Shorts from Canada, Finland, Japan, and the Netherlands.
Sept 28 & 29: Q&A with filmmakers
This short film program includes the following films:
You Can’t Get What You Want but You Can Get Me
Samira Elagoz & Z Walsh, Netherlands/Finland (13 min)
A slideshow of personal photographs and correspondence document two long-haired trans men falling in love.
Colors Under the Streetlights
Yoshimi Joya, Japan (23 min)
Late one night, two women who work at a hostess bar are approached by police.
Candle
Jérémi Roy, Canada (9 min)
David and Leonard are ex-lovers who reunite one autumn evening during a power outage.
Delta Dawn
Asia Youngman, Canada (26 min)
This documentary follows Dawn Murphy, or “Princess Delta Dawn”, who rose to fame in the 1980s and early 1990s and became the first Indigenous woman wrestler and the first Canadian woman wrestler to compete in Japan.
The Death of James
Sam Chou, Canada (14 min)
Two friends grapple with mortality as they are confronted with a dying pet ferret.
Pena’s Special Hauling
Anssi Kasitonni, Finland (12 min)
Perhaps he shouldn’t still be driving at his advanced age, but veteran truck driver Pena cannot help but get behind the wheel of his custom truck.
Salem on the Road
Étienne Galloy, Canada (20 min)
While experiencing a major depersonalization episode, Salem embarks on a solo cycling journey across the Gaspé Peninsula with the intent of ending her life.
Supported by
Community Partner
Various
Various
2023-2024
Various with English subtitles
Self harm
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
All the Lovers in the Night
A lonely proofreader's isolated world begins to open through an unlikely friendship with a gentle physics teacher. Based on Mieko Kawakami's acclaimed novel, this luminous drama is a delicate meditation on loneliness, intimacy, and self-discovery.
Clarissa
Arie and Chuko Esiri’s Clarissa brings Mrs. Dalloway to present-day Lagos, with Sophie Okonedo playing the titular society hostess opposite David Oyelowo, Ayo Edebiri, and India Amarteifio in a Nigerian vision of class, privilege, and past lives.
Image: © Courtesy of Elevation Pictures
Opening Gala: The Debut
VIFF is honoured to open the festival with this special by-invitation screening of Jesse Eisenberg's The Debut. When meek Mona (Julianne Moore) lands a part in a musical, she fully inhabits her character, but grows increasingly untethered from reality.
Árru
Set against the mountains and fjords of northern Norway, Árru follows reindeer herder Maia as a proposed copper mine threatens her Sámi community, forcing her to fight to protect both her community and the land that sustains it.
The Beloved
When Esteban Martínez, an acclaimed director with violent tendences, invites his estranged daughter to star in his latest project, the stage is set for a familial reconnection. But as tensions flare, questions about his intentions rise to the surface.
MODES 1
Archive and the land reveal other ways of seeing, ensuring that what is meant to endure cannot be erased.


