Canadian Screen Award for Best Short Documentary

The Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television's Award for Best Short Documentary is an annual Canadian film award, presented to a film judged to be the year's best short documentary film.^[1] Prior to 2012 the award was presented as part of the Genie Awards program; since 2012 it has been presented as part of the expanded Canadian Screen Awards.

The award has not always been presented at every past Genie or CSA ceremony. In years when the award was not presented, short documentary films were instead eligible for the Best Theatrical Short Film and/or Best (Theatrical/Feature-Length) Documentary categories. In the Canadian Film Awards era, it was often presented solely under the name Best Documentary, but was still presented to shorter documentaries and remained separate from the category for Best Theatrical Documentary.

Under current Academy regulations, the awards for Best Feature Length Documentary and Best Short Documentary can be collapsed into a single award for Best Documentary if either category receives three or fewer eligible submissions, but remain separate if both categories surpass three submissions.^[2]

1960s

Year	Film	Nominees	Ref
1968 20th Canadian Film Awards
	With Drums and Trumpets (Avec tambours et trompettes)	Marcel Carrière	[1]
1969 21st Canadian Film Awards
	Juggernaut	Walford Hewitson	[1]

1970s

Year	Film	Nominees	Ref
1970 22nd Canadian Film Awards
	KW+	Aimée Danis	[1]
1971 23rd Canadian Film Awards
	The Sea	Bané Jovanovic	[1]
1972 24th Canadian Film Awards
	Selling Out	Jack Winter, Tadeusz Jaworski	[1]
1973 25th Canadian Film Awards
	Grierson	Roger Blais	[1]
	Faire hurler les murs	Jean Saulnier
1974
	No award presented		[1]
1975 26th Canadian Film Awards
	At 99: A Portrait of Louise Tandy Murch	Deepa Mehta, Paul Saltzman	[1]
	Cree Hunters of Mistassini	Tony Ianzelo, Boyce Richardson
1976 27th Canadian Film Awards
	Volcano: An Inquiry into the Life and Death of Malcolm Lowry	Donald Brittain, John Kramer, James de B. Domville, Robert A. Duncan	[1]
1977 28th Canadian Film Awards
	Greenpeace: Voyages to Save the Whales	Michael Chechik	[1]
	Henry Ford's America	Donald Brittain	[3]
	Potters at Work	Marty Gross
	Ritual: The Collective Psyche of Japan	Kalle Lasn
1978 29th Canadian Film Awards
	The Hottest Show on Earth	Derek Lamb, Wolf Koenig, Terence Macartney-Filgate	[1]
	Return of the Reluctant Prodigy	Les Rose	[4]
	Song of the Paddle	Bill Mason
	The World of Noel Coward	Neil Sutherland

1980s

Year	Film	Nominees	Ref
1980 1st Genie Awards
	Priory: The Only Home I've Got	Mark Dolgoy	[1]
	It's Not an Illness	Claire Prieto	[5]
	Taking Chances	Marilyn Belec
1981 2nd Genie Awards
	No award presented		[1]
1982 3rd Genie Awards
1983 4th Genie Awards
1984 5th Genie Awards
1985 6th Genie Awards
1986 7th Genie Awards
	No More Hiroshima	Martin Duckworth	[1]
	Neon, an Electric Memoir	Rudy Buttignol	[6]
	Skyward	Roman Kroitor
1987 8th Genie Awards
	No award presented		[1]
1988 9th Genie Awards
1989 10th Genie Awards
	The World Is Watching	Harold Crooks, Jim Munro, Peter Raymont	[1]
	Dying to Be Perfect	Eileen Hoeter	[7]
	Space Pioneers, a Canadian Story	Rudy Buttignol

