About us
The best winter films from around the world, on one huge snow screen, in a truly unique location
The International Festival of Winter Cinema (IFWC) was founded in 2017 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. We are the world’s only completely free outdoor winter film festival.
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We aim to be the premier international juried and competitive film festival featuring unique perspectives and experiences presented through winter-themed cinema and audiovisual art.
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IFWC provides an opportunity to see and experience a curated program of the best winter films from around the world. We screen outside on our giant Snow Screen!
Mission & Vision
The International Festival of Winter Cinema (IFWC) recognizes and celebrates local and international cinema with winter, alpine, and polar themes of any style or genre. We especially encourage filmmakers to submit films that feature winter and mountain life, address climate change; are made by indigenous peoples,
low-income or new Canadians; or local filmmakers.
IFWC 2023
IFWC 2023 was our most successful year yet! We enjoyed record highs for attendance this season. New changes included new staff members and new items and chairs to bring a fresh ambiance to our site.
Sadly, 2023 was our last year in Hawrelak Park for a while as the park is now undergoing a multi-year renovation and refurbishment. With this change we are super excited to be debuting at our new site in 2024, alongside Silver Skate Festival, in Sir Wilfrid Laurier Park!
IFWC 2022
IFWC 2022 marked our return to Hawrelak Park and with that the return of our epic Snow Screen.
This year’s Snow Screen was the largest yet and to compliment it, our program was the most expansive it has ever been with films screened for 10 straight days, including classic Canadian films from the National Film Board! Year 5 was certainly a success, and we hope to keep providing an inclusive and accessible event every year!
IFWC 2021
IFWC 2021 was a tricky year due to the global COVID-19 Pandemic. As festivals around the world were either shutting down or turning to an entirely online format, we strove to continue bringing our films outdoors. In the end, we had to push back our festival from February to March and instead of building our beloved Snow Screen in Hawrelak Park, we set up a small screen at CO*LAB in downtown Edmonton.
Still, in a year full of uncertainty we were ecstatic to be able to hold public screenings outdoors at the end of Winter.
IFWC 2020
IFWC 2020 was a strong success having over 1000 attendees. This year we featured a couple of new experimental installations in different mediums.
Our launch party was accompanied by a projection mapping installation on the snow screen. Throughout the festival, we featured a curated 360 video installation of scenes from the Northwest Territories.
IFWC 2019
IFWC 2019 was our coldest film festival yet! This festival was also Bari’s first snow screen build. We received television and radio attention for his dramatic build.
Screenings took place at sub -30 degree temperatures, making our cinema potentially one of the coldest movie theatres in human history! Our audience and volunteers braved the cold to enjoy great films.
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