Social & External
This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.
A vibrant kaleidoscopic tribute to the guitar that meshes dance, mime, visual art, and virtuoso performances to create a spectacular yet intimate celebration of the instrument. For one exciting week the city of Toronto plays host to the International Guitar Festival. The streets echo with the sounds of the instrument as the great masters from every tradition gather to play for each other -- John Williams from England, Leo Brouwer from Cuba (classical), Turibio Santos from Brazil (folk), Vladimir Mikulka from Czechoslovakia (avant-garde), Rik Emmett and Kim Mitchell from Canada, Steve Morse from the USA (rock).
Every winter for decades, the Northwest Territories, in the Canadian Far North, changes its face. While the landscape is covered with snow and lakes of a thick layer of ice, blocking land transport, ice roads are converted to frozen expanses as far as the eye can see.
A retrospective documentary on 9/11 in connection with the 2001 Toronto International Film Festival.
Canadian director Catherine Annau's debut work is a documentary about the legacy of Pierre Trudeau, the long-running Prime Minister of Canada, who governed during the 1970s. The film focuses particularly on Trudeau's goal of creating a thoroughly bilingual nation. Annau interviews eight people in their mid-30s on both sides of the linguistic divide. One tells of her life growing up in a community of hard-core Quebec separatists, while another, a yuppie from Toronto, recalls believing as a child that people in Montreal got drunk and had sex all day long. Annau has all of the interviewees discuss how Trudeau's policies affected their lives and their perceptions of the other side, in this issue that strikes to the heart of Canada's national identity.
Since the late 18th century American legal decision that the business corporation organizational model is legally a person, it has become a dominant economic, political and social force around the globe. This film takes an in-depth psychological examination of the organization model through various case studies. What the study illustrates is that in the its behaviour, this type of "person" typically acts like a dangerously destructive psychopath without conscience. Furthermore, we see the profound threat this psychopath has for our world and our future, but also how the people with courage, intelligence and determination can do to stop it.
After years of preparation, a team of highly motivated Quebeckers set out on one of the longest wilderness expeditions ever documented. Stage one involves skiing in relentless polar conditions from Ellesmere Island to the Northwest Passage where the challenge was reaching the mainland. Cue canoes for a 2000km journey across Nunavut and NWT until they reach the first dirt road available where bikes are waiting to be pedalled 4000km to Point Pelee in Ontario.
This feature-length documentary brings together six of the rare television interviews given by Gilles Groulx between 1966 and 1983. Through these interviews, the filmmaker's ethical and aesthetic concerns are revealed. A striking coherence emerges in his thinking regarding his conception of cinema and the role the filmmaker should play in his culture and society.
Snowflakes at the End of the World offers a meditation on the beauty and ugliness of Montreal winter, and invites critical reflection on the relationship between humans and nature.
Documentary about filmmaker Bonnie Ammaaq's memories of life on Baffin Island, where her family moved for eleven years during her childhood from the hamlet of Igloolik to return to the traditional Inuit way of life.
Ten years after an enormous open-pit gold mine began operations in Malartic, the hoped-for economic miracle is nothing more than a mirage. Filmmaker Nicolas Paquet explores the glaring contrast between the town’s decline and the wealth of the mining company, along with the mechanisms of an opaque decision-making system in which ordinary people have little say. Part anthropological study, part investigation into the corridors of power, Malartic addresses the fundamental issue of sustainable and fair land management.
Wisconsin's tribe's ongoing fight to protect Lake Superior for future generations. "Bad River" shows the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa's long history of activism and resistance in the context of continuing legal battles with Enbridge Energy over its Line 5 oil pipeline. The Line 5 pipeline has been operating on 12 miles of the Bad River Band's land with expired easements for more than a decade. The Band and the Canadian company have been locked in a legal battle over the pipeline since 2019.
One of the earliest Cirque du Soleil releases, filmed during a tour of the troupe's native Canada in 1986 and filled with their trademark costumes, music and extraordinary feats.
This short film from 1946 presents an outline of the fur trade's history and the commercial use of fur in Canada. A thirst for fur by the kings and courts of the Old World positioned the fur trade as part of the country's industrial economy. Fur farming and conservation became increasingly important, although the lonely life of the trapper remained the same. This film offers a view of both.
An examination of the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women, the film explores the reasons why Indigenous women are uniquely vulnerable to violence by juxtaposing the stories of some missing or murdered women with the personal testimonies of women who are doing activism on the issue and women who have personally survived incidents of violence.
This short documentary shows the reactions of European immigrants as they land in Halifax at the beginning of the 1960s. From the port, we follow them on a snowy journey by train to Montreal.
The film explores key moments in the history of the Expos as well as the relentless efforts to bring major league baseball to Montreal. Continuation of the work released in 2003.
