Blood in the Snow Film Festival

06/19/2026

🎙️ BITSradio Episode 139 is now here!

Recorded at the 2025 Blood in the Snow Film Festival, Kelly and Rob chat with filmmaker Prasanna Paul and actor/producer Gavin Downes about Sanctorum, a sci-fi horror short that explores creation, obsession, and the terrifying cost of playing god.

⚙️ SANCTORUM

🎬 Writer / Director / Producer — Prasanna Paul

🎭 Actor / Producer — Gavin Downes

Sanctorum follows Deacon, a brilliant but tormented man who constructs an advanced robot to combat a dark, supernatural entity threatening humanity. As Deacon’s creation comes to life, he is forced to confront not only the evil beyond comprehension but also the consequences of playing god.

🚀 Official Selection — BITS 2025 Monsters & Martians Sci-Fi Shorts Program

🎧 Listen now: BITSradio.ca

🤖

New episodes every week featuring conversations with the filmmakers, actors, and creators behind Canada's most exciting independent genre films.

06/18/2026

Kelly and Rob sit down and chat with Prasanna Paul & Gavin Downes while at the Blood in the Snow Film Festival 2025. The discussion involves their project Sanctorum that played in the festival.

06/17/2026

📅 Application Info Session – Just 1 Week Away!

🩸 Canadian genre needs your story.

Applications are open for the BITS 2026 Horror Development Lab — a development initiative for underrepresented Canadian filmmakers developing feature films or web/TV series heading into production.

And before you apply, we want to make sure you have everything you need.

🧪 Join us for a free online info session on Wednesday, June 24 at 8:00 PM EST with Development Lab Coordinator Vanessa Magic and Festival Director & Founder Kelly Michael Stewart.

They’ll walk through the program, the application process, and what selected participants can expect from the full Lab experience.

🗓 Wednesday, June 24, 2026 - 2 weeks away!
🕗 8:00 PM EST
💻 Online — Free
🔗 Register at Deadlyexposure.ca

Now in its 6th year, the BITS Horror Development Lab runs November 16–18 at the Tranzac Club alongside Deadly Exposure (Nov 19–21) and the Blood in the Snow Film Festival (Nov 16–21) at the Isabel Bader Theatre.

The Lab is a hands-on development program supporting BIPOC, 2SLGBTQIA+, women, and underrepresented Canadian genre filmmakers. Selected participants work directly with industry professionals, receive pitch feedback, and leave with the tools and connections to take their projects to the next level.

Since 2021, the Lab has supported 61 projects — including alumni such as the award-winning Foreigner (dir. Ava Maria Safai), distributed by Raven Banner Entertainment.

Apply via FilmFreeway, but find all the details at 🔗 DeadlyExposure.ca

06/12/2026

🎙️ BITSradio Episode 138 is live!

Recorded at the 2025 Blood in the Snow Film Festival, Rob sits down with filmmakers Jenna Schaefer and Minsoo Koh to discuss their chilling short film Nicky Nine Doors.

🚪 NICKY NINE DOORS

🎬 Co-Directors — Jenna Schaefer & Minsoo Koh
✍️ Writer — Jenna Schaefer

Starring: Katerina Kova, Jenna Schaefer

Alone in the office after hours, a woman becomes the target of a Nicky Nine Doors prank. But as the knocks keep coming, it becomes clear that something far more sinister may be behind the game—and it's watching her.

🚪 Official Selection — BITS 2025 Dark Visions Horror Shorts Program

🎧 Listen now: BITSradio.ca

🚪

New episodes weekly — spotlighting the voices of Canadian indie film and genre cinema.

06/11/2026

Kelly and Rob sit down and chat with Jenna Schaefer and Minsoo Koh while at the Blood in the Snow Film Festival 2025. The discussion involves their project Nicky Nine Doors that played in the festival.

06/10/2026

🩸 Canadian genre needs your story.

Applications are open for the BITS 2026 Horror Development Lab — a development initiative for underrepresented Canadian filmmakers developing feature films or web/TV series heading into production.

