The Montreal International Documentary Festival (RIDM)
launches its 28th edition held from November 20 to 30
Letters From Wolf Street by Arjun Talwar
Montreal, Monday, November 17, 2025 – The 28th edition of the Montreal International Documentary Festival (RIDM) begins this week and will welcome nearly one hundred guests from here and abroad to accompany their films. From November 20 to 30, the public is invited to 11 days of discovery thanks to an original program composed of 136 works from 47 countries.
The festival will kick off on Thursday, November 20 at 7 p.m. at the Monument-National, with a screening of Letters From Wolf Street, in the presence of director Arjun Talwar, and editor and co-author Bigna Tomschin. Having made its mark at the Berlinale, this documentary paints a tender and nuanced portrait of a Warsaw neighbourhood, seen through the eyes of a filmmaker with an immigrant background who is in search of belonging.
The screening of the opening film will be preceded by the short film Memorial Continuum, directed by Malcom Odd as part of the Regard sur Montréal 2025 film residency – an initiative of the Conseil des arts de Montréal, SODEC and the NFB, in collaboration with Les Films de l’Autre. For its part, this work recounts the friendship and complicity of two artists as they lead us into the heart of the Island of Montreal (Tiohtià:ke).
A second screening of Letters From Wolf Street will take place on Sunday, November 23 at 3:45 p.m. at Cinéma du Parc, again with Arjun Talwar and Bigna Tomschin in attendance. The filmmaker will also be participating in the Live-recording of a CHOQ podcast: Le monde dans mes oreilles, on Friday, November 21 in the Café-bar of the Cinémathèque québécoise.
DAY 2 - Friday, November 21
The second day of the festival will be marked by the Lesson in cinema, presented for free as part of Emerging Talent Day. During this activity conducted in collaboration with the PCCQ - Prix collégial du cinéma québécois, Jonah Malak will discuss his documentary approach, his threefold role as director, editor, and producer, and his latest film Spare My Bones, Coyote! (Mais où va-t-on, Coyote?), a 2025 RIDM selection.
On this day 2, other free activities are offered to the public. The traditional Soirée de la relève Radio-Canada, showcasing six short documentary films by emerging local filmmakers, will be held at BAnQ. The UXdoc exhibition: Where documentary meets new technologies, which brings together a selection of Quebec and international works, will also be accessible until November 30. Among the creations presented are Traces: The Grief Processor by Vali Fugulin and Burn From Absence by Emeline Courcier.
The program also includes the launch of two feature films in the presence of international filmmakers. Awarded Best First Feature at IDFA, CycleMahesh by Suhel Banerjee presents the unusual story of a young migrant worker who took his rickety bicycle and rode the 1,700 kilometres to his hometown in seven days while public transit in India came to a halt during the COVID-19 pandemic. A Canadian Premiere, Evidence by Lee Anne Schmitt presents, in a rare fusion of art and pedagogy, a compelling essay that exposes John M. Olin Foundation’s invisible hand in the trickle-down dissemination of (neo)conservative ideology throughout the United States. On November 22, during the Roundtable | From the Personal to the Collective: Filmmaking as Reflection, the American director will discuss her approach alongside Mustafa Uzuner (Soul of the Foot), Basma al-Sharif (Morning Circle), and Oscar Ruiz Navia (Tigers Can Be Seen in the Rain), who will moderate the discussion. These filmmakers will also present their films on this second day of the festival.
Festival-goers will also have the chance to attend the World Premiere of Green Valley by Morgan Tams. In this visually stunning film, the filmmaker sets up a camera close to a community living physically and ideologically on the margins of consumer society. Finally, the Quebec Premiere of Courtney Montour’s feature film Rising Through the Fray is another must-see event at the festival. Combining interviews and direct cinema, this powerful, feminist documentary plunges us into the heart of Indigenous Rising Roller Derby, the first international team to bring together Indigenous players from several countries.
DAY 3 - Saturday, November 22
Canadian cinema will be in the spotlight on the third day of the festival. After presenting their recent feature films at TIFF, two directors well-known to RIDM attendees will be on hand to accompany their films. Peter Mettler will unveil While the Green Grass Grows: A Diary in Seven Parts in its entirety (420 minutes), an ode to life and a truly immersive sensory experience, which will be discussed with the filmmaker on Sunday morning during the Breakfast with Peter Mettler. For her part, Michèle Stephenson will present True North in the Magnus Isacsson Competition, a film of eloquent archives that looks back on an important movement of resistance and protest against racism toward Black people in Montreal to create a potent act of remembrance. The screening will be followed by an in-depth 60-minute discussion on the themes explored. Another film in this competition, Siksikakowan: The Blackfoot Man by Sinakson Trevor, will also be screened on Saturday, November 22. Through thoughtful discussions and scenes from daily life, the director examines masculinity as it is experienced within his community, the Siksika Nation.
