Workman Arts

Love, Harold

Alan Zweig | 2025 | Canada | Documentary | 90 minutes | English | Ontario Premiere

KEYWORDS: Suicide, grief, love, community

Award-winning Canadian documentarian Alan Zweig explores the nature of grief and helplessness after an old friend commits suicide. Zweig sits down with numerous friends and acquaintances also dealing with the loss of loved ones by their own hand. Their stories are as varied as the people they’ve lost, and their honesty and candour about their unimaginable experiences make an often taboo subject feel tangible and shared like never before. Their pain is palpable, but so too is their resilience. Love, Harold is a cinematic love letter to those we’ve lost but also a tribute to those left behind to pick up the pieces.

Loss is universal, it’s something everyone encounters in some form. Ghost is a journey through some of the different ways one can cope – both healthy and unhealthy. Director Stephanie Quilliams has transformed the pain of losing her sister to suicide into a unique artistic endeavour by animating her sister’s ashes.

Stephanie Quilliams an animator, puppeteer, director, and performance and multimedia artist. Steph has had her work shown internationally and has collaborated with artists both in Canada and America. Stephanie’s art often pushes boundaries and buttons. Through her most recent work Ghost, Steph takes a departure from her often humorous and bawdy themes to examine the concept of loss and how to cope with it.

POST SCREENING PANEL AND Q&A

Alan Zweig — Director, 'Love, Harold'

Alan Zweig is a Toronto documentary filmmaker known for using film to explore his own life. His first film was the cult classic Vinyl, which was listed by Pitchfork as one of the best music documentaries ever made. Other films include Hurt, I, Curmudgeon, There Is a House Here and Fifteen Reasons to Live. His films have won the Platform and Best Canadian Feature Awards at TIFF, a Genie and a Canadian Screen Award.

Alex Shendelman — Program Manager, Traumatic Loss Survivor Program Distress Centres of Greater Toronto

Alex is a survivor of suicide loss. After the suicide of his sister he started volunteering in the suicide loss program at the Distress Centres of Greater Toronto. After a period of volunteering in the that program (Survivor Support Program) he transitioned to the role of Program Manager. In that role he has developed innovative programming and training materials focussing on suicide loss.

Emma Badame — Rendezvous with Madness Film Programmer

One of our team of Rendezvous with Madness film programmers, Emma Badame, is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved entertainment journalist, the current Managing Editor at That Shelf, and an award-nominated digital marketing strategist for film, television, and not-for-profit arts organizations. Her coverage has appeared in POV, Billboard and Cineplex Magazines, on The Mary Sue, eTalk, Breakfast Television, PopLife, MuchMusic and more. This is her fourth year with the festival.