1990s

Year	Film	Nominees	Ref
1990 11th Genie Awards
	Stunt People	Lois Siegel	[1]
	Reading Between the Lines	Martha Davis	[8]
	Who Gets In?	Barry Greenwald
1991 12th Genie Awards
	The Colours of My Father: A Portrait of Sam Borenstein	Richard Elson, Sally Bochner	[1]
	The Actor	John Paskievich	[9]
	Hunters and Bombers	Rex Tasker, Alan Hayling
	In Search of the Edge	Scott Barrie
	Songololo: Voices of Change	Marianne Kaplan, Cari Green
1992 13th Genie Awards
	A Song for Tibet	Anne Henderson, Abby Jack Neidek, Kent Martin	[1]
	A Kind of Family	Andrew Koster	[10]
	Xénofolies	Michel Moreau
1993 14th Genie Awards
	The Measure of Your Passage (Le singe bleu)	Esther Valiquette	[1]
	Breaking a Leg: Robert Lepage and the Echo Project	Donald Winkler	[11]
1994 15th Genie Awards
	No award presented		[1]
1995 16th Genie Awards
	Fiction and Other Truths: A Film About Jane Rule	Aerlyn Weissman, Lynne Fernie, Rina Fraticelli	[1]
	Abby, I Hardly Knew Ya	Peter Raymont, Lindalee Tracey	[12]
	Enigmatico	David Mortin, Patricia Fogliato
	The Shaper	Martin Schliessler, Bill Sheppard
	Time Is on My Side	Jacques Holender
1996 17th Genie Awards
	Mum's the Word (Maman et Ève)	Daniele Caloz, Paul Carrière	[1]
	A Balkan Journey: Fragments from the Other Side of War	Brenda Longfellow	[13]
1997 18th Genie Awards
	Unveiled: The Mother/Daughter Relationship	Maureen Judge, Janis Lundman	[1]
	Forgotten Warriors	Loretta Todd, Carol Geddes, Michael Doxtater, Jerry Krepakevich	[14]
	Shooting Indians: A Journey with Jeffrey Thomas	Ali Kazimi
1998 19th Genie Awards
	Shadow Maker: Gwendolyn MacEwen, Poet	Anita Herczeg, Brenda Longfellow	[1]
	bp: pushing the boundaries	Brian Nash, Elizabeth Yake	[15]
	Remembering Memory	Elizabeth Yake, Lara Fitzgerald
1999 20th Genie Awards
	Hemingway: A Portrait	Bernard Lajoie, Érik Canuel, Tatsuo Shimamura	[1]
	In Time's Shadow, the Hegis	Rudy Buttignol, David Way	[16]

2000s

Year	Film	Nominees	Ref
2000 21st Genie Awards
	No award presented		[17]
2001 22nd Genie Awards			[18]
2002 23rd Genie Awards			[19]
2003 24th Genie Awards			[20]
2004 25th Genie Awards			[21]
2005 26th Genie Awards			[22]
2006 27th Genie Awards			[23]
2007 28th Genie Awards			[24]
2008 29th Genie Awards			[25]
2009 30th Genie Awards
	The Delian Mode	Kara Blake, Marie-Josée Saint-Pierre	[26]
	Passages	Marie-Josée Saint-Pierre	[27]
	Petropolis: Aerial Perspectives on the Alberta Tar Sands	Peter Mettler, Sandy Hunter, Laura Severinac

