
This documentary features the story of Jules Paivio, the last living Canadian volunteer of the infamous Mackenzie-Papineau Battallion of the “International Brigades”. When Jules left from his home near Port Arthur (Thunder Bay), Ontario, his father, a famous Finnish poet, wrote a lasting lament: “To My Son In Spain”. In 1936-37, 1700 Canadians volunteered to fight with the Spanish people against a fascist coup d’etat led by elements of the Spanish Army. Backed by Musselini and Hitler, the fascists were bent on overthrowing Spain’s democratically elected socialist government and replacing it with military and church rule. It could be argued this conflict marked the true beginning of what would become World War II.


Narrator
Self, Spanish Civil War veteran
Self, author of 'Renegades: Canadians in the Spanish Civil War'

To My Son in Spain: Finnish Canadians in the Spanish Civil War
This documentary features the story of Jules Paivio, the last living Canadian volunteer of the infamous Mackenzie-Papineau Battallion of the “International Brigades”. When Jules left from his home near Port Arthur (Thunder Bay), Ontario, his father, a famous Finnish poet, wrote a lasting lament: “To My Son In Spain”. In 1936-37, 1700 Canadians volunteered to fight with the Spanish people against a fascist coup d’etat led by elements of the Spanish Army. Backed by Musselini and Hitler, the fascists were bent on overthrowing Spain’s democratically elected socialist government and replacing it with military and church rule. It could be argued this conflict marked the true beginning of what would become World War II.
2009-05-30
0
To My Son
In Garcia Lorca's mother tongue, death is a woman: "la muerte". Daniel slips into the role of "death as a female" and speaks before a video camera on the life and death of the famous Spanish poet. Then the story begins.
4.07 female riders, 1 van, 15 days, 4,300km, 416 GB of raw material… culminating in one video, divided into four chapters. The film documents the adventure of the trip, portraying the girls, their lifestyle and their passion for longboard.
0.0Luis Bunuel, the father of cinematic Surrealism, made his film debut with 'Un Chien Andalou' in 1929 working closely with Salvador Dali. Considered one of the finest and controversial filmmakers with, 'L’Age d’Or' (1930), attacking the church and the middle classes. He won many awards including Best Director at Cannes for 'Los Olvidados' (1950), and the coveted Palme d’Or for 'Viridiana' (1961), which had been banned in his native Spain. His career moved to France with 'The Diary of a Chambermaid' with major stars such as Jeanne Moreau and Catherine Deneuve.
Their names are Chorowicz, Cyroulnik, Glichtzman, Feldhandler... They were born in France, after the second world war. Their families came from Central and Eastern Europe in the 20s and 30s, fleeing antisemitism and poverty. After the Holocaust, they grew up among ghosts, between anger, a desire for vengeance and a will to change the world. In the 60s and 70s, they became activists. Through their personal stories and the tale of their internationalist and antifascist struggle, the movie shows the audacity of those years of dissent.
6.0In their spare time, after their studies or their work, children and adolescents between the ages of eight and sixteen meet at the School of Bullfighting in Madrid to learn the Art of Cúchares: Torear. In their stomachs there is no hunger as in the past, their dreams do not lie in having a farmhouse and being famous. Their only dreams are to be in front of a bull, animal with which death goes, fact of which they are fully aware, as their teachers continually remind them. These, retired bullfighters, some by age, others by force and all with their bodies full of scars produced by the horns of a bull. The nude bullfighting scene is fascinating without being exploitive, and it serves as an analogy for the vulnerability these young bullfighters have when in the ring with the bulls.
4.0The concept for the film was developed based on sociological research conducted as part of the Youth Subcultures conference in collaboration with the Institute of Sociology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. The film’s core value lies in its ability to provide an inside look at selected subcultures, achieving an exceptional level of engagement with their members. The filmmakers managed to break through the participants' initial reluctance to openly discuss their experiences. The documentary directly addresses key aspects of these subcultures, including drugs, faith, and personal beliefs. It focuses on six specific groups: the techno scene, graffiti artists, antifascists, religiously oriented youth, skinheads, and young people inspired by Eastern spirituality. The film includes footage from illegal rave parties, graffiti sessions, and other underground activities. Overall, the documentary serves as an insightful map of Bratislava’s contemporary alternative scene.
