ReelAbilities Film Festival Toronto will celebrate its 5th Anniversary edition from May 20 – 24, 2020 – all online. ReelAbilities Film Festival will showcase Canadian and International shorts, features, and documentaries about Deaf and disability cultures and by filmmakers and actors with disabilities and/or who are Deaf.
“We are thrilled to bring ReelAbilities online – where we can reach even more people. We’re excited to showcase amazing films and the creativity of disability and Deaf cultures. We’re pleased that we can continue to host important conversations, highlight and convene fantastic filmmakers, directors, actors and writers, and provide a platform for learning about accessible media,” said Liviya Mendelsohn, Artistic Director of ReelAbilities Film Festival Toronto.
Highlights from the 5th Annual ReelAbilities Film Festival include the following films: Code of the Freaks, a blistering critique of Hollywood representations of disabled characters; Kupenda, where three determined teenagers set out to challenge their community’s long-held stigma against disability and climb Mount Kilimanjaro; Sock Guys, a peek inside a business owned and operated by a young man with Down Syndrome and his father, where people with intellectual disabilities work alongside their neurotypical colleagues; and From My Side of the Spectrum, the winner of the first ever Sandra Carpenter ReelAbilities Toronto Film Festival Student Film Award by 16 year old student filmmaker Aiden Lee.
ReelAbilities Film Festival was established in New York in 2007. In 2016, it crossed the border into Canada as ReelAbilities Film Festival: Toronto, making it the first international chapter of the Festival.