2010s

Year	Film	Filmmakers	Ref
2010 31st Genie Awards
	No award presented		[28]
2011 32nd Genie Awards
	Sirmilik	Zacharias Kunuk, Joel McConvey, Kristina McLaughlin, Kevin McMahon, Michael McMahon, Geoff Morrison, Ryan J. Noth	[29]
	75 Watts	John Cullen	[30]
	Derailments	Chelsea McMullan
2012 1st Canadian Screen Awards
	The Boxing Girls of Kabul	Annette Clarke, Ariel Nasr	[31]
	The Fuse: Or How I Burned Simon Bolivar	Igor Drljaca	[32]
	Keep a Modest Head (Ne crâne pas sois modeste)	Deco Dawson, Catherine Chagnon
	Let the Daylight Into the Swamp	Anita Lee, Jeffrey St. Jules
	Three Walls	Zaheed Mawani, Andrea Bussman
2013 2nd Canadian Screen Awards
	Chi	Anne Wheeler, Yves J. Ma, Tracey Friesen	[33]
	Just As I Remember	Andrew Moir	[34]
	Mary & Myself	Sam Decoste, Annette Clarke
2014 3rd Canadian Screen Awards
	Jutra	Marie-Josée Saint-Pierre, Marc Bertrand, René Chénier	[35]
	The Chaperone 3D	Fraser Munden	[36]
	Seth's Dominion	Luc Chamberland, Gerry Flahive, Michael Fukushima, Marcy Page
2015 4th Canadian Screen Awards
	Bacon and God's Wrath	Sol Friedman	[37]
	The Little Deputy	Trevor Anderson, Blake McWilliam	[38]
	Quiet Zone	David Bryant, Julie Roy, Karl Lemieux
	Rebel (Bihttoš)	Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers, Laura Good
	World Famous Gopher Hole Museum	Chelsea McMullan, Douglas Nayler
2016 5th Canadian Screen Awards
	This River	Katherena Vermette, Erika MacPherson, Alicia Smith, David Christensen	[39]
	Frame 394	Rich Williamson, Shasha Nakhai, Ed Barreveld	[40]
	The Road to Webequie	Ryan Noth, Tess Girard
	Stone Makers (Carrière)	Jean-Marc E. Roy, Colette Loumède, Denis McCready, Claudia Chabot
	Tshiuetin	Caroline Monnet, Éric Cinq-Mars
2017 6th Canadian Screen Awards
	Take a Walk on the Wildside	Lisa Rideout, Lauren Grant, Sasha Fisher	[41]
	Babe, I Hate to Go	Andrew Moir	[42]
	Three Thousand	Asinnajaq, Kat Baulu
2018 7th Canadian Screen Awards
	My Dead Dad's Porno Tapes	Charlie Tyrell	[43]
	Bonfires	Martin Bureau	[44]
	On My Way Out: The Secret Life of Nani and Popi	Barry Avrich, Howie Mandel, Brandon Gross, Skyler Gross
	Prince's Tale	Jamie Miller
	Voices of Kidnapping	Ryan McKenna
2019 8th Canadian Screen Awards
	Take Me to Prom	Andrew Moir	[45]
	Acadiana	Guillaume Fournier, Samuel Matteau, Yannick Nolin, Jean-Pierre Vezina	[46]
	Gun Killers	Jason Young, Rohan Fernando, Annette Clarke
	No Crying at the Dinner Table	Carol Nguyen, Aziz Zoromba
	Now Is the Time	Christopher Auchter, Selwyn Jacob, Shirley Vercruysse

2020s

Year	Film	Filmmakers	Ref
2020 9th Canadian Screen Awards
	Sing Me a Lullaby	Tiffany Hsiung	[47]
	CHSLD	François Delisle	[48]
	êmîcêtôcêt: Many Bloodlines	Alexandra Bailey, Theola Ross
	Jesse Jams	Trevor Anderson, Alyson Richards, Alexandra Lazarowich, Penny Frazier, Kim Hsu Guise, Lizzy Karp, Christina Willings
	Mutts (Clebs)	Halima Ouardiri
2021 10th Canadian Screen Awards
	Nalujuk Night	Jennie Williams, Latonia Hartery, Kat Baulu, Rohan Fernando, Annette Clarke	[49]
	Babushka	Kristina Wagenbauer	[50]
	The Brother (Le Frère)	Jérémie Battaglia
	Nuisance Bear	Jack Weisman, Gabriela Osio Vanden
	Still Processing	Sophy Romvari
2022 11th Canadian Screen Awards
	Patty vs. Patty	Chris Strikes, Kate Fraser, Maya Annik Bedward	[51]
	The Benevolents (Les Bienvaillants)	Sarah Baril Gaudet	[52]
	Bill Reid Remembers	Alanis Obomsawin, Annette Clarke
	The Goats of Monesiglio	Emily Graves, Anna Cooley, Raj Dhillon
	Perfecting the Art of Longing	Kitra Cahana, Kat Baulu, Ariel Nasr, Annette Clarke
2023 12th Canadian Screen Awards
	Madeleine	Raquel Sancinetti	[53]
	Cherry	Laurence Gagné-Frégeau	[54]
	Oasis	Justine Martin, Louis-Emmanuel Gagné-Brochu
	Violet Gave Willingly	Claire Sanford
	Zug Island	Nicolas Lachapelle
2024 13th Canadian Screen Awards
	Hello Stranger	Amélie Hardy, Sarah Mannering, Fanny Drew	[55]
	Afterwards (Après-coups)	Romane Garant Chartrand, Nathalie Cloutier	[56]
	The Bird in My Backyard	Ryan Wilkes
	perfectly a strangeness	Alison McAlpine
	Who Loves the Sun	Arshia Shakiba, Zaynê Akyol

See also

• Prix Iris for Best Short Documentary