The Borsos Competition is the main awards program for Canadian feature films screening at the annual Whistler Film Festival. The award is named in memory of Canadian film director Phillip Borsos.
Introduced for the first time in 2004, the juried competition presents six awards annually to honour films, actors, screenplays, directors, cinematographers and editors in Canadian cinema. Initially, only films that were having their world premieres at Whistler were eligible for the competition, although this requirement was soon dropped as the festival had difficulty attracting entrants who were willing to forego larger film festivals such as TIFF or the FNC, and thereafter films selected for competition only had to be a regional premiere within the Western Canada region.
From the award's inauguration until 2015, six films were selected for competition each year, except in 2012 when eight films competed; in 2015, the festival dropped size limits, and since then the competition has typically included between 10 and 20 films per year.
The festival also presents several other awards, which are not part of the Borsos Competition.
| Year | Film | Director | Ref |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | The Whistleblower | Larysa Kondracki | |
| Good Neighbours | Jacob Tierney | ||
| Hard Core Logo 2 | Bruce McDonald | ||
| Jo for Jonathan (Jo pour Jonathan) | Maxime Giroux | ||
| Small Town Murder Songs | Ed Gass-Donnelly | ||
| Wrecked | Michael Greenspan | ||
| Craft awards: • Raphaël Lacaille (Jo for Jonathan) and Martha Plimpton (Small Town Murder Songs), Best Performance |
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| 2011 | Keyhole | Guy Maddin | |
| 388 Arletta Avenue | Randall Cole | ||
| Café de Flore | Jean-Marc Vallée | ||
| Doppelgänger Paul | Dylan Akio Smith, Kris Elgstrand | ||
| Marilyn | Christopher Petry | ||
| Monsieur Lazhar | Philippe Falardeau | ||
| Craft awards: None presented this year. | |||
| 2012 | Picture Day | Kate Melville | |
| All That You Possess (Tout ce que tu possèdes) | Bernard Émond | ||
| Blood Pressure | Sean Garrity | ||
| Fair Sex (Les Manèges humains) | Martin Laroche | ||
| Home Again | Sudz Sutherland | ||
| Mad Ship | David Mortin | ||
| My Awkward Sexual Adventure | Sean Garrity | ||
| Still Mine | Michael McGowan | ||
| Craft awards: • Marie-Evelyne Lessard (Fair Sex) and Tatiana Maslany (Picture Day), Best Performance |
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| 2013 | |||
| The Husband | Bruce McDonald | ||
| Cas & Dylan | Jason Priestley | ||
| Louis Cyr (Louis Cyr, l'homme le plus fort du monde) | Daniel Roby | ||
| Patch Town | Craig Goodwill | ||
| Siddharth | Richie Mehta | ||
| Uvanga | Marie-Hélène Cousineau, Madeline Ivalu | ||
| Craft awards: • Tatiana Maslany (Cas & Dylan), Best Performance |
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| 2014 | Felix and Meira (Félix et Meira) | Maxime Giroux | |
| After the Ball | Sean Garrity | ||
| Bang Bang Baby | Jeffrey St. Jules | ||
| Mountain Men | Cameron Labine | ||
| Relative Happiness | Deanne Foley | ||
| Wolves | David Hayter | ||
| Craft awards: • Hadas Yaron (Felix and Meira), Best Performance • Maxime Giroux (Felix and Meira), Best Director, Best Screenplay |
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| 2015 | River | Jamie M. Dagg | |
| Basic Human Needs | Matthew Yim | ||
| The Birdwatcher | Siobhan Devine | ||
| The Colossal Failure of the Modern Relationship | Sergio Navarretta | ||
| The Demons (Les Démons) | Philippe Lesage | ||
| The Diary of an Old Man (Le Journal d’un vieil homme) | Bernard Émond | ||
| Forsaken | Jon Cassar | ||
| FSM | Melanie M. Jones | ||
| He Hated Pigeons | Ingrid Veninger | ||
| The Hotel Dieu | Adrian Thiessen | ||
| The Mirage (Le Mirage) | Ricardo Trogi | ||
| Natasha | David Bezmozgis | ||
| Nestor | Daniel Robinson | ||
| Numb | Jason R. Goode | ||
| Patterson's Wager | O. Corbin Saleken | ||
| The Sabbatical | Brian Stockton | ||
| The Steps | Andrew Currie | ||
| The Sublet | John Ainslie | ||
| Suspension | Jeffery Scott Lando | ||
| Craft awards: • Paul Savoie (The Diary of an Old Man), Best Performance • Jamie M. Dagg (River), Best Director, Best Screenplay • Dylan Macleod (He Hated Pigeons), Best Cinematography |
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| 2016 | Before the Streets (Avant les rues) | Chloé Leriche | |
