paraDOXA
Introducing paraDOXA, our new experimental program highlighting films that push the boundaries of documentary form. With a focus on community, each screening is followed by an in-depth discussion with the director—led by a local film collective or arts organization—offering audiences a deeper understanding into the creative and political dimensions of each respective work. This year’s selection interrogates the fissures between history and mythology, materiality and memory, exposing how power is inscribed into landscapes, and how communities navigate these contested spaces.
Archeology of Light
Sylvain L’Espérance, Canada, 2024, 71 mins 
For screening times, click here.
Panelists: Sylvain L’Espérance
Moderator: Grunt Gallery
Archaeology of Light immerses us in Quebec’s Minganie region, where light, wind, and water cast subtle, transitory patterns onto the landscape. The film moves at the pace of these natural forces, where light and shadow interact to evoke the presence of unseen energies. Using long intimate shots and dynamic sound design free from narration, L'Espérance immerses the audience in an entrancing world of subaquatic tones and ambient frequencies. Highlighting both the subject and the act of seeing, the film is not merely an observation of nature but a reverent surrender to its quiet rhythms.
Screening with short film...
Revoling Rounds
Johann Lurf and Christina Jauernik, Austria, 2024, 11 mins
Revolving Rounds uses a 20th-century cyclostéréoscope to immerse us in 3D space, animating a pea plant in motion. Daylight shifts to twilight as the plant’s motion is projected, collapsing the boundary between the natural world and the mechanical device.
Eastern Anthems
Matthew Wolkow & Jean-Jacques Martinod, Canada/USA/Ecuador, 2024, 78 mins
For screening times, click here.
Panelists: Jean-Jacques Martinod
Moderator: XINEMA
For years, Canadian filmmaker Matthew Wolkow has been determined to capture the rare emergence of Brood X cicadas—a phenomenon that only occurs once every 17 years in the eastern United States. However, when the COVID-19 pandemic forces Wolkow to hand over his project to friend Jean-Jacques Martinod, the film’s journey transforms into a deeper exploration of a creative collaboration under duress. Featuring intimate recordings of the cicadas' song, the film delves into themes of friendship, the creative process, and the passage of time. Expanding the boundaries of a typical nature documentary, Eastern Anthems offers a poetic portrait of an America on the brink of change.
HUAQUERO
Juan Carlos Donoso Gómez, Ecuador/Peru/Romania, 2024, 81 mins
For screening times, click here.
PRE-RECORDED Q&A
Panelists: Juan Carlos Donoso Gómez
Moderator: Vancouver Latin American Film Festival
In the 80s and 90s, the illegal trade of precolonial artifacts surged along the coasts of Ecuador and Peru. Huaquero explores this underworld through the experiences of former huaqueros (artifact hunters) and re-enactments. The film’s muted color palette recalls early colonial travel cinema, subtly underscoring the enduring effects of colonialism on Indigenous communities. As the huaqueros reflect on their involvement in uncovering and trading Pre-Hispanic artifacts—some authentic, others modified or outright forged—the film examines the tangled relationship between memory, myth, and survival. By focusing on the human aspect of this illicit trade, Huaquero gives voice to those who lived it, revealing their intimate relationship with the land and its buried past.
Sanctuary Station
Brigid McCaffrey, USA, 2024, 69 mins
For screening times, click here.
Panelists: Brigid McCaffrey
Moderator: Echo Park
Sanctuary Station traces a series of encounters with women and youth who have forged deep bonds with the towering redwoods and remote landscapes of northern California. Shot on luminous black-and-white 16mm, the film unfolds like an album of personal stories, mourning rituals, and acts of resistance. Anchoring these moments are the words of poet-activist Mary Norbert Körte (1934–2022), her poetry touching on inner reflection and the larger cycles of life. Scenes of forest defense movements and the simple beauty of daily routines capture the delicate balance between individual memory and collective action, in a landscape shaped by history and the fight for its future.
To Use a Mountain
Casey Carter, USA, 2025, 99 mins
For screening times, click here.
Panelists: Casey Carter
Moderator: TBC
In To Use a Mountain, the fight against a nuclear waste dump becomes a battle for survival and identity in six rural American communities. When the U.S. government quietly proposes burying almost 70,000 tonnes of radioactive waste beneath their land, it sparks decades of environmental devastation, and the ensuing resistance and grassroots activism. Through a blend of real and imagined spaces, personal stories, data visualization, and archival materials, the film explores the clash between government power and environmental justice. The film’s intricate structure pulls us into a struggle that continues to shape these communities long after the crisis has faded from the headlines.
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