| Sean Horlor | |
| Birth Date: | 11 January 1981 |
| Birth Place: | Edmonton, Alberta, Canada |
| Alma Mater: | University of Victoria |
| Years Active: | 2007–present |
Sean Horlor (born January 11, 1981) is a Canadian film director, film producer, poet, actor, television producer, columnist and blogger, who co-directs with Steve J. Adams under their production company, Nootka St.[1]
Born in Edmonton, Alberta, Horlor grew up in Victoria, British Columbia.[1] He has an undergraduate degree in fine arts from the University of Victoria.
In 2003, Horlor collaborated with the Vancouver poet Matt Rader and the illustrator James Kingsley to publish Our Mission, Our Moment through Rader's publishing company, Mosquito Press. A hand-bound chapbook, Our Mission, Our Moment contains eight poetic transpositions of the speeches of George W. Bush.
His poem "In Praise of Beauty" won first place for poetry in This Magazines 2006 Great Canadian Literary Hunt[2] < and "St. Brendan and the Isle of Sheep" was a 2006 Editor's Choice in Arc Poetry Magazines Poem of the Year contest.[3]
His first poetry collection, Made Beautiful by Use, was published by the Winnipeg publisher Signature Editions in 2007.[4] Edited by the poet John Barton, the collection was described as "a striking and, yes, beautiful set of musings on belief, sex, and power".[5] It was longlisted for the 2008 ReLit Awards.[6]
His work also appeared in the groundbreaking Seminal: The Anthology of Canada’s Gay Male Poets (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2007), edited by the poets Billeh Nickerson and John Barton.
Horlor is also a freelance writer. He has written for The Globe and Mail, the Vancouver Sun and Xtra! West.
In 2009, he was the co-host and co-creator of Don't Quit Your Gay Job, an original Canadian comedy television series in which Horlor and Rob Easton tried out various jobs.[7]
He is a co-founder and co-owner with Steve J. Adams of Nootka St. Film Company. Adams and Horlor directed a number of short films together, including Just the Tip (2012), Only One (2016), A Small Part of Me (2016),[8] Angela (2016), Hunting Giants (2017), Brunch Queen (2018),[9] The Day Don Died (2018) and Dear Reader (2021).
Horlor and Adams premiered their debut feature documentary Someone Like Me at the 2021 Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival,[10] where it won a Rogers Audience Award and finished as a Top 5 Audience Favourite for the festival.[11] Produced by the National Film Board of Canada, the film follows eleven strangers from Vancouver's LGBTQ community over fifteen months after they unite to help a queer youth escape life-threatening violence in Uganda.[12]
It was later a finalist for Best British Columbia Film at the Vancouver Film Critics Circle Awards 2021,[13] and a nominee for the DGC Allan King Award for Best Documentary Film at the 2021 Directors Guild of Canada awards.[14]
Horlor and Adams' 2023 documentary Satan Wants You looks into the Canadian origins of North America's moral Satanic panic over alleged satanic cults and ritual abuse in the 1980s and early 1990s, particularly the discredited 1980 bestseller Michelle Remembers.[15]