Asinabka Film & Media Arts Festival

09/11/2026

FREE Closing Night Outdoor Film Screening
Location: Club SAW (67 Nicholas St.)
Ancestral Beasts - Dramatic Feature
Tim Riedel (Mètis) • 104min • 2026 • English • Canada

*Director in Attendance!

A troubled Métis woman retreats to her ancestral rural home to heal her mental health, only to discover a lethal presence that forces her to decide between what she is willing to sacrifice and what she must protect.

09/11/2026

Super excited for this lineup, don’t miss this one!
☝️ 🎤🧑‍🎤🎈🎉⚡️💥

Music Showcase • Sat. Sept. 19, 2026, 7:00pm @ Club SAW (67 Nicholas St.)
$15 advance / $20 at the door (Ticket Link in Bio!)

09/11/2026

Join us for our FREE Opening Night Outdoor Film Screening on Tuesday, Sept. 15, at Club SAW, doors at 6:00pm.

Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband)
Zacharias Kunuk • 100min • 2025 • Inuktitut (Eng. Subtitles) • Canada

Set in the Arctic over 4,000 years ago, Wrong Husband is an epic Inuit love story infused with myth, magic, and spiritual power.

Since you Said Goodbye!
Mimi Moore • 2026 • New Zealand • 20 minutes
A nostalgic walk down memory lane in Nuhaka with Leo Koziol. Produced by Hiona Henare and Louisa Tipene Opetaia.

09/10/2026

We’re planning an Arts & Craft Vendor market for Asinabka next week, Sept. 16-17-18, 4-9pm. We still have spots available… if you’re an artist and want a FREE table to setup and sell your work, please email us to secure your spot: [email protected]

09/09/2026

Lines Carried - Shorts
Thurs. Sept 17, 2026 4pm @ Arts Court Theatre, 2 Daly St, Ottawa

Sukkaillutit Uqaruk - Say It Slowly
Ashley Qilavaq-Savard (Inuk)
A moving parallel between language loss and climate change, highlighting personal and communal resilience.
My journey to learning Inuktitut at times has felt disorienting and anxiety producing and also fulfilling and soul nourishing.
How can we adequately be protectors of the land if we do not speak its language? If we do not understand its seasonal shifts, its life cycles, its volatile nature? Our generation is doing the best we can to reclaim our cultural identity in a changing world, it starts by saying it slowly.

Sámi vs. Sámi
Ellen - Astri Lundby (Sámi)
Over a century ago, the Swedish state forcibly relocated Northern Sámi families into Southern Sámi territory, resulting in a long-running conflict over land, reindeer herding and, ultimately, the right to be Sámi. Since then, the state has remained silent.

Nunkui
Verenice Benítez (Ecuadorian)
Nunkui lives in a Shuar community with her grandparents, aunts, and cousins , and dreams of the feminine spirit of the garden, also named Nunkui . While her great-aunt teaches her magical chants and secrets for cultivation, the vast Amazon rainforest where they live is handed over to mining companies, and evictions begin in the area. Premonitory dreams, the figure of her grandfather—a Shuar leader who fights to defend the territory—and the complexity of a lush world of plants, animals, and spirits mark her entry into adolescence and her understanding of her place in the world.

Portraits - Short Doc
My Grandmothers Tipi
Lindsay Chewanish (Eeyou Cree)
This work is a sensory and tactile immersion in a grandmother’s tipi. Through her memories of living in a tipi, this film captures the sweetness of everyday life, the joy of cooking and the passage of time.

Date: Thurs., Sept. 17, 2026
Location: Arts Court Theatre (2 Daly Ave, Level 3)
Screening: 9:00pm

Tickets per program: $5 (At the door only)
Thursday All-Day Film Pass: $15*
*Available at the door or in advance on Eventbrite
*includes access to all 4 film programs on Thursday Sept. 17

09/08/2026

Rising Through the Fray
Courtney Montour, Director
Uniting from across continents to bring representation to the sport they love, Indigenous Rising laces up their skates to claim their space on the roller derby track.

AKI
Darlene Naponse (Anishinaabe)
AKI (Anishinaabemowin for “earth” or “land”) is a meditative, visually immersive documentary set in Atikameksheng Anishnawbek in Northern Ontario, Canada. Filmed over seasonal years, this unscripted project unfolds entirely without narration or dialogue, instead relying on the aural textures of wind, water, animal and human life, and ceremony to tell the story of a people fully rooted in their land.

Sonic Legacy - Shorts
ASTRO-TĪPUNA
Te KuraHuia / Arikirangi Te Ao / Ahoroa o Te
Long before the ancient Toiroa (Star People) decided to live and praise the earthly vibrations on the soils of Aotearoa. They navigated the night sky. Astro-Tīpuna shares a modern vision of the old ways sharing positive messages of self-love to the Stars of the Pacific Sky that they guard and protect. It is said that we will return to adorn the cloak of the sky father and shine brighter than we already do.

Fistful - Narrative Shorts
Date: Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2026
Location: Arts Court Theatre (2 Daly Ave, Level 3)
Screening: 9:15pm

Tickets per program: $5 (At the door only)
Wednesday All-Day Film Pass: $15*
*Available at the door or in advance on Eventbrite
*includes access to all 4 film programs on Wednesday Sept. 16

09/04/2026

Igloolik, Nunavut, 2000 BCE. Kaujak (Theresia Kappianaq) and Sapa (Haiden Angutimarik) were promised to each other at birth. After the sudden death of Kaujak’s father, her mother marries a man from another camp tearing the young lovers apart. The promise of a better life quickly turns to a nightmare, with aggressive suitors backed by an evil shaman vying to win Kaujak’s hand. But Kaujak resists, holding on to hope that Sapa will one day make things right.

Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband) is the latest feature film by award-winning Canadian Inuit director
Zacharias Kunuk, starring Theresia Kappianaq, Haiden Angutimarik, Leah Panimera, Mark Taqqaugaq,
and Dion Amarualik, many of whom are newcomers to the screen. Best known for his 2001 feature film
Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner, winner of the 2001 Camera d’Or and voted Canada’s Best Film of All-Time
by the Toronto International Film Festival Film Critic poll in 2015, Kunuk is considered one of the pioneers
of Indigenous cinema, having directed five feature films and over 40 documentaries all in Inuktitut

Join us for the 15th annual Asinabka Festival opening night film - Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband), the latest film by Inuk director Zacharias Kunuk presented in partnership with the National Gallery of Canada screening free at SAW Courtyard, Tuesday September 15 at sunset.

Chimigwetch to our sponsors, partners and volunteers as we present the best of Indigenous film, art and music September 15-20 on Unceded Algonquin Territory. Check our website for tickets which are available now.

09/02/2026

06/01/2026

The 15th annual Asinabka Festival will be taking place in Ottawa, Canada, from SEPTEMBER 15-20, 2026.

The Festival is currently seeking works from filmmakers and media artists. All submissions can be made directly through email, or made through FilmFreeway. Full details are available on the festival website (link in bio).

DEADLINE TO SUBMIT: June 1, 2026

04/16/2026

Miigwech to everyone that came out for our screening of Seeds by Kaniehtiio Horn. It’s such an epic and hilarious film, if you haven’t seen it yet you should definitely add it to your watch list!
Miigwech to and REEL CANADA 🍁 for planning this special day!
🦅🎥🖤