Jean-François Lesage is a Canadian documentary filmmaker, most noted for his 2020 film Prayer for a Lost Mitten (Prière pour une mitaine perdue).[1]
The brother of filmmaker Philippe Lesage, his first credit as a filmmaker was a collaboration with his brother on the 2009 short documentary How Can You Tell If the Little Fish Are Happy? (Comment savoir si les petits poissons sont heureux?).[1] His feature debut was in 2013 with A Mile End Tale (Conte du Mile End).[2]
His 2015 film A Summer Love (Un amour d'été) won the Grand Prize for National Feature at the 2015 Montreal International Documentary Festival.[3] He won special jury prizes at RIDM for The Hidden River (La rivière cachée) in 2017,[4] and for Prayer for a Lost Mitten in 2020.[5] Prayer for a Lost Mitten also won the Best Canadian Feature Documentary award at the 2020 Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival,[6] and was a Canadian Screen Award nominee for Best Feature Length Documentary at the 10th Canadian Screen Awards in 2022.[7]