***DEADLINE EXTENDED to DECEMBER 16 2022***
DOC BC YT NT opens call for submissions to its THIRD Breakthrough Program, sponsored by Creative BC.
Prepare to pitch for development funds and a development deal for your project. Sell your project to prestigious festival markets like Hot Docs International Documentary Festival and beyond! Six emerging and high-potential producers will be selected for a rigorous and intimate market-preparation course where they’ll hone their project pitches and materials to prepare for festivals and markets like the Deal Maker program at Hot Docs.
Emerging producers will learn to pitch for development funds by meeting key industry mentors at each session such as broadcasters, distributors, and story and trailer editing consultants. They will be supported to workshop their pitch and encouraged to apply to festival markets like Hot Docs International Documentary Festival and beyond!
Awards & Prizes
Selected filmmakers will get exclusive access:
For four months leading up to Hot Docs, bi-weekly sessions with acclaimed documentary filmmakers and project-specific feedback from funders, broadcasters, distributors, and peers. As well as workshops, where participants will hone their trailers and work on their pitch materials with story editors, producers, and pitch specialists.
1. Free one-year DOC membership with all its benefits, including free access to other DOC events.
2. The Breakthrough Alumni Network, a private group where alumni share opportunities and information.
3. Digital pass to the 2023 Hot Docs Film Festival (attend industry sessions, network with key industry professionals, set up meetings to sell their projects, and connect and collaborate with peers).
Rules & Terms
The following information is required to apply:
1. In one to three pages, give us a summary of your industry and work experience, your educational background and past professional development, or mentorship programs. Please note that many past applicants choose to submit a CV plus a list of broadcast credits and/or a filmography. This section should be used to convey your relevant experience to the jury, so please share your accomplishments with us!
2. In no more than one page, tell us why you would benefit from the Breakthrough Program and what you hope to achieve by attending a pitch session such as the Hot Docs Festival and Forum, or equivalent. Why would this program be timely for your career as a producer or director intending to produce your next project? Tell us about how you intend to interact with the other participants in the program to build community and how you have built a community in your career thus far.
3. In no more than one page, tell us briefly about the main project you are intending to workshop during this program. If available, please include sizzle, trailer, visual elements/references and/or websites you have.
4. In no more than one page, if you have a second or third in development, you may tell us about them. We encourage you to include links to any trailers, visual elements/references and/or websites you have. However, this is not mandatory.
To submit follow the link, register, and submit via FilmFreeway. *If you have any trouble with the FilmFreeway platform or need to send us more information, please email docbc@docbc.org.
Join us in our upcoming panel: After Hot Docs – Industry Experts and Filmmakers Share Their Festival Experience on May 25th at 5PM PST | 6PM 
Jessica Hallenbeck is a documentary filmmaker and community planner. With an undergraduate degree in media and film from Queen’s University, she has worked in documentary for close to 20 years. 
Olena Decock is an Industry Programmer at Hot Docs, focusing her energy on working with projects funded through the CrossCurrents Canada Doc Fund, the Hot Docs-Slaight Family Fund and the Hot Docs-Blue Ice Docs Fund. In everything she does, her overarching goal is to help great docs get made. She is an avid admirer of social realist cinema, films about collective healing, and loves to curl up to a good ol’ fashioned music doc. Olena has 9-years’ experience working at international film festivals, including two year as the Programming Associate to TIFF’s Middle East & Africa selections. She co-produced the short DZIADZIO (d. A. Ries), which world premiered at TIFF18. Olena is fluent in French and proficient in karaoke.
Julian Carrington is an Industry Funds Programmer and Distribution Manager at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival. He supports the administration of the Hot Docs portfolio of funds and oversees Hot Docs’ distribution marketplace, including the Distribution Rendezvous pitch meeting program and the Doc Shop sales platform. Julian is also the co-programmer of For Viola, a BIPOC-centered screening series at the Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema launched in 2020. Prior to joining Hot Docs, he served as an associate programmer with the Toronto International Film Festival, and, from 2015 to 2017, managed the Documentary Organization of Canada’s Festival Concierge service.
