Shorts Program: Light of a Thousand Stars

“…in the air, there your root remains, there, in the air.” – Paul Celan

The end. Is the end. And the beginning. Again. The seven films in this program hover above, in and around death with reflections on state violence, imperialism and environmental catastrophe amidst the current genocide in Palestine, among other sites of struggle. We will gather, we will mourn, and we will remember. This program is dedicated to Tomonari Nishikawa (1969-2025).

Scott Miller Berry and Faraz Anoushahpour part of of the programming collective for Diffusion Festival will be in person to present the films and speak to the program in a talk back after the show.

Return of the Bright Night

Sophie Sabet

2025, 10 minutes, Canada, HD Video

Revisiting a moment of political and familial rupture to investigate how structures of power in political crisis cause residual alienation across temporalities and geographies. Return of The Bright Night mines the gaps and fissures within memories and migration, tracing the past as a method to negotiate the present. -SS

the talking camera that talks for those who makes other

vida zamora

2025, 4 minutes, USA, HD video

the talking camera that talks for those who makes other meditates on visuality through archival images that appear when searching "US-Mexico Border" taken and disseminated by reporters and newscasters in the USA. Through colour bias, audiovisual feedback, and critical dislocations, “the talking camera” reveals the tensions inherent to acts of image-making when visuality precedes the capturing of the image itself. -VZ

Traces (آثار)

Chantal Partamian

2023, 9 minutes, Lebanon/Canada, 8mm and 16mm to HD Video

Beirut 1980: Amid the rubble of a torn building, a reel of film. An unlikely unraveling of queer bodies taking shape and form, while the war-torn city around and its spectacle of toxic masculinity glitches and disintegrates. -CP (Courtesy Vidéographe)

Smart Bomb

Marnie Parrell

1991, 2 minutes, Canada, SD Video to HD Video

Shot during the Gulf War in 1991, Smart Bomb was influenced by footage of the video assist on the newest weapon: the Smart Bomb. It was eerie how closely it resembled the image created by the Pixel Vision camera, continuing the long relationship between war technology and consumer products. To that end, it was shot in the Eaton Centre in Toronto on a busy Saturday. -MP (Courtesy Vtape)

Sound of a Million Insects, Light of a Thousand Stars

Tomonari Nishikawa

2014, 2 minutes, Japan, 35mm to HD video

35mm negative film stock was buried under leaves near the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. The abstract flurry of activity on the surface of the filmstrip translates the energies of the radioactive site. Disordered marks and traces, representing the imprint of time between sunset and sunrise on the night of June 24th, 2014, blend into the green and blue tones of the light-exposed emulsion. -Kortfilm (Courtesy Canyon Cinema)

An Autumn Follows The Hearse

Long Pham

2025, 10 minutes, USA, HD Video

Amber-flecked sky. Ghostly droplets emit lime moonbeams. A procession for the drowned. -LP

Adieu Ugarit ( وداعاً أوغاريت)

Samy Benammar

2024, 15 minutes, Canada, 16mm to HD video

In 2012, Mohamed saw his best friend shot dead by an armed militia on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria; the blood spilled in the lake contaminated his memory. Ten years on, the reflections on the Laurentian waters revive Mohamed's trauma. I ask him if he'd like to dredge up the memories, repair the pain by retreating for a few days to the most distressing calm he can find. He talks about death, immigration, and anger. We wonder how and why we should recount this story. -SB (Courtesy Winnipeg Film Group)

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