Northern Ontario Music and Film Awards return

The Northern Ontario Music and Film Awards (NOMFA) have returned for the first time in four years to celebrate arts in the region.

The Northern Ontario Music & Film Awards 2024 Conference -- Day 2, June 28, 2024. NOMFA 2024 is being held in Greater Sudbury, Ont. (Lyndsay Aelick/CTV News Northern Ontario)

“The last one we've done before this was 2019 and we haven't been able to do it since then because of the pandemic," said Michael Scherzinger, Associate Managing Director for Cultural Industries Ontario North (CION).

"In that time, though, you know, in between when we were able to hold this conference, we saw so many artists releasing amazing music, so many films were being produced in northern Ontario – just the influx of like, quality music and film coming out of northern Ontario was so incredible to see that as soon as we are ready to bring this back, we had to bring it back to celebrate.”

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The three-day event features panels, showcases and of course an award ceremony.

One of the award finalists is Kyle Schmalenberg who is nominated for outstanding short film, best directing and screenplay alongside his co-writer and director Victoria Anderson-Gadner for Braided Together.

“It's a wonderful feeling being nominated, because I think it means, it's a form of acknowledgment, right? That somebody has seen the film and thinks that it's worth some recognition like this,” said Schmalenberg.

“It's a special project for us because, we filmed it in Thunder Bay. I'm not even from the north. I live further south in Toronto, but I co-directed and co-wrote it with Victoria Anderson Gardner, who is from Thunder Bay.”

Schmalenberg told CTV News that his film is about how friendship supports people through loneliness or grief.

“There's two protagonists. One is named Tania and she's a black girl who has just moved to Thunder Bay in Grade 12. She's feeling lonely, she doesn't have very many friends. (And) the other girl is named Autumn and she is Indigenous. She’s Ojibway and she’s recently, lost her sister and so her mother and her, they're going through some challenges, some friction, because they're not dealing with the grief in the same way or in a way that supports each other,” he said.

“So when Autumn and Tania become friends, it ends up actually supporting both of them with the kinds of things that they need.”

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For more information on NOMFA or other nominees, visit the Cultural Industries Ontario North website.