33 years since Oscar nom, Montreal filmmaker Joyce Borenstein feels sense of closure

Montreal filmmaker Joyce Borenstein poses for a photograph alongside paintings by made by her father, in Montreal on Tuesday, March 3, 2026. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Christopher Katsarov

MONTREAL — Joyce Borenstein spent hours in her Montreal-area apartment, surrounded by the paintings of her famous artist father, carefully watching every Oscar-nominated film from 2025.

As a newly minted member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Borenstein was able to vote in several categories, helping choose who will take home the bronze statuettes plated in 24-karat gold on Sunday for the 98th Academy Awards.

Her role ahead of this weekend in Los Angeles was small — she is one of thousands of Academy members eligible to vote for Oscar nominees — but its symbolic importance is immense for her. This year’s awards ceremony is a homecoming of sorts for the Montreal animator and filmmaker, whose short documentary detailing the life of her dad, famed painter Sam Borenstein, called “The Colours of My Father,” was nominated for an Oscar in 1993.

Oscar nominees are automatically asked to join the Academy, the body of film industry professionals that runs the awards. But Borenstein was not invited in the 1990s because despite being the writer and director of the documentary, only the film’s two producers were part of the credited team. She was introverted at the time, she said, and didn’t push back.

“I was very disappointed about that,” Borenstein said in a recent interview in her Westmount home. “It was sort of a big deception in my life, a sadness.”

Thirty-three years later, Borenstein is returning to the Oscars to attend the ceremony as an Academy member with a feeling of vindication and closure after an “emotionally difficult” career. “Back when I was younger, I was very shy,” she said. “This is definitely a positive happening among a lot of not-so-positive experiences that I’ve had.”

Borenstein took pride — and a lot of time — in choosing her Oscar nominees. After almost 70 hours watching about 50 shortlisted movies over one month, she has some favourites.

Best actor? Ethan Hawke in “Blue Moon,” Richard Linklater’s comedy-drama based on Broadway songwriter Lorenz Hart. Best documentary feature? “Mr. Nobody Against Putin,” where Russian teacher and documentarist Pavel Talankin explores state propaganda in the school system. She also voted for “The Girl Who Cried Pearls,” an animated short made and set in Montreal by the National Film Board, with whom Borenstein worked early in her career.

Whereas members would once receive a pile of DVDs in the mail, the films were made available to Borenstein on a high-security server with a streaming platform, which allows the Academy to keep track of the films its members have seen. She would hook up a computer to her living room television and watch a movie with her husband, who sometimes fell asleep as the plot unfolded.

The Academy has about 11,000 members from around the world who are eligible to vote for the Oscars, but the full list is not publicly available. Film professionals who are not nominated for an Oscar can still be considered if they are sponsored by two members in their field. Borenstein’s peers, themselves members, encouraged her to put together a portfolio of her work and offered to sponsor her candidacy into the Academy.

“Lo and behold it came to pass,” she said with pride. “It’s really made such a big difference in my happiness because my career is very important to me, and my films are my babies.”

At the National Film Board, her work included animated interpretations of Canadian poet P.K. Page’s 1969 poem “Travellers Palm.” Over the years, she continued her animated short biographical documentaries, and in 2017 she released “Lida Moser Photographer: Odyssey in Black and White,” for which she animated the New York photographer’s journey through 1950s Quebec.

Prof. David Douglas with Concordia University’s school of cinema estimates about 9,000 Academy members actually vote for the Oscar nominees every year. He says several of his colleagues — like Borenstein, who taught at Concordia in the 1990s and 2000s — have joined the Academy or have been nominated themselves, including indie filmmakers Wendy Tilby and Chris Hinton.

“There were quite a number of nominations all of a sudden around Concordia (in the 1990s and 2000s). It was really exciting to see,” Douglas said.

In 2004, Denys Arcand became the first and only Québécois director to win an Oscar for a feature film with “The Barbarian Invasions.” Notable Canadians who have won Oscars include Mary Pickford, James Cameron, Christopher Plummer, Sarah Polley and Paul Haggis.

“Certainly, the NFB as an institution has had quite a number of nominations. We just had another one this year,” Douglas added, referring to “The Girl Who Cried Pearls” by Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski.

Douglas says that while the Academy has kept up the mystique around its membership, it has also “cleaned things up” after scandals, including when it came to light that some people who voted had not actually watched the nominated films. The Academy is also making more room for non-American cinema, accepting an increasing number of indie films and becoming more inclusive, Douglas said.

Borenstein agrees, adding that she’s happy to see the Oscars become more global. She hopes young Canadian filmmakers can feel inspired to keep pushing through what she says is a difficult and competitive industry.

“Be devoted. Be passionate. We need as many expressions and films as there are filmmakers,” Borenstein said. “And if the establishment board doesn’t think you’re worthy or you’re a good fit, don’t listen to them because there are ways around.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 11, 2026.

Erika Morris, The Canadian Press