Global film festivals come up with watch-from-home options for cinephiles

Some festivals have simply cancelled their events, the most prominent among them being Cannes, but many decided to go online.

Montreal-based documentary filmmaker Nathalie Bibeau was excited about premiering her first documentary feature at Toronto’s annual Hot Docs, North America’s biggest documentary film festival that usually runs from late April to early May. Instead, she watched as Hot Docs announced a postponement of the festival in April and then moved it online in May. This year’s Hot Docs Festival Online ran May 28 to June 6, and some films were also shown on Canada’s state-owned broadcaster CBC.

The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic has downsized the film festival screen this year. “We basically reinvented the whole festival to move to the online