From childhood to old age, two films explore a particular stage of life. Presented as a World Premiere, Kindergarten by Jean-François Caissy invites us into the chaotic and authentic world of early childhood. With the highly acclaimed Agatha's Almanac, filmmaker Amalie Atkins introduces us to her aunt Agatha Bock, an independent, radiant 90-year-old woman with a lively spirit.
Day 3 also marks the start of the Focus Taiwan: Beyond the Frame. A celebratory cocktail reception open to the public will be held in the Norman-McLaren Space at the Cinémathèque québécoise, followed by a screening of the opening film of the Focus Taiwan: Taman-taman (Park) by So Yo-Hen. The film explores the stories of two Indonesian poets who meet in Tainan Park, where they turn everyday experiences and personal narratives into nighttime poems. DJ Vice City will offer an audiovisual performance, combining live music with the screening of the film This Is Not a Film by Deng Nan-guang by Huang Pang-Chuan and Chunni Lin, which explores archival footage. This event is presented in collaboration with the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute (TFAI), the Taiwan International Documentary Festival (TIDF), Taiwan Docs, and with the support of the Taipei Cultural Center in New York and the Bureau Économique et Culturel de Taipei à Montréal.
DAY 4 - Sunday, November 23
On Sunday mornings, RIDM organizes screenings for the whole family at the Cinémathèque québécoise. This year, la lumière collective presents First Sight, a series of screenings and experimental film workshops for ages 5 to 17. Filmmaker Rachel Samson presents her program Marboulette, featuring films by Gilnaz Arzpeyma and by Diane Obomsawin, before a workshop on drawing, light pad animation, and flip books. The creations will then be screened, followed by a discussion meant to explore the ideas and imaginaries they evoke.
The International Feature Film Competition includes three films with their directors in attendance. First, The World Upside Down by Agostina Di Luciano and Leon Schwitter will have its North American Premiere. This film, which blends the codes of documentary and fiction, examines an Argentina in crisis through folklore, mysticism, and the reversal of beliefs. Meanwhile, Imago by Déni Oumar Pitsaev, winner of the Golden Eye for Best Documentary at the Cannes Film Festival, will have its Quebec Premiere at RIDM. Shot against the stunning backdrop of the Caucasus Mountains, this visually rich film is a poignant meditation on exile, identity, and inherited memory. Presented as a North American Premiere, in the New Visions Competition, Mauricio Freyre's feature film Estados Generales takes the audience on a sensory journey, where plant seed is revealed as yet another manifestation of colonial violence and neglect.
Festivalgoers will also be invited to discover works by local filmmakers. Director Sylvain L’Espérance will present the World Premiere of Marche commune, a feature film exploring the world's film archives that reveals the presence of human beings on the move. Serge-Olivier Rondeau will present the North American Premiere of The Inheritors, a film centering the voice of a colony of ring-billed gulls populating Canada’s largest landfill.
DAY 5 - Monday, November 24
The fifth day of the festival will offer audiences the opportunity to see the World Premiere of The Westoxicateds by Gilda Pourjabar. In this documentary, the filmmaker and her brother examine how art slips through the cracks of repression to light the rebellious sparks in the hearts of Iranian youth in the 1980s and ‘90s. Screened as a North American Premiere, Waking Hours by Federico Cammarata and Filippo Foscarino follows a group of Afghan smugglers in the forest on the border between Serbia and Hungary.
The Canadian Premiere of the feature film Chronicle of a City by Nadine Gomez is also a must-see event this year. Both poetic and sensory, this documentary essay exposes the magnetism and the dark side of cities that attract and embrace us as much as they confine us. A Quebec Premiere, Stefan Djordjevic’s Wind, Talk to Me is a particularly intimate hybrid film. Its narrative swings between contemplative images of the past and the present, and between a mother's philosophical approach to illness and the introspection of a bereaved family learning to believe in the miraculousness of the wind.
The 28th edition of RIDM will take place from November 20 to 30, 2025
at the Cinémathèque québécoise, Cineplex Odéon Quartier Latin, Cinéma du Musée, Cinéma du Parc,
Cinéma Public, BAnQ, the Centre Pierre-Péladeau, the Exhibition Room at Place des Arts, and Monument-National.
To learn more about the 2025 program and to buy tickets: ridm.ca
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For interview requests, screening links and material requests, please contact:
Caroline Rompré | pixelleX communications | 514-778-9294 | caroline@pixellex.ca