List of film festivals in Canada
The list below notes when a festival is considered a qualifying festival for the purposes of the Canadian Screen Awards.[1] A variety of genre-specific, regional and specialty film festivals take place throughout the year, with important festivals in this class including Toronto's Hot Docs and Vancouver's DOXA for documentary films, Toronto's Inside Out for LGBT-themed films, Montreal's Fantasia for horror, science fiction and thriller genre films, and the Ottawa International Animation Festival for animated films.The primary "festival season", comprising the largest and most important general-interest film festivals, takes place almost entirely in the months of September and October, including the Toronto International Film Festival, the Vancouver International Film Festival, the Cinéfest Sudbury International Film Festival, the Calgary International Film Festival, the Festival du nouveau cinéma in Montreal and the Atlantic International Film Festival in Halifax.Many, though not all, Canadian films will screen at one or more of these festivals before going into commercial release later in the fall or sometime in the following year.The final significant film festival of the year is the Whistler Film Festival in early December, whose Borsos Competition provides a significant platform for independent films by emerging Canadian filmmakers.