The Reel 2 Real International Film Festival for Youth offers much more than just samples of recent domestic and foreign films. There are also public forums, workshops for young would-be filmmakers and actors, panel discussions, and guest appearances from directors and production people.

The festival, which runs from April 9 to 15 at the Vancity Theatre (1181 Seymour Street), includes feature films and several programs of shorts.

The following capsule reviews look at one short each from three of the programs (the directors of which are all in attendance) and one of the unique foreign features (with its Canadian actor appearing at the fest as well).

"My Father Joe" (Canada, nine minutes, Family Matters program. In English, French, and Yiddish with English subtitles)
It’s not easy to create an engaging character in just a few minutes of screen time, but young Jamie Meyers does just that as the wide-eyed 10-year-old Jacov, a recent refugee from Nazi-controlled France living in Montreal with his mother and father. Day after day, he watches as his father, Noah, the family’s saviour and a former head designer for a Parisian handbag firm, comes home from work seething about the incompetence of those who now reject his creations. When he takes Dad’s forgotten lunch to his factory one day, he gets the surprise of his young life. Director Nikila Cole’s resolution might come a bit quickly, but it’s believable and may even bring a lump to a throat or two. Plus, you gotta love the brief inclusion of a bagel bakery for an authentic 1940s Montreal Jewish feel.

"Ormie" (Canada, four minutes, Animation Nation program)
This animated effort from Starz Animation Toronto director Rob Silvestri is part of a new series featuring the title character, a (presumably lovable) greedy pink pig. This particular episode’s setup involves a refrigerator, a full cookie jar, and the hungry Ormie. How many ways can Ormie dream up to scale the fridge and get his trotters on the tempting but out-of-reach morsels? As many ways, seemingly, as the coyote employs to nab the roadrunner. In the end, Ormie should have been careful what he (or she) wished for.

"The Gidji" (Australia, eight minutes, Responding in Kind program)
Revenge might be a dish best served cold, but warmed-up isn’t so bad either. In "The Gidji", Aussie director Pat Herford (who now works out of Toronto) brings together two teen boys living on an out-of-the-way stretch of coastline who have been roughed up by a couple of local surfers. After donning wetsuits and returning to the beach for some spearfishing (a “gidji” is a sling-powered hand spear), the wronged new buds spy the board bullies and decide to get creative.

Eep! (Netherlands, 80 minutes. In Dutch with English subtitles [subtitles will be read aloud at the April 9 screening])
This fantasy-drama feature is one of the more unusual youth-audience offerings of recent years. The idea came from the book of the same name by Joke van Leeuwen, with the screenplay by Mieke de Jong (who coscripted Winter in Wartime). When country dweller and birdwatcher Warre finds a tiny, fallen feathered youngster in a field, he brings her home to his wife, Tine, who promptly begins to raise the human-looking bird as the child they never had. The foundling’s long, feathered wings in place of arms proves no obstacle to the inventive Tine, who parades her in public and also attempts, fruitlessly, to teach “Birdie” to speak and use eating utensils. Eventually, the urge to join the migrating flocks of southbound birds overhead proves too much for Birdie to resist, and her escape leads Tine, Warre, and another young outcast on a cross-country search that teaches them all, and some others, a few things about love, responsibility, and empty nests. The relatively low-tech special effects only add to the film’s almost whimsical charm, which at times is itself threatened by surreal and near-absurd situations. In the end, the characters’ matter-of-fact acceptance of their parts in the allegory lulls viewers into a similar come-what-may mindset. Even if winter approaches, there’s always the spring. Hauntingly adorable eight-year-old Canadian actor Kenadie Jourdin-Bromley, who plays Birdie, will burn her cheeping visage into your memory (and will make a personal appearance at the festival; visit the festival website for details).