Clement Virgo’s coming-of-age feature Brother has secured the most film nominations for the 11th annual Canadian Screen Awards, including Best Motion Picture.

Brother (Conquering Lion Pictures, Hawkeye Pictures; pictured) is up for 14 trophies overall, followed by Stéphane Lafleur’s Viking (micro_scope) with 13 nominations and David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future (Serendipity Point Films) with 11. The Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television (the Canadian Academy) unveiled the nominees across 145 film, television, and digital media categories on Wednesday (Feb. 22).

Viking is also nominated for Best Motion Picture, alongside Monia Chokri’s Babysitter (Amérique Film, Phase 4 Productions), Anthony Shim’s Riceboy Sleeps (Lonesome Hero Productions, Kind Stranger Productions, A Lasting Dose Productions), Charlotte Le Bon’s Falcon Lake (Metafilms, Onzecinq, Cinefrance Studios) and Sadaf Foroughi’s Summer with Hope (First Generation Films, Sweet Delight Pictures).

Based on David Chariandy’s novel of the the same name, Brother (pictured) centres on the bond between two Jamaican brothers as they navigate adolescence within their community in the Toronto suburb of Scarborough.  The film is directed, written and produced by Virgo, with Toronto’s Elevation Pictures handling Canadian distribution. The film’s other nominations include Adapted Screenplay, Achievement in Direction as well as in art direction.

Viking is co-written and directed by Montreal’s Lafleur with Les Films Opale as the Canadian distributor. The French- and English-language sci-fi comedy’s other nominations include Achievement in Cinematography, direction as well as in art direction.

Sci-fi thriller Crimes of the Future, written and directed by horror auteur Cronenberg, is nominated for Achievement in Cinematography, direction, casting and Adapted Screenplay, to name a few. The film is produced by Robert Lantos and distributed in Canada by Montreal and Toronto-based Sphere Films.

Joining Virgo (Brother), Lafleur (Viking) and Cronenberg (Crimes of the Future) in the Achievement in Directing category are Le Bon for Falcon Lake and Shim for Riceboy Sleeps. Both Virgo and Le Bon are also nominated for Adapted Screenplay for their respective films, as well as Catherine Léger for Babysitter. Shim is up for Original Screenplay for Riceboy Sleeps alongside Marie Clements for Bones of Crows (Marie Clements Media, Screen Siren Pictures, Grana Productions), Foroughi for Summer with Hope as well as Sophie Jarvis for Until Branches Bend (Experimental Forest Films, Ceroma Films, Reign Films)

Competing for the Best First Feature Film Award alongside Le Bon’s Falcon Lake is Graham Foy for The Maiden (F F Films, MDFF), Geneviève Albert for Noémie dit oui (Leimotiv Films), Joëlle Desjardins Paquette for Rodéo (CG Cinéma) and Danny Dunlop for Wolves (Black Wave).

As the CSAs introduce gender-neutral awards for film and tv performance categories, the nominees for Best Performance in a Lead Role include Chokri in Babysitter, Lamar Johnson for Brother, Kelly Depeault for Noémie dit oui, Steve Laplante for Viking, Joseph Engel for Falcon Lake, Choi Seung-yoon in Riceboy Sleeps, Maxime Le Flaguais for Rodéo  and Larissa Corriveau in That Kind Summer (Un été comme ca) (Metafilms).

Marsha Stephanie Blake and Aaron Pierre are both up for Best Performance in a Supporting Role for their parts in Brother. The category also includes Nadia Tereszkiewicz for Babysitter, Mohammed Marouazi for Breathe (Respire) (Ugo Media), K.C. Collins for Chien Blanc (Go Films), Sara Montpetit for Falcon Lake, Jean-Luc Kanapé for Nouveau-Québec (Voyelles Films) as well as Leili Rashidi for Summer with Hope.

In the running for Best Short Documentary is The Benevolents (Les bienveillants), Bill Reid Remembers, The Goats of Monesiglio, Patty vs. Patty and Perfecting the Art of Longing. Up for Best Live Action Short Drama are III, À la vie à l’amor, Mimine, No Ghost in the Morgue (Pas de fantôme à la morgue) and Simo سیمو.

The field for Best Animated Short includes Arctic Song, Triangle of Darkness (Triangle noir), Impossible Figures and other stories I, The Shadow Of My Life and 2023 Oscar nominee The Flying Sailor.

Among the nominees for Ted Rogers Best Feature Length Documentary are Batata, Dear Audrey, Handle with Care: The Legend of the Notic Streetball Crew, zo reken and To Kill a Tiger.

The film categories received a total of 235 submissions (74 feature film, 43 feature documentary, 118 short film).

The full list of nominations is on the Canadian Academy website.

Image courtesy of Elevation Pictures