Image+Nation

awards

AUDIENCE AWARD

DOCUMENTARY
RISING THROUGH THE FRAY
Courtney MontourCanada

Uniting from across continents to bring representation to the sport they love, Indigenous Rising laces up their skates to claim their space on the roller derby track. Indigenous Rising is the first team in roller derby history to break the barriers of representing a single country at the Roller Derb...

Film
feature
PLAINCLOTHES
Carmen EmmiUSA

In a 90s New York mall, a sting operation lures gay men to humiliating arrests. Lucas, a hot young cop, serves as bait. But when Lucas is tempted to break protocol to pursue one of his targets, personal and official lives collide in this riveting psychodrama. Lucas (Tom Blyth) has gone undercover ...

Film
short
Itty Bitty Betty
Laura BuchananCanada

Betty, driven by fear of rejection, lives isolated at home among her miniature figurines. When she meets a woman she can’t stop thinking about, she faces a difficult choice: remain in her safe, private world or step outside and risk vulnerability for a real connection....

Film

EMERGING VOICES AWARD

In partnership with Fierté Montréal Pride
Itty Bitty Betty
Laura BuchananCanada

Betty, driven by fear of rejection, lives isolated at home among her miniature figurines. When she meets a woman she can’t stop thinking about, she faces a difficult choice: remain in her safe, private world or step outside and risk vulnerability for a real connection....

Film

SPECIAL MENTION

documentary
RISING THROUGH THE FRAY
Courtney MontourCanada

Uniting from across continents to bring representation to the sport they love, Indigenous Rising laces up their skates to claim their space on the roller derby track. Indigenous Rising is the first team in roller derby history to break the barriers of representing a single country at the Roller Derb...

Film
feature
JULIAN
Cato KustersBelgium, Netherlands

Based on Fleur Pierets’ memoir of the same name, Julian tells the heart-wrenching love story between the author Fleur and Julian Demoor and Project 22—their international LGBTQ+ marriage campaign of 2017 that was brought to an abrupt halt by tragic circumstances. In 2017, it was legal for same-sex ...

Film
animation
Dare to be Fabulous
João Paulo Buosi, Carla Sampaio da Silva, Adam Meziane Philipps, Zhen Zhou, João Buosi, Yangjia Chen, Xinxin QinFrance

Determined to prove to his father that he is the city's most feared gangster, Alessandro sets out to rob a bar with his friend Joe. However, when they discover that it is a drag queen bar and that the star performer is Alessandro's father in drag, the night takes an unexpected turn....

Film
live action short
Le huard (The Loon)
Paula BourgieCanada

When her childhood best friend falls in love, nostalgic teenager Dodo struggles to let go of the past and goes to increasingly dangerous lengths to secure her affections, threatening to spoil their idyllic lakeside holiday. ...

Film
performance
SANDBAG DAM (ZEČJI NASIP) (EN)
Čejen Černić ČanakCroatia, Slovenia, Lithuania

CROATIAN • ENGLISH ST | Marko, slight but mighty, seems always in control, always a champion—but what happens when he slips his banks? As “unstable air” portends torrential rains for a small Croatian village, the return of Marko’s former neighbour is the rush that might pull him under. Marko (Lav...

Film
script
BEAUTIFUL EVENING, BEAUTIFUL DAY (LIJEPA VEČER, LIJEP DAN)
Ivona JukaCroatia, Canada, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cyprus, Poland

A tight-knit group of revolutionary gay filmmakers in late-1950s former Yugoslavia are shackled by the state to Emir, a communist bureaucrat conditioned to see sabotage everywhere. When the group endeavours to use the Tito regime’s ideological weapons against them, an upended system or the horrors o...

Film
cinematography
QUEERPANORAMA
Jun LiChina, Hong Kong, USA

The protean central character of Queerpanorama has built a sex life for himself as an unreliable narrator. Curious about Hong Kong’s international tourists and struggling immigrants, this native Hongkonger briefly infiltrates their bubbles in the guise of other men he has bedded. In an open relati...

Film

GRAND PRIX DU JURY

short
Inkwo For When the Starving Return (Inkwo à la défense des vivants)
Amanda StrongCanada

In the near future, Dove, a gender fluid person, discovers the powers and perils of their Inkwo (Indigenous medicine) while defending the living against a horde of ravenous monsters, testing their courage, resilience, and connection to the Earth....

Film
feature
BEARCAVE (ARKOUDOTRYPA)
Stergios Dinopoulos, Krysianna PapadakisGreece, United Kingdom

Passionate, provocative, and powerful—it’s easy to see why Bearcave was awarded the Europa Cinema Label at the 2025 Venice Film Festival. Set in a fictional remote village in the Balkan Mountains of Greece, a love story between two lifelong friends unfolds—but will their relationship survive the cal...

Film
documentary
QUEER AS PUNK
Yihwen Chen

In Muslim-majority Malaysia, a queer punk band led by a transman are outliers of the system —carving out spaces to exist through their music while challenging conservative traditions and religious extremism. Brash, defiant and wickedly funny, punk rockers Shh…Diam! are an underground sensation in K...

Film