10.0Tito del Amo, a passionate 72-year-old researcher, takes the final step to unravel the enigma about the alleged Spanish origin of the American cartoonist Walt Disney, making the same journey that his supposed mother made to give him up for adoption in Chicago. A journey that begins in Mojácar, Almería, Spain, and ends in New York. An exciting adventure, like Alicia's through the looking glass, to discover what is truth and what is not, with an unexpected result.
7.0A low-intensity war is being fought on the streets of Europe and the aim is on fascism. This critically acclaimed documentary takes us behind the masks of the militants called antifascists. In 2013 a group of armed nazis attacks a peaceful demonstration in Stockholm where several people are injured. In Greece the neo-nazi party Golden Dawn becomes the third largest in the election and in Malmö the activist Showan Shattak and his friends are attacked by a group of nazis with knives and he ends up in a coma. In this portrait of the antifascists in Greece and Sweden we get to meet key figures that explain their view on their radical politics but also to question the level their own violence and militancy.
5.0Documentary produced by Falange and edited in Berlin, in response to the international success of the Republican production "Spain 1936" (Le Chanois, 1937).
0.0The young farmer Aalami leaves his family to find work elsewhere. He gets to know the country and its people, customs and traditions at Küste in North Africa: Market life in Tetuan, the art of craftsmanship, the life of the Moors, dances and festivities in honour of the caliph, white mosques, the call of the muezzin of the minaret and the music of the shepherd flutes. Aalami also follows Franco's call and flies from Morocco to Spain to fight at Bürgerkrieg. In the end Aalami comes back to his wife and children.
4.7Footage filmed in Spain, subjected a new visual effects process. Deslaw devoted himself to the discovery of a new machine that enabled film to be developed while using a new method called solarisation.
10.0SINOPSIS / SYNOPSIS Every year in Spain, some 16,000 Fiestas are organized, during which animals are used. Honoring the Holy Virgin and the Patron Saints, and with the blessing of religious and political authorities, entire towns -including children- are involved in celebrations of unbelievable cruelty. 60,000 animals are hence abused each year during these “Fiestas of Blood”.
5.0In 1939, just finished the Spanish Civil War, Spanish republican photographer Francesc Boix escapes from Spain; but is captured by the Nazis in 1940 and imprisoned in the Mauthausen concentration camp, in Austria, a year later. There, he works as a prisoner in the SS Photographic Service, hiding, between 1943 and 1945, around 20,000 negatives that later will be presented as evidence during several trials conducted against Nazi war criminals after World War II.
7.1An exploration —manipulated and staged— of life in Las Hurdes, in the province of Cáceres, in Extremadura, Spain, as it was in 1932. Insalubrity, misery and lack of opportunities provoke the emigration of young people and the solitude of those who remain in the desolation of one of the poorest and least developed Spanish regions at that time.
7.5When looking at Pedro Almodóvar’s filmography, it becomes evident that women are everywhere; in fact, his work revolves around them. His divas are the best to create a real portrait of Almodóvar and evoke the emotional power of his films. These women are the ideal observers of a cinematic career that, from La Mancha to Hollywood, has changed the image of Spain in the world.
5.5A serious crisis has shaken Spain since the referendum on self-determination and the proclamation of the independence of Catalonia by the government of Carles Puigdemont, bold actions firmly fought by the Spanish government by applying the constitutional article that allows it to place a region under guardianship. While Spain is on the verge of implosion, Europe is holding its breath.
5.0Carmen's life has been a quixotic comedy; surviving the war, becoming a nun, getting divorced in a conservative society, and having numerous lovers, always defying the rules. Now, at 86, she is planning her suicide. The film follows her final days, exploring her bond with her adopted son, as well as her journey to face death on her own terms.
7.5The life story of Vicente Miguel Carceller (1890-1940), a Spanish editor committed to freedom who, through his weekly magazine La Traca, connected with the common people while maintaining a dangerous pulse with the powerful.