National Film Board of Canada greenlights 20 projects for production. New documentary, animation and interactive works from across Canada.

From: National Film Board

Montreal – National Film Board of Canada (NFB)

The NFB, Canada’s public producer, has greenlit 20 new productions and co-productions—documentary, animation and interactive works that got underway between April and September, 2021, following the NFB’s health guidelines and protocols for the COVID-19 pandemic.

For more information on these and other projects currently in the works across NFB studios, please visit our NFB Production web page.

DOCUMENTARY

Anything for Fame – feature-length film
Director: Tyler Funk
Co-producers: Sebastian Mercado (North of Now Films) and Shirley Vercruysse (BC & Yukon Studio)

This character-driven documentary explores the social phenomenon of Internet fame and the unseen hurdles facing those who seek it, revealing the challenges of a new generation of content creators.

Bill Reid – short film
Director: Alanis Obomsawin
Producer: Annette Clarke | Quebec & Atlantic Studio | 100% NFB

A short film using previously unheard interviews from the personal archives of Alanis Obomsawin, celebrating the life and accomplishments of renowned Haida carver Bill Reid.

Cohabiter – feature-length film
Director: Halima Elkhatabi
Producer: Nathalie Cloutier | French Program Documentary Studio | 100% NFB

A mosaic of private conversations and everyday stories about co-existence and the way we deal with the fact of living together. Through this intimate exploration of diverse experiences and perspectives, filmmaker Halima Elkhatabi invites a wider conversation about housing and accessibility in Montreal.

Étoile du nord – web series
Director: Patrick Bossé
Producer: Nathalie Cloutier and Pierre-Mathieu Fortin | French Program Documentary Studio | 100% NFB

A look at the daily life of Laurie Rousseau-Nepton, resident astronomer at the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope. In her thirties and one of the few women in her field, Rousseau-Nepton is also the first Indigenous woman from Quebec to earn a doctorate in astrophysics.

Fire-Jo-Ball – short film
Director: Audrey Nantel-Gagnon
Producer: Nathalie Cloutier | French Program Documentary Studio | 100% NFB

Jo-Ann is a server. In the spring of 2020, the bars close. No longer the object of others’ gazes, Jo-Ann looks at herself for the first time. Fire-Jo-Ball paints a picture of a woman who adopts pink as her favourite colour, even if her life isn’t always rosy.

Lay Down Your Heart – feature-length film
Director: Marie Clements
Producer: Shirley Vercruysse | BC & Yukon Studio | 100% NFB

Lay Down Your Heart focusses on the art and ability of visual and theatre artist Niall McNeil, who has Down syndrome, to forge family from a wide range of creative collaborators.

Losing Blue – short film
Director: Leanne Allison
Producer: David Christensen | North West Studio | 100% NFB

Anyone who has stood by a Rocky Mountain lake knows its blue colour is hard to believe. Now, though, it’s disappearing because of our warming climate. Losing Blue is an Anthropocene story where humans are impacting deep-time processes with unknown consequences.

Love, Amma – short film
Director: Prajwala Dixit
Producer: Annette Clarke | Quebec & Atlantic Studio | 100% NFB

Produced through the Re-Imagining the Islands initiative, Love, Amma is a letter from the filmmaker to her five-year-old daughter. Reflecting on her newly diagnosed invisible disability and her search for answers from her mother and her grandmother, Prajwala journeys between St. John’s and Bengaluru.

Mission – medium-length film
Directors: Melanie Shatzky and Brian M. Cassidy
Producer: Rohan Fernando | Quebec & Atlantic Studio | 100% NFB

A portrait of one man’s path that has been both fragmentary and cyclical, enduring four decades on the streets. Encounter a compelling and unique soul whose recollections offer insight into the plight of countless others like him and the humanity hidden behind the stereotypes.

Modern Goose – short film
Director: Karsten Wall
Producer: Alicia Smith | North West Studio | 100% NFB

This experimental wildlife documentary gives viewers an intimate look at urban Canada goose behaviour, while artistically portraying the challenges these animals face when habituating to city life.

