Montréal’s image+nation LGBTQ film festival turns 38
Festivals and events
Canada’s pioneering image+nation LGBTQ film festival will screen and stream 125 films from across Québec, Canada and the world at its 38th edition from November 20 to 30, 2025.
With narrative and documentary features and short films from 38 countries – including Australia, Canada, Croatia, Denmark, France, Portugal and the United States – image+nation unspools on several Montréal film screens: Cinéma Public, ONF Cinéma, PHI, Concordia University and Théatre Outremont. Films will be presented in their original language, with French or English subtitles.
The importance of Queer Cinema
Founded in 1987, image+nation is Canada’s trailblazing first LGBTQ film festival and continues to play a trendsetting role within the larger festival circuit and an essential role in the lives of LGBTQ people by fostering community and identity.
Over 11 days, this year’s edition will screen and stream award-winning features, powerful documentaries and acclaimed short films from around the world, offering something for all cinematic tastes, from light-hearted comedies and love stories to deeper dramatic tales and social-issue works.
Says image+nation director Charlie Boudreau, “This year we look at the present and reflect upon the past with our 25th anniversary edition of Queerment Québec, celebrating with a special retro selection, our first Student Film event, as well as a program of films that speak to/of our history while also amplifying emerging voices from less-represented countries in the queer cinema canon. As we embark on a moment in history that does not favour difference, LGBTQ+ voices must be heard and seen, and shared. image+nation is here to make this happen.”
Opening night film
Director Gail Maurice’s evocative women-centric Blood Lines brings visibility to the lives of Indigenous adoptees in a remote Métis village (November 20 – Théâtre Outremont).
Closing night film
A touching tale of an intergenerational queer family, Sophie Hyde’s Jimpa stars Oscar winner Olivia Colman and John Lithgow as her gay father in the story of a visit to Amsterdam with Colman’s non-binary teenager (November 29 – Sir George Williams Alumni Auditorium (H110) at Concordia University).
Lights! Camera! Action!
The festival’s A Question of Gender programme showcases trans and non-binary cinematic storytellers. Check out such films as Elena Oxman’s Outerlands, Farnoosh Samadi’s Between Dreams and Hope, and the documentary A Deeper Love: The Story of Miss Peppermint directed by Oriel Pe’er.
The Indigiqueer Voicesprogramme screens films by 2Spirit and queer Indigenous creators from across Turtle Island. Programming includes Gail Maurice’s festival-opening film Blood Lines, Brett Hannam’s crowd-pleasing ghost story At the Place of Ghosts (Sk+te’kmujue’katik), the fierce drag musical Starwalker directed by Corey Payette, and Courtney Montour’s Indigenous roller derby documentary Rising Through the Fray.
The Made au Canada programme celebrates Canadian filmmakers who portray our national queer identities. This year’s programme includes a retrospective screening of Aerlyn Weissman and Lynne Fernie’s 1992 classic film Forbidden Love: The Unashamed Stories of Lives, and a virtual exclusive screening of Noam Gonick’s Parade: Queer Acts of Love + Resistance.
Back for its 25th year, the Queerment Québec programme at the PHI highlights short films by local filmmakers exploring queer Québecois perspectives. This year the series features conversations with creators and special programming looking back on 25 years of QQ.
The Focus France programme brings queer filmmaking from France to Montréal audiences. This year’s programme presents Caroline Fournier’s Amantes, Alice Douard’s Des preuves d’amour (Love Letters), and Robin Campillo’s Enzo.
The Zeitgeist programme features films showcasing contemporary queer voices that reflect current cultural preoccupations; the First Voices programme will screen Croatian-Montenegrin filmmaker Ivona Juka’s Beautiful Evening, Beautiful Day; while the fourth edition of the I+N x FMC / CMF SERIES co-presented by the Canada Media Fund presents the November 29 screening and panel discussion GIV50: We Are Never Better Served Than By Ourselves celebrating 50 years of Groupe Intervention Vidéo.
All-star screenings
Festivalgoers can get a first-episode sneak peak of the upcoming CRAVE television series Heated Rivalry, created by award-winning Montréal writer-director-producer Jacob Tierney, based on the bestselling book series Game Changers by Rachel Reid, and starring Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie as rival major league hockey players turned lovers, Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov. Cast members will attend the I+N screening on November 23 before the series debuts on CRAVE on November 28.
I+N screens the critically-hailed queer features Plainclothes, about a closeted cop who lures gay men in sting operations, starring Tom Blyth and Russel Tovey; and the sublime historical drama The History of Sound starring Paul Mescal and Josh O’Connor.
I+N also screens Montréal, ma belle starring famed Chinese-American actress Joan Chen.
Special events
I+N inaugurates La soirée étudiante at the Espace ONF on November 21, screening works by young queer filmmakers from Québec CEGEPs and universities; La soirée KINO on November 25 pulls together the KINO community for an evening of queer short films and celebration; and in collaboration with the Archives gaies du Québec, I+N on November 22 screens a selection of videos from their current AGQ exhibition The Emergence of the Gay Village.
Click here for the full I+N38 schedule.
image+nation runs from November 20 to 30, 2025. For tickets and info, visit image-nation.org.
Richard Burnett
Richard “Bugs” Burnett is a Canadian freelance writer, editor, journalist, blogger and columnist for alt-weeklies, mainstream and LGBTQ+ publications. Bugs also knows Montréal like a drag queen knows a cosmetics counter.