And before you apply, we want to make sure you have everything you need.

🧪 Join us for a free online info session on Wednesday, June 24 at 8:00 PM EST with Development Lab Coordinator Vanessa Magic and Festival Director & Founder Kelly Michael Stewart.

They’ll walk through the program, the application process, and what selected participants can expect from the full Lab experience.

🗓 Wednesday, June 24, 2026 - 1 week away!
🕗 8:00 PM EST
💻 Online — Free
🔗 Register at Deadlyexposure.ca

Now in its 6th year, the BITS Horror Development Lab runs November 16–18 at the Tranzac Club alongside Deadly Exposure (Nov 19–21) and the Blood in the Snow Film Festival (Nov 16–21) at the Isabel Bader Theatre.

The Lab is a hands-on development program supporting BIPOC, 2SLGBTQIA+, women, and underrepresented Canadian genre filmmakers. Selected participants work directly with industry professionals, receive pitch feedback, and leave with the tools and connections to take their projects to the next level.

Since 2021, the Lab has supported 61 projects — including alumni such as the award-winning Foreigner (dir. Ava Maria Safai), distributed by Raven Banner Entertainment.

Apply via FilmFreeway, but find all the details at 🔗 DeadlyExposure.ca

06/06/2026

💫 Congratulations!

We are honoured to announce Gavin Baird, recipient of the After Dark Award in honour of Jeff Barnaby, for Klee.

Jeff Barnaby was an exceptional storyteller in Indigenous genre filmmaking, often melding horror, sci-fi and thrillers interchangeably. A fearless auteur, Jeff’s style defied the western gaze on Indigenous peoples, hailing them as resilient and strong survivors and heroes.

To honour his memory, imagineNATIVE is proud to celebrate Jeff’s impact on Indigenous genre-bending films with a $2,500 cash prize. With support from Netflix.

06/04/2026

🎙️ BITSradio Episode 137 is live!

Recorded at the 2025 Blood in the Snow Film Festival, Rob sits down with filmmaker Dylan Pun and producer Sang-Thanh Nguyen to discuss their short film Shrimp Fried Rice.

🍤 SHRIMP FRIED RICE

🎬 Director / Writer — Dylan Pun
🎬 Producer — Sang-Thanh Nguyen

Starring: Jeff Yung, Adam Cawley, 🍤 Marty Stelnick

A talented shrimp chef with an ego that outweighs his tiny body carries out his vendetta against a certain culinary inclined rat, putting The Shrimp’s human puppet at risk of deportation.

🎧 Listen now: BITSradio.ca

🍤 .mov

New episodes weekly — spotlighting the voices of Canadian indie film and genre cinema.

06/03/2026

👽 Some visitors come with a mission.

Klee, directed by Gavin Baird, follows an alien who is sent to Earth and tasked with a mission to invade, seduce, and terminate a family of colonizers in 19th-century Saskatchewan.

👽 Developed through the imagineNATIVE Institute (imagineNATIVE Originals).

🌙 Screening as part of Witching Hour at the 26th annual imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival

🕙 Friday, June 5, 2026 · 10:00 PM
📍 TIFF Lightbox, Cinema 2

🎟 Part of TD Free Friday — admission is free. Tickets are available day-of only at the imagineNATIVE Box Office on June 5. Limit two tickets per person.

June 2–7 Toronto · June 8–14 Online

imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival

06/03/2026

🌙 What can your garbage say about you?

Love Is Trash, directed by Kenny Welsh, follows a woman at a data collection agency who creates ad recommendations based on people’s trash and finds herself drawn to a man through his garbage.

🌙 Screening as part of Witching Hour at the 26th annual imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival

🕙 Friday, June 5, 2026 · 10:00 PM
📍 TIFF Lightbox, Cinema 2

🎟 Part of TD Free Friday — admission is free. Tickets are available day-of only at the imagineNATIVE Box Office on June 5. Limit two tickets per person.

June 2–7 Toronto · June 8–14 Online

imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival
am.kenny.w