Reel Canada (stylized as REEL CANADA) is a non-profit organization based in Toronto dedicated to the presentation of Canadian films in Canadian schools.[1] It is the organization behind National Canadian Film Day, an event in April, inaugurated in 2014.[2]
Reel Canada was founded in 2005 by Jack Blum and Sharon Corder[3] along with a committee of filmmakers and other prominent members of the Canadian film and TV industry, including Colm Feore[4] and Atom Egoyan.[5] The organization was conceived as a way to engage young people in Canadian arts and culture and build an audience for Canadian film by bringing those films to high school classrooms.[6][7] To date, the organization has held over 1000 screenings across the country, expanding to include ESL screenings to new Canadians through a program called "Welcome to Canada" and National Canadian Film Day.[8]
Beginning in 2014 and held every April, National Canadian Film Day is an effort to promote Canadian film across Canada through synchronized screenings, events, and panel discussions.[9][10] The inaugural event, held April 29, 2014, was officially recognized in the House of Commons of Canada.[11] The 2017 edition, a special sesquicentennial celebration, is on April 19, 2017.[12] In 2019, the organization held the sixth annual National Canadian Film Day (NCFD) celebrating 100 years of Canadian cinema, with more than 1,000 events held in 600 Canadian communities and 25 countries.[13]
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada, the 2020 edition of National Canadian Film Day was staged online, including film screenings on various streaming video on demand platforms and television channels, and a four-hour livestreamed broadcast featuring interviews with Canadian actors and filmmakers.[14] The hosts of the livestream, Ali Hassan and Peter Keleghan, received a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Host in a Web Program or Series at the 9th Canadian Screen Awards in 2021.[15]
In 2022, for the first time a National Canadian Film Day event was held outside Canada, with professor Brad Warren and his Canadian wife Tanja organizing a screening of the films Indian Horse, My Internship in Canada (Guibord s'en va-t-en guerre), The Red Violin and Bon Cop, Bad Cop at Coastal Carolina University in Conway, South Carolina.[16]