The Toronto International Film Festival has revealed its top 10 film-tastic Canadian features and short films of 2025.
On Tuesday, TIFF announced the top films of the year marking the 25th edition of Canada’s Top Ten, presented by MUBI.
These top ten films are shaping contemporary Canadian cinema, according to TIFF’s Chief Programming Officer Anita Lee.
“Spanning globally minded stories and deeply personal visions, these films reveal the profound ways Canadian artists are interpreting the world around them,” Lee said.
She adds her excitement about seeing the first four in the lineup, all emerging new voices, and acknowledges talent amongst all ten winners.
To highlight the films, TIFF is rolling out the red carpet at the TIFF Lightbox in Toronto from Feb. 5-8, with early ticket access for members starting Jan. 15 at 12 p.m. and public sales on Jan. 16. at 12 p.m.
An opening night ceremony scheduled for Thursday, Feb. 5, will also present the second annual Charles Officer Legacy Award: The Market and CBC, recognizing a Black Canadian director and/or writer whose work exemplifies the creative excellence, strong point of view, and community-mindedness of the award-winning late filmmaker. Let’s see who follows last year’s winner: Montreal-based filmmaker Miryam Charles.
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Discover Canada’s Top Ten list below.
Top Ten Feature Films
Sk+te’kmujue’katik (At the Place of Ghosts)
Director Bretten Hannam’s third feature and Platform selection, Sk+te’kmujue’katik (At the Place of Ghosts), presented in English, Mi’kmaw and French, is an eerie thriller about two estranged brothers who are confronting spirits that have haunted them since childhood.
Follow along their journey through Sk+te’kmujue’katik, a forest where time collapses on itself, avenging for their trauma.
Agatha’s Almanac
Standout director Amalie Atkin’s English-language film, Agatha’s Almanac, was named Best Canadian Feature Documentary at Hot Docs 2025 for her film revolving around 90-year-old Agatha Bock. The film explores the housing resident trying to maintain her heritage: ancestral farm and heirloom seeds, and traditional practices, all documenting a fading way of life.
Blue Heron
Director Sophy Romvari presented her debut feature-length film, Blue Heron, filmed in English and Hungarian on Vancouver Island, in which a family of six explores internal dynamics through the lens of the youngest.
Follies
Director Eric K. Boulianne’s French-language Follies, explores a couple’s new sexual frontiers in the wake of an open relationship.
Mile End Kicks
Director Chandler Levack’s English-language feature film, Mile End Kicks, follows a 24-year-old music critic who publishes a story about an indie band, with which she becomes romantically involved.
Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie
Director Matt Johnson, recipient of the TIFF’25 People’s Choice Midnight Madness Award, reveals the English-language film, Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie.
Follow Matt and Jay’s journey back to 2008 when booking a show at the Toronto-based concert venue Rivoli goes awry.
Space Cadet
Director Kid Koala’s animated no-dialogue film, Space Cadet, follows a young girl, Celeste, and a first-generation Guardianbot who becomes her family while her mom’s away in space.
As she grows older, she leaves the robot behind, where the audience sees her joy versus the robot’s system shutting down from loneliness.
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The Things You Kill
Director Alireza Khatami’s Turkish film, The Things You Kill, also Canada’s official Oscar submission for Best International Feature, made TIFF’s top ten list.
In this thriller, a university professor’s mother suspiciously dies, so he coerces his strange gardener to execute a cold-blooded act of vengeance.
Tuner
Director Daniel Roher, winner of the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2023 for Navalny, marks a narrative debut with Tuner.
This English-language film follows Niki White’s auditory condition, leading him to pursue a career as a piano tuner rather than a promising musical career. But that skill is being used on locked safes, turning this into a heist.
Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband)
Director Zacharias Kunuk is the winner of the Best Canadian Feature Film Award at TIFF’25 and honoured with a Special Tribute Award for his feature film, Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband), in Inuktitut.
His film surrounds Kaujak and Sapa, two young lovers in an Inuit community who are promised to each other, yet separated at birth after a mysterious death. The audience gets to follow along their story and see the spirit guides’ effort into restoring harmony in this fairytale.
Explore themes of Inuit culture and mythology, love, faith, and the struggle against adversity in this screening.
Top Ten Short Films:
A Soft Touch
Director Heather Young’s 20-minute English-language short film, A Soft Touch, follows a senior housing resident’s sacrifices after being scammed, exposing her vulnerability. This short has also earned an honourable mention from the jury.
Ambush
Director Yassmina Karajah’s 21-minute Arabic-language short, Ambush, follows a group of soldiers awaiting an ambush with a clock ticking of limited oxygen in space.
Jazz Infernal
Director Will Niava’s 16-minute French-language short film, Jazz Infernal, follows Koffi, a young Ivorian trumpeter who arrives in Montreal with only his dad’s legacy. He confronts his roots to find his voice.
Klee
Director Gavin Baird’s short film Klee embodies a mashup of body horror and Prairie Gothic that rewrites the script of colonization. The film follows a shape-shifting alien disguised as an Indigenous man in rural Saskatchewan, gradually infiltrating and transforming an isolated farming settlement.
La Mayordomía
Director Martin Edralin’s 23-minute Spanish-language film, La Mayordomía, follows the religious tradition of Mexico City neighbours hosting and tending to cherished Baby Jesus statues, which are moved between homes annually.
Lloyd Wong, Unfinished
Director Lesley Loksi Chan’s 29-minute English-language short, Lloyd Wong, Unfinished, follows a filmmaker who completes an unfinished 1990s video project by a Chinese-Canadian artist who documented his life living with HIV. These three decades worth of footage offers unique perspectives on art, identity, and legacy.
Pidikwe (Rumble)
Director Caroline Monnet’s 10-minute, no-dialogue short film, Pidikwe (Rumble), follows generations of Indigenous women as they blend traditional and modern dance. This cultural exploratory film bridges the past and the future.
Ramón Who Speaks to Ghosts
Director Shervin Kermani’s eight-minute Spanish-language film, Ramón Who Speaks to Ghosts, follows Ramón’s ghostly experience walking through La Palma post-volcanic eruption.
Ripe
Director Solara Thanh Bình Đặng’s 19-minute Vietnamese-language short film, Ripe, explores a comedic romantic relationship after accidentally breaking their crush’s arm.
The Girl Who Cried Pearls
The 17-minute short film, The Girl Who Cried Pearls, led by directors Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski in French and English, is a haunting fable about a girl whose tears transform into pearls, and a greed for wealth from someone she thought she loved.
This short has won the Short Cuts Award for Best Canadian Short Film and was recently included on the Academy Awards shortlist for Best Animated Short Film.
To increase access to art in rural, remote, and underserved communities, a selection of Canada’s top 10 films will be featured in TIFF’s Donald Shebib Film Circuit.
