SOFT

2022 / 87 min / color

In the feature debut from Canadian filmmaker Joseph Amenta, three queer adolescents spend their summer break wandering the streets of Toronto and exploring its nightlife. Julien (Matteus Lunot) is a runaway who’s been taken under the wing of trans woman Dawn (Miyoko Anderson); she shows him the ways of non-normative living and becomes a mother figure to him. Julien is determined to get into the local gay bar with his friends Otis (Harlow Joy), who’s a bit obsessed with him and follows him everywhere, and Tony (Zion Matheson), a young trans girl — an incurable optimist who imagines their uncertain future with a lot of hope. Amenta shows how these young characters can always rely on one another, even in challenging situations rooted in their experience of growing up queer. By showing relationships and social networks that can be characterized as a “chosen family,” Soft offers a unique insight into the reality of a young LGBTQIA community for whom that family can be the only way to survive.

• Chilliwack FF – Jury Prize