For more than twenty-five years, Ina Fichman, Intuitive Pictures, has been producing award- winning documentary and fiction films, and interactive projects. Many of her creative documentaries have been released in theatres in Canada and abroad and have played at festivals including Sundance, Berlin, Hot Docs, RIDM, CPHDOX, Venice, SXSW, Tribeca, TIFF and others. Award-winning productions include Amer Shomali’s THE WANTED 18, MONSOON (Canada’s Top 10) and VITA ACTIVA: THE SPIRIT OF HANNAH ARENDT. Recent productions include STRAY, THE GIG IS UP, ONCE UPON A SEA, BLUE BOX, THE OSLO DIARIES, INSIDE LEHMAN BROTHERS, GIFT and LAILA AT THE BRIDGE. In 2018, Ina was the recipient of the Don Haig Award from Hot Docs which recognizes the work of a Canadian independent producer. She is currently chair of the national board of the Documentary Association of Canada, is one of the chairs of the Documentary Producers Alliance (DPA) and also sits on the Board of the Canadian producers association, CMPA. Ina is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Joella Cabalu is a Filipino Canadian documentary filmmaker based in Vancouver. It Runs in the Family (2015) was her first mid-length documentary, receiving Audience Choice Awards at the Seattle Asian Film Festival and Vancouver Queer Film Festival and a special jury mention at CAAMFest for the Loni Ding Award for Social Justice Documentary. Since then, she has worked as a producer, supporting emerging women directors in creating critically acclaimed short documentaries, including On Falling (Tribeca 2020), Biker Bob’s Posthumous Adventure (Lunenburg 2019), Do I Have Boobs Now? (Slamdance 2017), and FIXED! (DOXA 2017). Currently, she is producing her first feature documentary Back Home with support from the Telefilm Talent to Watch fund.
still screening at festivals and winning awards and is now on Amazon. Other documentaries include the award-winning Many Rivers Home, a personal story about seniors living in assisted care at the end of life; Have You Forgotten Me , that shines a light on North America’s oldest Sikh Temple in North America ‘ anchored by the letters of a wife left behind ; Warrior Boyz, examining the long-running gang scene unique to the Indo-Canadian enclave of BC’s Lower Mainland and Hockey United following dreams of two South Asian hockey hopefuls. Baljit I president of Viva Mantra films Inc which launched by producing several season of an A&E series VIVA! for City TV/ Omni.
As a member of the Directors Guild of Canada, Playwrights Guild of Canada, and DOC BC, she’s a dedicated member of our creative industries
Sheona has worked in the Canadian film & television industry as a writer, producer and director, for over two decades. She is an award-winning documentary filmmaker. Recent films include Into Light, Dead Man’s Switch a crypto mystery, Candice, A Short Essay on Men, and Inside Her Sex. She recently finished writing a feature film script, Back By Midnight, that was optioned by Christine Haebler of Screen Siren. She is currently writing her first novel, Inferno. Sheona lives in Vancouver with her husband and three kids.
Steve J. Adams have created work that shines a spotlight on misunderstandings — queer and otherwise. Their first feature-length documentary, Someone Like Me (NFB), follows a group of young LGBTQ+ strangers who unite to help Drake, a fun-loving gay man, escape to Vancouver from life-threatening persecution in Uganda. Sean and Steve have directed and produced more than 20 projects together, including the award-winning short The Day Don Died (Hot Docs 2019) and Brunch Queen (Inside Out 2018). They recently completed a series of shorts for Knowledge Network entitled Dear Reader, and their next feature documentary, Satan Wants You, is currently in development with CBC documentary Channel.
Heavyweight (2012), and The Fruit Hunters (2012). He is currently completing a screenplay for his first dramatic feature, Eggplant, which was selected in 2015 to participate in the prestigious Sundance Labs. Chang’s films have premiered at international film festivals including Sundance, Berlin, Toronto, and IDFA and have played theatrically in cinemas around the world. Up the Yangtze was one of the top-grossing documentary releases in 2008. In 2013, China Heavyweight became the most widely screened social-issue documentary in Chinese history with an official release in 200 Mainland Chinese cinemas. His films have been critically-acclaimed, receiving awards in Paris, Milan, Vancouver, San Francisco, the Canadian Genie, Taiwan Golden Horse, Cinema Eye Honors, among others and have been nominated at Sundance, the Independent Spirit Awards and the Emmys. Chang’s films have been shown on international broadcasters including PBS, National Geographic, ARTE, ZDF, Channel 4, HBO, TMN, NHK, CBC, TV2, SBS and EBS. Chang is the recipient of the Don Haig Award, the Yolande and Pierre Perrault Award, and the Guggenheim Emerging Artist Award. He is a member of the Directors Guild of Canada. In 2013, he was invited to become a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
and specializes in projects that focus on the culture, environment and lifestyles of Canada’s far north. . Raised on a farm in Southern Ontario, Cox moved to the NWT as a young woman working as a folk musician before embracing film as her preferred medium for story-telling. A self-taught cinematographer and editor, Caroline brings a raw authentic lens to her storytelling in the remote part of Canada she has come to call home.
Joella Cabalu is a Filipino Canadian documentary filmmaker based in Vancouver. It Runs in the Family (2015) was her first mid-length documentary, receiving Audience Choice Awards at the Seattle Asian Film Festival and Vancouver Queer Film Festival and a special jury mention at CAAMFest for the Loni Ding Award for Social Justice Documentary. Since then, she has worked as a producer, supporting emerging women directors in creating critically acclaimed short documentaries, including On Falling (Tribeca 2020), Biker Bob’s Posthumous Adventure (Lunenburg 2019), Do I Have Boobs Now? (Slamdance 2017), and FIXED! (DOXA 2017). Currently, she is producing her first feature documentary Back Home with support from the Telefilm Talent to Watch fund. Koto: The Last Service marks her return to the director’s seat, exploring stories about intimacies, identities, and relationships.
