STORY films are 10-15 minute shorts from directors, producers and editors in the Norman Jewison Film Program at the Canadian Film Centre. The films are professionally produced in the fall, edited before the New Year, and submitted to the international festival circuit. Recent STORY films have premiered at TIFF, VIFF, CIFF, Fantasia and many more! This is a chance for actors to connect with Canada’s most exciting emerging talent, both on and off screen, and to collaborate with writer/directors on a piece that supports a feature film in development.

Ryan Leedu is a writer and director from the Canadian prairies. Ryan makes films that combine moments of patience, of small gestures, of precise compositions, that contrast with bursts of spontaneity and uninhibited performances. His film No Bedroom, an improvised affair that follows a woman who uses the premise of renting her house as a strange way to meet people, garnered an award for “breakout performance” for lead actor, Cassandra Paige, at the 2024 Canadian Film Fest. His previous film Portrait of the Con-Artist as a Young Man, premiered at VIFF in 2023. He’s the current President of the Film and Video Arts Society of Alberta (FAVA), was a resident of the Talent Lab at the 2024 Reykjavik International Film Festival, and is a current Director’s Lab resident at the Canadian Film Centre.

Two brothers come to a head upon meeting for lunch on the anniversary of their father’s death.

With one brother tethered tightly to the past, and the other completely detached in all of his relationships, they are unable to grasp the full extent of their alcoholic father’s influence on their lives.