Totems

Retake - Making the World's First Haida-Language Feature Film

Retake follows the journey of co-directors Gwaai Edenshaw (Haida) and Helen Haig-Brown (Tsilhqot'in) as they work to produce The Edge of the Knife, a feature-length film told entirely in the critically-endangered Haida language. The film tells the story of a traditional Haida legend, showcasing the Haida culture in many ways that have never been seen by a broad audience.

Salesman

This documentary from Albert and David Maysles follows the bitter rivalry of four door-to-door salesmen working for the Mid-American Bible Company: Paul "The Badger" Brennan, Charles "The Gipper" McDevitt, James "The Rabbit" Baker and Raymond "The Bull" Martos. Times are tough for this hard-living quartet, who spend their days traveling through small-town America, trying their best to peddle gold-leaf Bibles to an apathetic crowd of lower-middle-class housewives and elderly couples.

To the Orcas with Love

Stories of personal connections with orcas, beautiful cinematography featuring B.C’s resident orcas, and an evocative soundscape composed by Jeff Rona and Ben MacDougall provide an uplifting contrast to the environmental challenges we face. Inspired by elders including environmentalist and CBC Broadcaster, David Suzuki, whale researchers Alexandra Morton and Paul Spong, totem carver Wayne Alfred, and lifelong resident of the Broughton archipelago Billy Proctor, this film is anchored by Rob Stewart’s invitation to rise up and create the world we dream for ourselves. Viewers will come to understand the importance of the personal choices we make; it becomes clear that what we do to nature, we do to ourselves.

The Prince of Nothingwood

French documentarist Sonia Kronlund follows actor and director Salim Shaheen, an Afghan movie star who produced more than 110 low-budget movies in a country devastated by war.

Dealing Dogs

An undercover investigation of Martin Creek Kennel is carried out by the animal rights group Last Chance for Animals. The film documents the efforts of a young animal rights activist named "Pete" to both get hired by the Martin Creek Kennel and secure enough evidence to shut down owner C.C. Baird's violation-filled kennel.

An Intent to Enrich the Bare Mechanistic World

Prof. Petr Vopěnka is a worldwide famous Czech mathematician, author of many books concerning history of Maths, geometry above all. He is an original thinker, connecting mathematics with philosophy. He has become recognized by public because of invention of the biggest number (the so-called Vopěnka's cardinal) and thanks to being active in politics for two years - he was the first Minister of Education after 1989 revolution in Czechoslovakia. His portrait works mostly with non-synchron images trying to find the abstract qualities in the pieces of prof. Vopěnka's everyday reality, that should inspire the spectator for concentrated interpretation of the words that are mapping personality of Vopěnka - mathematician.

Naked Spaces: Living Is Round

Shot with stunning elegance and clarity, NAKED SPACES explores the rhythm and ritual of life in the rural environments of six West African countries (Mauritania, Mali, Burkino Faso, Togo, Benin and Senegal). The nonlinear structure of NAKED SPACES challenges the traditions of ethnographic filmmaking, while sensuous sights and sounds lead the viewer on a poetic journey to the most inaccessible parts of the African continent: the private interaction of people in their living spaces.

Le Cinéma de grand-père

Remarkable life story of Henri Diamant-Berger, a director and screenwriter whose devotion to cinema led him to collaborate with some of the greatest actors and filmmakers of his time.

Des poules et des grosses voitures

Hobbyhorse Revolution

A film about teenagers with growing pains, who discover their own voice and talent through riding and grooming toy horses.

Sound and Chaos: The Story of BC Studio

For over 30 years, Martin Bisi has been recording music from his studio in Gowanus, Brooklyn. He has worked with many influential musicians, including Sonic Youth, Swans, Herbie Hancock, Brian Eno and the Dresden Dolls. Now though, he finds himself squeezed in by the approaching gentrification of his neighborhood.

The World According to Monsanto

Monsanto is the world leader in genetically modified organisms (GMOs), as well as one of the most controversial corporations in industrial history. This century-old empire has created some of the most toxic products ever sold, including polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and the herbicide Agent Orange. Based on a painstaking investigation, The World According to Monsanto puts together the pieces of the company’s history, calling on hitherto unpublished documents and numerous first-hand accounts.

Hold on Tight

A short documentary exploring the ways LGBT couples show affection, and how small interactions like holding hands in public can carry, not only huge personal significance, but also the power to create social change.

Doctors, Liars, and Women: AIDS Activists Say No to Cosmo

Outraged by the controversial January, 1988 article in Cosmopolitan magazine, the women in the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power, (Act Up, New York), organized the first AIDS demonstration focused on women. Doctors, Liars and Women:AIDS Activists Say No To Cosmo not only documents the efforts of the Women's Committee to organize this protest, it also serves as a how-to-guide for direct action.

History and Memory: For Akiko and Takashige

This film is a poetic composition of recorded history and non-recorded memory. Filmmaker Rea Tajiri’s family was among the 120,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans who were imprisoned in internment camps after the attack on Pearl Harbor. And like so many who were in the camps, Tajiri’s family wrapped their memories of that experience in a shroud of silence and forgetting. This film raises questions about collective history – questions that prompt Tajiri to daringly re-imagine and re-create what has been stolen and what has been lost.

The Alexander Ball

The Alexander Ball is an observational documentary extravaganza celebrating Samoan-Māori-Australian trans woman of colour, Ella Ganza, and the Meanjin (Brisbane) ballroom scene, as she and her ballroom family prepare for one of the biggest pride events of the year: The Alexander Ball.

Manufacturing Dissent

"Michael Moore doesn't like documentaries. That's why he doesn't make them." A documentary that looks to distinguish what's fact, fiction, legend, and otherwise as a camera crew trails Michael Moore as he tours with his film, Fahrenheit 9/11.

Shakespeare and Victor Hugo's Intimacies

Documentary about a lodging house, owned by Rosa Carbajal, at the corner of Shakespare and Víctor Hugo streets.

Pretty Bloody: The Women of Horror

Pretty Bloody: The Women of Horror is a television documentary film that premiered on the Canadian cable network Space on February 25, 2009. The hour-long documentary examines the experiences, motivations and impact of the increasing number of women engaged in horror fiction, with producers Donna Davies and Kimberlee McTaggart of Canada's Sorcery Films interviewing actresses, film directors, writers, critics and academics. The documentary was filmed in Toronto, Canada; and in Los Angeles, California and New York City, New York in the US.

A Better Man

Following a series of intimate conversations between a former couple who lived through two years of domestic abuse, A Better Man infuses new energy and possibility into the movement to end violence against women.