TIDAL SURGES #2

Dive into the wild and unpredictable currents of Tidal Surges, a series of short films that brings together local and regional filmmakers exploring a range of stories, ideas, images, and perspectives that will surprise, challenge, and stay with you long after the credits roll.

A Song for my Father

Shona Buschlen | 2026 | 6m

A poetic documentary that examines grief and the complicated relationship we develop with the things that once connected us to the people we’ve lost. After the sudden death of their musician father, filmmaker Shona Buschlen and her younger brother Eddie, a jazz trumpet player, return to a performance space where their father once played. In the early stages of grief, music becomes difficult to hear, no longer comforting but a reminder of absence. Over time, these feelings begin to shift. Through archival recordings of their father’s bass and live trumpet improvisations by Eddie, the film creates a call and answer across time, tracing how sound becomes a way to sit with grief rather than escape it. Blending voiceover, childhood footage, and sound-driven editing, A Song For My Father explores grief not as something to be resolved, but as something lived with, where healing comes from allowing yourself to feel.

Shona Buschlen is a musician and filmmaker from the Kitchener Waterloo region.

Out on the Water 

Anushay Sheikh and Cathy van Ingen | 2026 | 8m

Through an intimate conversation on the water, Brown Girl Outdoor World founder Demiesha Dennis demonstrates how one person's vision can dismantle barriers and transform who gets to belong in the outdoors.

Cathy van Ingen is a filmmaker and feminist scholar whose work explores the intersections of gender, race, sexuality, and physical culture — increasingly through documentary film as a form of critical, community-facing research

The Wreck of Harold Murphy

Erin Brandenburg | 2025 | 21m

The Wreck of Harold Murphy is a 21-minute narrative drama about a weathered singer-songwriter from Windsor, Ontario, whose dreams of musical success have long since faded. Nearing fifty, Harold is broke, depressed, and creatively empty. He escapes to a remote cabin on Pelee Island, hoping to write one last song to save his career, or at least himself.

Surrounded by the island’s natural sounds - cicadas, waves, birds and the local dirtbike kid, Harold struggles to tune out the noise in his own head. As inspiration evades him, frustration turns inward. But slowly, Harold begins to rediscover his connection to music and what got him started in the first place. In the end, he doesn’t find fame, but does find a reason to keep going."

Erin Brandenburg is an award-winning director and writer known for creating socially engaged, innovative work in film, theatre, and digital media. Her projects often explore underrepresented voices, regional identity, and the power of place.

A recent winner of Project Pitch at the Ontario Screen Creators Conference for her upcoming short film, Petrichor, she has also held prestigious residencies at the Banff Centre, Stratford Playwrights’ Retreat, and Soulpepper Academy. Her work spans large-scale productions (Detroit: Music of the Motor City), digital experiments (HOME DAY, UnMute), and intimate narrative storytelling.

Her latest film, The Wreck of Harold Murphy, was shot on Pelee Island and stars Windsor folk musician Ron Leary in his screen debut. The film was an official selection at the Forest City Film Fest. 

Some Place to Stand

Sandy McLennan | 2026 | 4m

In 1967 this song (and a film: A Place to Stand) was commissioned by the Province of Ontario for their pavilion at the Expo 67 world's fair in Montréal, Québec, Canada. Over the decades the song has been the source of nostalgia, and also teasing. The lyrics/phrases seemed corny and light. In 2026 they seem much heavier: to wish for something we already have is easy, but when the specter of speaking such lines in the absence of these concepts first appears in consciousness, it is disturbing. Here are hand-processed images from current travels in Southern Ontario which recall any old Canadian "propaganda" film I saw growing up, together with a wonky sampling of the song DJ’d off a 45 RPM record from that positive time in Canada.

Sandy McLennan loves wandering just outside his darkroom door with cameras and sound recorders. Hand-processing and printing motion pictures via chemistry and chance reveals memory of personal and state-of-the-world emotions. Specializing in Double 8mm and 16mm film, he may include audio improvised from location field recordings, self-talk and the physical sound of assembling. He leads workshops giving the experience of slow-hand time and revelation. He has received grants from Canada Council and Ontario Arts Council.

Lonely Child

Holly Treddenick, Angola Murdoch, Stacie Dunlop | 2022 | 16m

Escape into the dream world of a child: surrounded in layers of colourful zebra stripes, fairies dance the farandole under a starlit sky, Merlin the Magician casts his magical spells and the evil fairy Carabosse glares down at the merriment from high up in her jade palace. 

The Lonely Child project is an intricate tapestry of elements, combining contemporary music, theatre, dance and circus to reimagine Claude Vivier’s iconic Lonely Child in a dramatic setting by animating the role of the child sung by soprano Stacie Dunlop, while his dream world is brought to life through the choreography of aerialist-dancers Angola Murdoch and Holly Treddenick. 

In our unique creation approach for this project, there has been no outside artistic vision, rather was co-directed in a collaborative process by Holly, Angola and Stacie. The work has come together organically through discussion, discovery and experimentation. 

Holly Treddenick is an artist, producer, founder and artistic director for Femmes du Feu Creations. In 2001 Holly was introduced to the world of circus, beginning as a fire dancer, then moving into the air as an aerialist. Holly serves on the Welland Downtown BIA, the Welland Arts & Culture Advisory Committee, and is co-founder and chair of the Welland Creatives Network. Holly relocated to Welland after 25 years in Toronto, with her family in 2019 just prior to the pandemic, to open a new circus and multi-arts center, The Bank Art House with her husband.

Breaking

Norah Jane Legros | 2026 | 8m

Breaking is a psychological short film set in a dystopian future where Canada has been placed under the rule of a fascist dictatorship run by a supreme leader who is known by no name to his subjects. "He" has begun to take over all of the Provinces of Canada and forcefully creates one mega country under the name of "CanAdia". This film follows two news anchors who are delivering the manipulated propaganda news to the country each day. However, on this particular day the news is too much to handle and one of them begins to break and we witness the unraveling of both anchors and the facility they are trapped in as they begin to remember their lives before. This piece of work was really inspired by the current state of the world, especially the consistent and endless nonconsensual feed of media overload we are constantly subjected to.

Norah Jane Legros is a 20 year old Director/Actor from Thorold Ontario, Canada. She is fairly new to the world of directing having made 3 short films where she took on the multifaceted hat of Director and Actor. Norah Jane is a recent graduate from Acting for Film and digital media program at Niagara College where she broadened her film making abilities and found her love for creating meaningful short form content. Her aspirations for upcoming short films are to create weird, creepy and campy pieces of digital art that make the wheels in other weirdos' brains turn!

Gone for A Run

Cathy van Ingen | 2025 | 2m

Gone For a Run is a short film that follows a women going on a run.

Cathy van Ingen is a Niagara-based documentary filmmaker and Kinesiology Professor at Brock University. She holds an MFA in Documentary Media and is the founder of Catchweight Films Inc.

Shelter Vets

Jing Lang | 2026 | 18m

Shelter Vets follows Dr. Sarah Kirk and Dr. Jill Kirk, a mother–daughter pair of shelter veterinarians, between their work in shelter medicine and their Niagara farm home, shared with rescue horses (4) and rescue cats (17). 

Through conversations, archival footage, and b-roll, the film reveals who they are, why they choose this work, and the lives they have altered—exploring the love, loss, fulfillment, and heartbreak of caring for animals without guardians.

Jing Lang is a filmmaker who produces media and advise for nonprofits. A former actuary and insurance executive, she has fostered 47 cats and trained as a feline behaviourist. Shelter Vets is her directorial debut — a tribute to those who choose this work.