Night Watches Us – short film
Director: Stefan Verna
Producer: Ariel Nasr | Quebec & Atlantic Studio | 100% NFB

Produced through the Re-Imagining My Quebec initiative, Night Watches Us examines the death of Nicholas Gibbs, a mentally ill 23-year-old father of three young children, fatally shot by police in Montreal’s Notre-Dame-de-Grâce district.

A Return to Memory – medium-length film
Director: Donald McWilliams
Producer: Annette Clarke | Quebec & Atlantic Studio | 100% NFB

Gudrun Parker was one of many NFB women, sometimes known as the “Grierson Girls,” who helped lay the groundwork for Canadian documentary film during the Second World War and the years that followed. A Return to Memory rediscovers the women and their work buried in the vaults—and rewrites documentary history.

Sandy’s Point – short film
Director: Alexis Normand
Producer: Jon Montes | North West Studio | 100% NFB

Growing up Fransaskois, filmmaker and musician Alexis Normand’s family felt torn between English and francophone cultures. Alexis brings these conversations back to the kitchen table, candidly exploring her family’s place in Fransaskois culture and what linguistic acceptance might look like in the Prairies.

Siksikakowan: The Blackfoot Man – feature-length film
Director: Trevor Solway
Producer: Coty Savard | North West Studio | 100% NFB

Siksikakowan is about how Indigenous men experience and express masculinity in their everyday lives.  This feature documentary follows a selection of Blackfoot men and captures masculinity in its raw form, offering a glimpse into the spectrum of masculine expressions.

Sons – feature-length film
Director: Justin Simms
Producer: Rohan Fernando | Quebec & Atlantic Studio | 100% NFB

Set against the backdrop of his son Jude’s first five years of life, filmmaker Justin Simms looks at modern masculinity through the lens of fatherhood and asks an increasingly urgent question: “How do we teach our sons to be better men?”

Upstairs with David Amram – short film
Director: Alanis Obomsawin
Producer: Annette Clarke | Quebec & Atlantic Studio | 100% NFB

A personal and intimate performance and conversation with celebrated musician David Amram.

ANIMATION

Émergences – short film
Director: Ryo Orikasa
Co-producers: Pierre Baussaron (Miyu Productions), Nobuaki Doi (New Deer) & Jelena Popović (English Program Animation Studio)

A visualization of Misérable miracle by Franco-Belgian poet and painter Henri Michaux. The rhymes, originally written in French and inspired by Michaux’s artwork, are brought to life by Ryo Orikasa, an innovative Japanese animation director.

What the Hell – short film
Director: Valerie Barnhart
Producer: Jelena Popović | English Program Animation Studio | 100% NFB

Dante’s Hell, once the epitome of human suffering and punishment, faces an existential crisis: it loses its relevance on 21st-century Earth. Charlotte, a sharp-witted Harpy, is determined to break free of her employment in Dante’s obsolete Inferno. But not before her ex-boyfriend Asterion tries to win her back. A contemporary love story for the end times, a horror comedy based on the current state of world affairs.

INTERACTIVE/IMMERSIVE

Vimy: monument vivant – web
Created by: Gonzalo Soldi, Anne Lagacé, Claude Guilmain, Sylvain Bellemare, Karen Vanderborght and Priam Givord
Producer: Denis McCready | Canadian Francophonie Studio in collaboration with the Vimy Foundation

This interactive experience commemorates 105 years since the battle of Vimy Ridge, an anniversary that will be marked in April 2022. Vimy: monument vivant explores this historic battle, the monument erected at the site, and the years of the Great War—making connections between past, present and future.

Why? – mobile
Director: Danielle Sturk
Producer: Denis McCready | Canadian Francophonie Studio | 100% NFB

Adolescent girls in Canada are regularly subjected to sexual assault by their peers, at school and in their social activities and media. This project will facilitate an interactive dialogue between adolescent boys and girls aged 13 to 17 about rape culture and the impact of toxic masculinity on their lives.

– 30 –
Associated links

• NFB Production web page

Contacts

Jennifer Mair
NFB Publicist
C.: 416-436-0105
j.mair@nfb.ca | @NFB_Jennifer

Lily Robert
Director, Communications and Public Affairs, NFB
C.: 514-296-8261
l.robert@nfb.ca

NT5