Hot Docs to Open with Antidiva: The Carole Pope Confessions

Canadian rock icon Carole Pope gets the spotlight at Hot Docs 2026 as the festival will open with the world premiere of Antidiva: The Carole Pope Confessions. The film directed by Michelle Mama (Fluid: Life Beyond the Binary) profiles the career of the Rough Trade star and tells the story of how she forged a path for women in rock while becoming a queer icon. The film kicks off Hot Docs on April 23.

Other documentaries announced for this year’s festival include nine films vying in the Canadian Spectrum Competition. Docs in the Canadian competition include Ceremony, directed and produced by Banchi Hanuse, which looks at a radio stations investigation into fishing resources. In Code of Misconduct, directed by Sébastien Trahan and produced by Annie Bourdeau, a journalist dives into the story of five hockey players charged with sexual assault within a larger story about the underbelly of “Canada’s game.” In Concrete Turned to Sand, experimental filmmakers Ryan Ermacora and Jessica Johnson deliver a photo essay about oyster farmers off the coast of British Columbia.

Meanwhile, A Fire There, directed by Marlene Edoyan and produced by Dominique Dussault, takes audiences to a small village on the Georgian-Armenian border, while Kingdergarten, directed and produced by Jean-François Caissy, offers an observational portrait of the formative years in children’s education.

Disability rights fuel The Last Days of April as directors/producers Ree Wright and Meaghan Wright observe an advocate’s fight to end her life on her own terms. Melani Wood also serves as producer. A story of survival and recovery, meanwhile, comes in Nekai Walks, directed by Rico King and produced by David Mcilvride. The film tells the story of Toronto’s Nekai Foster, who was shot at age 16 while walking home in the Jane and Finch neighbourhood.
 
A shooting captured in an iconic photograph serves as the basis for Saigon Story: Two Shootings in the Forest Kingdom. The doc by Oscar nominee Kim Nguyen (War Witch) and produced by Nabil Mehchi, Robert Vroom, and Ariel Nasr looks at the history of Eddie Adams’s Saigon Execution and family histories connected to the photograph. Rounding out the Canadian Spectrum Competition is təm kʷaθ nan Namesake, directed by Evan Adams and Eileen Francis and produced by Peg Campbell. The film chronicles the Tla’amin Nation’s efforts to change the name of Powell River, B.C. in acknowledgment of the harms done by the city’s namesake through his participation in the creation of the residential school system.

Other films in Hot Docs’ slate of 115 documentaries—a number on par with last year, but roughly half of pre-pandemic tallies—comprises 80  features and 35 shorts. The line-up includes the world premiere of Simon Ennis and Brad Abrahams’s Gimme Truth about “conspiracy culture.” Meanwhile, Nance Ackerman’s The Delivery Line captures the efforts of midwives as they deliver babies under trying circumstances. The doc headlines the return of Hot Docs’ popular Persister programme featuring stories by and about women. Meanwhile, former Forum champ The Sandbox, directed by Kenya Jade Pinto, who produced with Shasha Nakhai, observes human stories caught amid the migration crisis and its intersections with technology. The film recently premiered at CPH:DOX.

This year’s national spotlight turns the lens to Brazil with the Made in Brazil programme. Docs on the ticket for the Brazilian showcase include the world premiere of Solar Shadow from directors Hugo Haddad and Isadora Canela and the international premiere of Dona Onete – This Tiny Piece of My Heart from director Mini Kerti.

Serving as Hot Docs thematic programme this year, Digital Witnesses curates stories about the A.I. revolution and culture 2.0. The slate includes Sundance doc Ghost in the Machine, directed by Valerie Veatch, which looks at the creation of A.I. and the heady questions it invites.

Hot Docs will again conclude by naming the winner of the $50,000 Rogers Audience Award and crown the top Canadian doc as voted by festival attendees with an encore screening.

The festival previously announced Special Presentations titles including Time and Water, American Doctor, and docs about Kenny Loggins and the CN Tower in Convictions of the Heart and The Tower that Built a City, respectively. The Big Ideas series includes an appearance by Democracy Now! journalist Amy Goodman who will be in Toronto to discuss her film Steal this Story, Please!. The full line-up is available on HotDocs.ca.

Subscribe today to read about Hot Docs 2026 titles in our upcoming issue, including Antidiva, The Sandbox, Saigon Story, and Concrete Turned to Sand.

 

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