Watch: NFB Short ‘Hairy Legs’ Brings a Funny Feminist Awakening to Streaming

Following a successful international festival tour, director Andrea Dorfman’s humorous and heartfelt autobiographical animated short Hairy Legs is now streaming in Canada and the U.S. Produced by the National Film Board of Canada, the film is available to watch for free across nfb.ca, YouTube and NFB Apps.

Synopsis: Hairy Legs, an animated short film, documents a 13-year-old girl’s small yet life-changing act of rebellion on the road to womanhood and feminism. Deciding not to shave her legs led filmmaker Andrea Dorfman to question and ultimately defy society’s expectations.

With charm, warmth and humor, Hairy Legs captures the universality of girls exploring gender, curiosity and freedom as they evolve from spending exuberant, carefree days on their bicycles to facing and defying stereotypes.

The 16’56” short is crafted in drawn and painted animation as well as stop motion with 2D puppets. The film was produced by Liz Cowie and Rohan Fernando for the NFB.

“I can’t speak for anyone else’s experience of being a woman, or any gender, but what I went through, and the culminating epiphany I had, led me to identify with the idea of personal freedom and how vital it is to locate instances where I feel it. Through the telling of this story, I could see that I felt free when I was doing something that allowed me to forget myself, specifically when I’d lose myself in making art or doing something physical — the things that I loved,” Dorfman shared in an interview with NFB. “…There is freedom in determining who we are allowed to be. Who we must be.”

Hairy Legs has been recognized with the Guy L. Coté Grand Prize for Best Animated Film by Montreal’s Sommets du cinéma d’animation (2025), the Diversity Award from SPARK Animation Festival in Vancouver (2024) and an Honorable Mention for Ottawa International Animation Festival’s DGC Award for Best Canadian Animation. The short was also included in the Best of Annecy (presented in partnership with WIA) program at Animation Is Film in L.A., and has been an official selection of festivals including Annecy, DOC NYC and Anima.

Halifax filmmaker Andrea Dorfman has written and directed many award-winning documentaries, features and animated films, including the Emmy-nominated Flawed (2010), Big Mouth (2012) and feature doc The Girls of Meru (2018). Dorfman’s video collaborations with poet-musician Tanya Davis, How to Be Alone (2010) and How to Be at Home (2020), became YouTube sensations.