Festival du Nouveau Cinéma (Festival du nouveau cinéma de Montréal)

Festival du Nouveau Cinéma

Festival du nouveau cinéma de Montréal

Also known as: FNC, Montreal Festival du Nouveau Cinéma, Festival international du nouveau cinéma de Montréal
📝 Sign up as a festival representative to manage this page!

The Festival du nouveau cinéma (FNC) in Montreal presents auteur cinema from Quebec, Canada and around the world, with a focus on new voices, new approaches and new technologies. Film enthusiasts Claude Chamberlan and Dimitri Eipidès started it in 1971 to give a screen to films without distribution, and the festival describes itself as the oldest film festival in Canada. Each October it shows around 200 shorts and features, fiction and documentary, over eleven days. An early advocate of video and new media, it keeps sections for formally adventurous work, such as Les Nouveaux Alchimistes and Temps Ø.

In the International Competition, the Louve d'Or goes to the best feature and the Loup Argenté to the best short, which qualifies for the Academy Awards. National, student and children's programmes have their own awards, and the industry programme includes the Nouveau Marché co-production market and a pitch for Canadian debut features. The 55th edition runs from 8 to 18 October 2026.

Country

Canada

Categories

Documentary, Experimental, Feature, Short

Awards and prizes

International Competition: Louve d'Or for the best international feature film; Loup Argenté for the best international short film (Academy Awards qualifying); Daniel Langlois Innovation Award; Best Performance Award. National Competition: National Grand Prize for the best Canadian feature and short film; Audience Award for a Canadian short film. Les Nouveaux Alchimistes: Nouveaux Alchimistes Award for the best feature film; Dada International Award and Dada National Award for short films; Best Animation Award for the best animated short. Temps Ø and International Panorama: audience awards. FIPRESCI International Film Critics Award for the best first feature. Fierté Montreal Award for the best 2SLGBTQIA+ feature film. RPCÉ student competition: RPCÉ Award for the best student short film; Young Wolf Award for the best college-level student short. Campus Critique: Grand Prize for the best review. P'tits Loups: Audience Award. Nouveau Marché: Pitch Premières Œuvres Award, SLA Location Award, Nouveau Marché Award for the best feature project in development, ArteKino International Award.

Festival rules

Short films (under 59 minutes) and feature films (59 minutes and over) are accepted. For the 2026 edition, only works completed after 1 January 2025 were considered. Selected short and feature films must be Quebec premieres: works already broadcast on television, screened publicly in theatres, or presented on an online platform accessible across Canada before the festival are not eligible. Works whose original language is neither French nor English must have French or English subtitles. Works previously submitted and rejected by the festival are not eligible. Submission is through FilmFreeway with a secure online screener valid until the end of the festival, and carries a fee.

Contacts

✏️ Edit this page!