TIFF Names Zacharias Kunuk's Uiksaringitara: Wrong Husband to Top 10 List!

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Uiksaringitara: Wrong Husband,

The Historical Love Story

from Award-winning Director,

Zacharias Kunuk,

Named to Canada’s Top Ten Films.

Photo: Haiden Angutimarik as Sapa (left) and Theresia Kappianaq as Kaujak (left) star in Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband), directed by Zacharias Kunuk. Photo Credit: Kingulliit Productions, 2025.

Pronunciation: Uiksaringitara (week-sa-ring-gi-ta-ra)

Igloolik. January 6, 2026. TIFF announced today that the ancient Inuit love story, Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband), from award-winning Canadian Inuit director, Zacharias Kunuk, has been named one of Canada’s Top Ten Films.

Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband) stars newcomers Theresia Kappianaq, Haiden Angutimarik, and Dion Amarualik, along with Leah Panimera and Mark Taggaugaq

Wrong Husband which had its world premiere at Berlinale 2025 and its North American premiere at TIFF 2025, won the TIFF Award for Best Canadian Film and Kunuk received the TIFF Special Tribute Awardhonouring his career and impact on cinema. Additionally, the film won the Borsos Award for Best Direction at the 2025 Whistler Film Festival.

Best known for his 2001 feature film Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner, winner of the 2001 Camera d’Or and voted Canada’s Best Film of All Time by the TIFF Film Critic Poll in 2015, Kunuk is considered one of the pioneers of Indigenous cinema, having directed five feature films and over 40 documentaries all in Inuktitut.

Filmed on location in Nunavut during the 24hr daylight of the arctic tundra, the film combines meticulous attention to detail with a meditative cinema-verité observational style and applies it to creating immersive historical drama that transport audiences into a world that they have never seen before.

The film is currently being screened in theatres across the country, and is available for theatrical bookings this winter. Contact: distribution@isuma.tv for more information about upcoming screenings or to request bookings.

Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband) is co-written by Kunuk along and Samuel Cohn-Cousineau (Tautuktavuk: What We See, Tia and Piujuq), and produced by Carol Kunnuk, Jonathan Frantz (Tautuktavuk: What We See, The Shaman’s Apprentice, One Day in the Life of Noah Piugattuk) and Cohn-Cousineau, with Susan Avingaq (Tautuktavuk: What We See, Tia and Piujuq, Uvanga)and Zacharias Kunuk serving as executive producers and Cecilia Greyson (Tautuktavuk: What We See) as Associate Producer.

The film is being distributed in Canada by Isuma Distribution International and broadcasted by Uvagut TV.

Cinematography by Jonathan Frantz and Thomas Leblanc-Murray (Festin Boréal, Me Without You), costume design and by Susan Avingaq, production design by Avingaq and Melanie McNicoll (Uvanga) and editing by Kunuk, Frantz and Raphael Sandler (Sam & Jean).

Original soundtrack and compositions by Tiffany Ayalik and Inukshuk Mackay from the duo PIQSIQ (Road to Nowhere, Sunburnt Unicorn).

Igloolik. 2000 BCE. In a world dictated by supernatural forces, teenage lovers Sapa (Haiden Angutimarik) and Kaujak (Theresia Kappianaq) have known since they were toddlers’ that they will be married - their parents having arranged it at birth. When Kaujak’s father mysteriously dies, her mother, Nujatut (Leah Panimera) marries a strange man from another camp (Mark Taqqaugaq), tearing the two apart. The promise of a better life quickly turns to a nightmare, with aggressive suitors, particularly Angusiaq (Dion Amarualik) backed by powerful shamanic forces vying for Kaujak. With the help of Sapa’s grandmother Ulluriaq (Emma Quassa), the lovers must use supernatural powers to take matters into their own hands and reunite once and for all.

Uiksaringitara (Wrong Husband) was produced with the participation of Canada Media Fund, Telefilm Canada, the Indigenous Screen Office, with the assistance of the Government of Nunavut and the Nunavut Film Development Corporation, and broadcaster support from Uvagut TV.

ABOUT ZACHARIAS KUNUK

Zacharias Kunuk is the co-founder Igloolik Isuma Productions Inc. In addition to his feature Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner (2001 Cannes Camera d’Or, “Best Canadian Film of all-time” TIFF Film Critic Poll), Kunuk has directed more than 30 documentaries and feature films including The Journals of Knud Rasmussen, Maliglutit (Searchers), and the Oscar-shortlisted animation film Angakusajaujuq (The Shaman’s Apprentice). His 2019 film One Day in the Life of Noah Piugattuk premiered as the main art piece of the Canadian Pavilion at the 58th Biennale di Venezia, where Kunuk and the Isuma Collective were Canada’s representative artists. In 2003, he founded the distribution company Isuma Distribution International, to allow Inuit audiences better access to Inuktitut film and video and in 2008, the website www.isuma.tv. In 2015, he was named an Officer of the Order of Canada, and in 2019, an Officer of the Order of Nunavut. His latest film, Wrong Husband, had its world premiere at Berlinale 2025 and its North American premiere as a Special Presentation at TIFF 25 where it won Best Canadian Film.