Festival 2020

WINNERS 2020

Here are the Winners of the Toronto Independent Film Festival 2020

No-Budget Feature (budget under $25k): F-Word by Heidi Germiane Schnappauf
Micro-budget Feature (budget under $250k): The Xrossing by Steven J. Mihaljevich
Low-budget Feature (budget over $250k): Discarded Things by Tara Lynn Marcelle & Joanne Hock
Sci-Fi/Fantasy Feature: All Earthly Constraints by Ryan M. Moore
Thriller Feature: The Wilderness Night by Jordan Warner
Documentary Feature: The Blinding Sea by George Tombs
Documentary Short: In Your Palm by Carter Kirilenko
Music Video: Midnight Shine – Lonely Boy by Cliff Hokanson & RoseAnna Schick
Short Film (Jury Award): The Cold / IOWÍSTO by Brittany Delgaty
Short Film (Audience Award): Sweet Tofu by Li Xiaolong & Brennan Martin
Short Film (Festival Director Award): Purgatory by Nadyja von Ebers
Animated Short: The Story of the I’m Alone by Allison Wolvers
Horror Short: Half Chance of Evil by Sara Lohman
Sci-Fi/Fantasy Short: Fruitfly by Jeffrey Hanley
Short Short: Black Boys Can’t Cry by Victor Gabriel
Experimental Short: Platform by Terence McGlade & Hayden Currie

Screenplay Award categories:
Feature Screenplay: Polly Freed by Brooke Berman
Sci-Fi / Horror Screenplay: Parasomniac by Devi Bhaduri

Congratulations to all our 2020 Winners

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Here’s the schedule for the 2020 Toronto Independent Film Festival.

DRAMA
http://www.aec.movie/
Emily is a struggling screenwriter who works in an ice cream shop. Emma, the lead character in Emily’s screenplay, is a struggling screenwriter who is also secretly “Emmageddon” – a superheroine with the impeccable social graces of a Jane Austen protagonist. Now, Emmageddon must confront Darius, gelato shop owner and art-destroying supervillain, to save all struggling artists everywhere in the universe.

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Feature Film:
Engaged in Vegas (79m) [Buy here]
Directed by Abe Schwartz

COMEDY
https://www.instagram.com/engagedinvegas
When Jen Delaney asked Abe Schatz to marry her, they took off to Las Vegas to create the best engagement video ever. The content they recorded – with the help of a cameraman – turned out to be something else entirely. #schatzamore

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Feature Film:
Love, Unemployed (96m) [Buy here]
Directed by Ricky Wong

DRAMA / ROAD TRIP
https://www.facebook.com/LoveUnemployed/
Eros, a disgruntled and repugnant street bum, used to be a Cupid. Now however, he spends his days fighting the monotony of his mundane existence and uses his gift of foresight to throw unwanted fortunes at all who pass him by.

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Feature Film:
The Blinding Sea (108m) [Buy here]
Directed by George Tombs

DOCUMENTARY
https://www.evidentia.net/evidentia-films/
The film follows the life and rivalries of the Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen, who developed relationships with people in diverse cultures in order to explore aboriginal traditional knowledge and modern science, transforming discovery itself into high adventure.

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Feature Film:
Discarded Things (106m) [Buy here]
Directed by Tara Lynn Marcelle & Joanne Hock

Discarded Things (106m) [Buy here]
Directed by Tara Lynn Marcelle & Joanne Hock

DRAMA
http://karenabercrombie.com/
The film follows the life of Grace Wyatt, an esteemed music professor whose life is disrupted by tragedy and alcoholism. When she finds herself thrown out of her lavish academic world and into the harsh reality of teaching at-risk youth, she begins to find emotional restoration as she gets to know the teens. Together, they offer each other support through the power of forgiveness and music.

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Feature Film:
F-Word (77m) [Buy here]
Directed by Heidi Germiane Schnappauf

COMEDY / LGBT+
https://www.magicalmisfitproductions.com/fword-the-film
Mike Gallagher is just an all American boy. Mike teaches middle school English. Mike is engaged to the love of his life and happy as can be. Mike has everything going for him – until his secret is exposed to the very person who could change his life forever.

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Feature Film:
Fall Back Down (104m) [Buy here]
Directed by Sara Beth Edwards

DRAMA
http://www.fallbackdownfilm.com/
A depressed ex-activist takes a job in a sweatshop where he and his coworker make a grim discovery.

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Feature Film:
Like Love (82) [Buy here]
Directed by Michael Wolfe

DRAMA
https://likelovemovie.com/
LIKE LOVE is a vaguely romantic comedy that chronicles the tender, tragic and totally unintentional friendship between a boy and a girl. Harper is a killjoy with a knack for finding the worst in everyone. Enter Jackson: serial monogamist, idealist, and king of attracting the least available person in the room. After a series of un(fortunate) circumstances prompts them to become roommates, a friendship is born. Yet their closeness inevitably sends Jackson down the rabbit hole of attraction, pushing Harper to make a choice: play along, or risk losing her best friend entirely.

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Feature Film:
River Road (88m) [Buy here]
Directed by Rob Willey

THRILLER
https://tallgrassfilms.ca/river-road
A rock musician and a free-spirited woman start an intense relationship in Vancouver which soon spirals into a world of hard drugs and crime.

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Feature Film:
Stealing Chaplin (104m) [Buy here]
Directed by Paul Tanter

CRIME THRILLER
http://www.dystopianfilm.com/
Inspired by real events, two Las Vegas based con men dig up and steal the corpse of comedian Charlie Chaplin in order to ransom it. With the theft gaining the world’s attention and the reward rising daily, soon every local lowlife, criminal and dirty cop wants a piece of the action.

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Feature Film:
The Xrossing (108m) [Buy here]
Directed by Steven J. Mihaljevich

THRILLER
https://playtimemotionpictures.com/
When a suspicious death remains unsolved, 3 boys suspect and harass a reclusive Indigenous man, until one boy breaks the toxic cycle to make amends. The man and boy form an unlikely friendship, however the inertia of past actions bring multiple characters to a crossroad and thrilling climax.

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Feature Film:
Wharf Rats (99m) [Buy here]
Directed by Jason Arsenault

COMEDY
https://www.facebook.com/wharfratspei/
Wharf Rats follows man/child Hughie Hackett, the son of late Paul Hackett, beloved fisherman and local legend in Split Lip Cove, PEI. Hughie has spent his life doing as little as possible without actually doing nothing at all, squandering his potential. Frustrated that his Uncle Angus, known as the best Hackett fisherman in town, a reputation secured by sabotaging his competition, is about to sell off the family fishing company, Hughie forms a misguided plan to pretend that a simple-minded man is his long-lost brother, the key to his father’s will.

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Feature Film:
The Wilderness Night (99m) [Buy here]
Directed by Jordan Warner

THRILLER
https://www.facebook.com/TWNMovie
A man fights through his own psychological and spiritual torment when his guilty past is shadowed by a religious Cult Leader.