadian Grand Prize

 

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Director
Cast

Jusi Sala, Pierre Savu-Massé

Credits
Country of Origin

Canada

Year

2021

Language

In Inuktitut with English subtitles

Film Contact
Links
Content Warning

Coarse language; nudity; violence

PG
21 min

Featured in:

Patty Vs. Patty film image

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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Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre

Short Forum 1: The Scarier One
Object of Riddle film image; a disproportionate metal face

Short Forum 1: The Scarier One

93 min

The return of scary: fear in all its chilling, suspenseful, and unsettling shades.

International Village 8

That Shadow Fading

Dir. Samuel Urbina
76 min

Samuel Urbina's feature debut is a quiet, deeply affecting mother and son drama following Sol, a single mother about to become an empty nester as her son Junior prepares to move to Lima upon graduating college.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema
The Only Living Pickpocket in New York
The Only Living Pickpocket in New York film image; man walking down a city street

The Only Living Pickpocket in New York

Dir. Noah Segan
88 min

A career thief’s circumstances grow desperate when he fences valuable merchandise stolen from a vengeful crime family. John Turturro is exquisite as a wiseacre who is typically one step ahead of everyone but now finds himself behind the eight ball.

Vancouver Playhouse The Rio Theatre

Gabin

Dir. Maxence Voiseux
105 min

Filmed over 10 years, Gabin follows Gabin Jourdel from age 8 to 18 and the animals, schoolwork, chores, and imagined futures that define his youth. As he grows, his adolescence becomes a question of inheritance and choosing one’s own future.

International Village 10

Frank & Louis

Dir. Petra Volpe
95 min

In a bid to increase his changes at parole, Frank joins an initiative where long-term inmates care for aging prisoners suffering from dementia. But when he meets the elderly Louis, it puts his own predicament into perspective.

Fifth Avenue Cinema - 19+ only
Iron Boy
Iron Boy film image; 2D animated boy looking at clouds

Iron Boy

Dir. Louis Clichy
90 min

Iron Boy, a hand-painted animated feature, follows a hardworking preteen farm boy and his sublime flights of fancy as he faces the earthshaking upheavals of growing up in an iron back brace. Winner of the Special Jury Prize at Cannes 2026.

Image: © Eddy Cinema, Beside Productions, Regular Production, France 3 Cinema, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Cinéma, RTBF

Lindsay Family Stage at Granville Island

Credits

Producer

Sandrine Berger

Screenwriter

Jean-Sébastien Beaudoin-Gagnon, Éric K. Boulianne

Cinematography

Van Royko

Editor

Alain Loiselle

Original Music

Jean-Olivier Bégin

Director

Gabriel Allard Gagnon headshot, Sikiitu director

Gabriel Allard Gagnon

Gabriel Allard Gagnon has directed some 50 music videos and six documentary feature films. After doing a project in the Canadian far north during which he met Inuit Nation members, he created Sikiitu, his first work of fiction.

Filmography: T’es où, Youssef? (2017); Les Poussières de Daech (2020)