Telefilm Canada has selected 20 feature-length documentaries in the English market for funding via its Theatrical Documentary Program.

The 20 films will receive a shared total of $5 million in production support under the program, which finances projects in production and post-production.

Of the selected projects, 10 are from Ontario (including two bilingual films), five are from Quebec (including one bilingual and three multilingual films), three are from British Columbia (including one bilingual production), and one each from Manitoba and Newfoundland and Labrador.

The Ontario-based productions include writer and director Alison Reid’s The Art of Adventure, produced by Free Spirit Films and distributed by Game Theory Films; Taste of Longing by writer and director Noura Kevorkian, produced by Saaren Films and also distributed by Game Theory; Disco’s Revenge, written and directed by Omar Majeed and Peter Mishara, and produced by Disco Movie Canada, 86 Media House, and Elevation Pictures, which is also distributing; writer and director Alan Zweig’s Ending it All, which is produced by 52 Media and distributed by the National Film Board (NFB); and Say it Loud, written and directed by Graeme Mathieson, with levelFILM attached as distributor.

Additional Ontario projects include writer and director Jason Lapeyre’s Monkey on a Stick, produced by Sphere Media and distributed by Sphere Films; Plastic People, co-directed by Ziya Tang and Ben Addelman, who is also the writer, and produced by Plastic People Documentary Productions, with White Pine Pictures distributing; and PostNatural, by directors Brett Story and Ben Travers, who is also the writer, with 90th Parallel Productions producing and Photon Films and Media distributing.

Rounding out the Ontario productions are writer-director Maya Després-Bedward’s Black Zombie, produced by Black Zombie Productions and distributed by Raven Banner, and Under Duress: Max Stern and the Nazi Art War, written and directed by Jamie Kastner, produced by C7 Galerie Productions and distributed by Vortex Media. Black Zombie is in English and French, while Under Duress: Max Stern and the Nazi Art War is in English and German.

The five projects selected from Quebec include The Mad World of Harvey Kurtzman by writer and director Bart Simpson. It is produced by Intuitive Pictures Productions and distributed by levelFILM.

The other Quebec productions are The Death Tour, co-directed by Sonya Ballantyne and Stephan Peterson, who is also the writer, produced by H2LShiners and distributed by Raven Banner; Saigon Story, directed by Kim Nguyen and written by Dimitri Katadotis, with Noble Television as producer and NFB as distributor; writer-director Julien Elie’s Shifting Baselines, produced by Greenground Productions and distributed by Acéphale; and writer-director Carol Nguyen’s The Visitors, produced by Metafilms and Portage Films and distributed by NFB.

The Death Tour is in English, French, and Cree; Saigon Story in English, French, and Vietnamese; Shifting Baselines in English, French, and Spanish; and The Visitors is in English and Vietnamese

Films from B.C. include writer-director Trish Dolman’s Dress for Excess, produced by SILO Entertainment and Screen Siren Pictures, and distributed by Photon Films and Media; John Bolton’s King Arthur’s Night, produced by Let’s Get the Grail Productions, with levelFILM as distributor; and writer-director Patrick Shannon’s Saints and Warriors, produced by Ball Is Life Entertainment, First Take Entertainment, and Grand Old Time Productions and distributed by Game Theory Films. Saints and Warriors is in English and Haida.

Rounding out the list is the Newfoundland/Labrador production, writer-director Deanne Foley’s I Will Not Forget You (working title), produced by Odd Sock Films and Pearl Productions, and distributed by NFB, and the Manitoba-based production The Passion of Kurelek, written by Halya Kuchmij, and directed by Kuchmij, Cordell Barker and John Paizs. The film is produced by Merit Motion Pictures and distributed by Northern Banner.

Earlier, Telefilm announced the selection of eight feature-length documentaries in the French market under the same program.

More funding decisions will be announced in the coming weeks.

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