Syrian-Canadian filmmaker Amar Chebib began making videos while growing up skateboarding in the Middle East. He has since directed various award-winning short films and commercials, as well as a feature documentary about three Syrian musicians turned refugees. Amar resides with his wife in Vancouver, BC on unceded Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh territory.
Kent Donguines is a Filipino-Canadian narrative and documentary filmmaker based in Vancouver, BC. He produced the award-winning CBC short documentary, THE INK RUNS DEEP, which premiered at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival. He also wrote, directed, and produced the Telus Storyhive short film KALINGA (Care), a documentary about the sacrifices Filipina nannies make to work in Canada. Kent is one of five Canadian producers selected for the prestigious 2020 Canadian Film Centre Producers Lab. He was a finalist in the 2017 Whistler Film Festival Power Pitch Competition. He’s also an alumnus of the Telus Storyhive-Banff Fellowship and HotDocs Doc Accelerator programs. Kent has worked for production companies in Canada and the Philippines, including Cedar Island Films Inc., Black Cap Pictures (Ten17p), Viva Entertainment, and Star Cinema.
Jaime Leigh’s projects primarily concern the empowerment of womxn and environmental justice. Her most recent documentary “What About Our Future?” which she co-directed, shot, and edited with Cláudio Cruz was supported and funded by Creative BC and has appearances by David Suzuki and Greta Thunberg. The project screened at The Vancouver Short Film Festival (2021), DOK Leipzig (2020), Aesthetica Short Film Festival (2020), St. John’s International Women’s Festivals (2020), Planet in Focus (2020), Eco-Cine Film Festival (2020), BIFED (2020) and was a finalist for ‘The SIMA Awards’ (2021.) ‘What About Our Future?’ will participate in the ‘Hot Doc’s Doc’s For School’s’ Program’ and had its broadcast premiere with ‘Hollywood Suite’ March 21st 2021. The film will also screen at DOXA (2021), and One World Human Rights Film Festival (2021.)
Brazil) and is a self-taught photographer and filmmaker. Concerned with the perceived world of dualities and what lies beyond it, Cruz has an instinct for creating unique and powerful imagery around heartfelt topics.
Our popular Pre-Hot Docs Mixer is back – Virtual Edition!
She is known for award-winning shows that trigger immense audience response and spark uncomfortable conversations about gender. In response to a gruesome sexual assault case in India, she produced a debate show Because, It’s a Boy! which won the United Nations Population Fund Laadli Media Award for Gender Sensitivity.
Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers is a writer director, producer and actor. She is a member of the Kainai First Nation (Blood Tribe, Blackfoot Confederacy) as well as Sámi from Uŋjárga. She co-wrote and co-directed the Toronto and Vancouver Film Critics’ Award-winning film The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open with Kathleen Hepburn. The Body Remembers When the World Broke Open was nominated for six Canadian Screen Awards; Tailfeathers and Hepburn received the awards for Best Directing and Best Original Screenplay. Tailfeathers recently appeared in Jeff Barnaby’s Blood Quantum and stars in Danis Goulet’s Night Raiders which will premiere at Berlinale 2021. Her feature-length documentary Kimmapiiyipitssini: The Meaning of Empathy premieres at Hot Docs 2021.
Carmen Pollard is a Canadian filmmaker and editor focused on stories that centre underrepresented voices and perspectives within the arts, social and climate justice. She’s drawn to sensorial storytelling and finding new aesthetic ways of exploring the boundaries between truth and fiction. Her award-winning work has been broadcast throughout North America, has screened theatrically, on Netflix, and at festivals worldwide.
from Vancouver and the unceded Coast Salish territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh nations. Credits include the feature documentary THE RANKIN FILE: LEGACY OF A RADICAL (produced by Opus 59 Films, opening night film at DOXA 2018/broadcast premiere on Knowledge Network 2019), the short documentary JEAN SWANSON: WE NEED A NEW MAP (premiering 2021, produced by Hot Docs Citizen Minutes) and short dramatic films BOSSBABE (premiering 2021), ROADKILL (2013), CHARLIE GAUVIN (2012), and BUNKY THE VAMPIRE KILLER (2010). Teresa begins production on her second feature documentary DOUG AND THE SLUGS AND ME for CBC Documentary Channel in 2021. She is currently developing a number of projects including a comedy television series (based on her short film CHARLIE GAUVIN), a short documentary about a cult Toronto band, and a POV feature documentary about life with Type 1 Diabetes.