| An American Dream: The Education of William Bowman | Ken Finkleman | ||
| The Cyclotron (Le Cyclotron) | Olivier Asselin | ||
| The Death (and Life) of Carl Naardlinger | Katherine Schlemmer | ||
| Grand Unified Theory | David Ray | ||
| Hunting Pignut | Martine Blue | ||
| It's Not My Fault and I Don't Care Anyway | Chris Craddock | ||
| Lost Solace | Chris Scheuerman | ||
| Lovesick | Tyson Caron | ||
| Menorca | John Barnard | ||
| Population Zero | Adam Levins | ||
| Raw | David I. Strasser | ||
| Red Mile | Justin McConnell | ||
| The Second Time Around | Leon Marr | ||
| The Space Between | Amy Jo Johnson | ||
| The Squealing Game | Steve Kerr | ||
| The Sun at Midnight | Kirsten Carthew | ||
| The 3 L'il Pigs 2 (Les 3 p'tits cochons 2) | Jean-François Pouliot | ||
| The Void | Jeremy Gillespie, Steven Kostanski | ||
| Craft awards: • Kawennáhere Devery Jacobs (The Sun at Midnight), Best Performance • Chloé Leriche (Before the Streets), Best Director • Olivier Asselin (The Cyclotron), Best Screenplay • Mathieu Laverdière (The Cyclotron), Best Cinematography |
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| 2017 | All You Can Eat Buddha | Ian Lagarde | |
| Allure | Carlos and Jason Sanchez | ||
| 8 Minutes Ahead | Ben Hoskyn | ||
| Becoming Burlesque | Jackie English | ||
| The Cannon | Marshall Axani | ||
| Cardinals | Grayson Moore, Aidan Shipley | ||
| The Definites | Hannah Cheesman, Mackenzie Donaldson | ||
| Hochelaga, Land of Souls (Hochelaga, terre des âmes) | François Girard | ||
| Juggernaut | Daniel DiMarco | ||
| Mobile Homes | Vladimir de Fontenay | ||
| Never Saw It Coming | Gail Harvey | ||
| Nobody Famous | Sarah Rotella | ||
| Porcupine Lake | Ingrid Veninger | ||
| The Prodigal Dad | Robert Wenzek | ||
| Prodigals | Michelle Ouellet | ||
| Santa Stole Our Dog | Bryan Michael Stoller | ||
| Someone Else's Wedding | Pat Kiely | ||
| Trench 11 | Leo Scherman | ||
| Tulipani, Love, Honour and a Bicycle | Mike van Diem | ||
| Venus | Eisha Marjara | ||
| Craft awards: • Evan Rachel Wood (Allure), Best Performance • Ian Lagarde (All You Can Eat Buddha), Best Director • Grayson Moore (Cardinals), Best Screenplay • Sara Mishara (Allure), Best Cinematography |
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| 2018 | A Colony (Une colonie) | Geneviève Dulude-De Celles | |
| Acquainted | Natty Zavitz | ||
| An Audience of Chairs | Deanne Foley | ||
| Bella Ciao! | Carolyn Combs | ||
| The Dancing Dogs of Dombrova | Zack Bernbaum | ||
| Falls Around Her | Darlene Naponse | ||
| Family First (Chien de garde) | Sophie Dupuis | ||
| The Fireflies Are Gone (La Disparition des lucioles) | Sébastien Pilote | ||
| Honey Bee | Rama Rau | ||
| In God I Trust | Maja Zdanowski | ||
| Nose to Tail | Jesse Zigelstein | ||
| Red Rover | Shane Belcourt | ||
| Roobha | Lenin M. Sivam | ||
| Les Salopes, or the Naturally Wanton Pleasure of Skin (Les salopes ou le sucre naturel de la peau) | Renée Beaulieu | ||
| Sashinka | Kristina Wagenbauer | ||
| Stockholm | Robert Budreau | ||
| Trouble in the Garden | Roz Owen | ||
| Woodland | Jon Silverberg | ||
| Craft awards: • Émilie Bierre (A Colony), Best Performance • Geneviève Dulude-De Celles (A Colony), Best Director • Robert Budreau (Stockholm), Best Screenplay • Michel La Veaux (The Fireflies Are Gone), Best Cinematography |
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| 2019 | Antigone | Sophie Deraspe | |
| Apapacho | Marquise Lepage | ||
| Black Conflux | Nicole Dorsey | ||
| Body and Bones | Melanie Oates | ||
| Canadian Strain | Geordie Sabbagh | ||
| The Cuban | Sergio Navarretta | ||
| Dreamland | Bruce McDonald | ||
| Entangled | Gaurav Seth | ||
| Fall Back Down | S. B. Edwards | ||
| From the Vine | Sean Cisterna | ||
| Guilt (Le Coupable) | Onur Karaman | ||
| Hammer | Christian Sparkes | ||
| The Marijuana Conspiracy | Craig Pryce | ||
| Promiseland | Kirk Caouette | ||
| Queen of the Morning Calm | Gloria Ui Young Kim | ||
| Spinster | Andrea Dorfman | ||
| Things I Do for Money | Warren P. Sonoda | ||
| Thunderbird | Nicholas Treeshin | ||
| Volition | Tony Dean Smith | ||
| We Had It Coming | Paul Barbeau | ||
| Craft awards: • Nahéma Ricci (Antigone), Best Performance • Sophie Deraspe (Antigone), Best Director, Best Screenplay • Celiana Cárdenas (The Cuban), Best Cinematography |
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