Return Home
HomePage
Overview
After the near death of her grandfather, Chinese Canadian filmmaker Michelle Wong embarks on a personal journey back home to her small town of St. Paul, Alberta to speak to her grandparents about their journey from China to Canada.
Release Date
1992-05-01
Average
10
Rating:
5.0 startsTagline
Genres
Languages:
EnglishKeywords
Similar Movies
Anvil! The Story of Anvil(en)
At 14, best friends Robb Reiner and Lips made a pact to rock together forever. Their band, Anvil, hailed as the "demi-gods of Canadian metal" influenced a musical generation that includes Metallica, Slayer, and Anthrax. Following a calamitous European tour, Lips and Robb, now in their fifties, set off to record their 13th album in one last attempt to fulfill their boyhood dreams.
Jeronimo(en)
Born to Korean immigrant parents freed from indentured servitude in early twentieth century Mexico, Jerónimo Lim Kim joins the Cuban Revolution with his law school classmate Fidel Castro and becomes an accomplished government official in the Castro regime, until he rediscovers his ethnic roots and dedicates his later life to reconstructing his Korean Cuban identity. After Jerónimo's death, younger Korean Cubans recognize his legacy, but it is not until they are presented with the opportunity to visit South Korea that questions about their mixed identity resurface.
A Matter of Time(en)
Kathryn Calder, one of the vocalists behind the Influential and successful indie band The New Pornographers, puts her life on hold when her mother is diagnosed with ALS. After moving back to her childhood home to care for her mother, she is inspired to record her first solo album, 'Are You My Mother?' there as a gift to her as she fights the disease. Old bandmates, friends, and a new extended family only recently discovered all join Kathryn in her and her mother's journey.
Home Feeling: Struggle for a Community(en)
This feature documentary takes us to the heart of the Jane-Finch "Corridor" in the early 1980s. Covering six square blocks in Toronto's North York, the area readily evokes images of vandalism, high-density subsidized housing, racial tension, despair and crime. By focusing on the lives of several of the residents, many of them black or members of other visible minorities, the film provides a powerful view of a community that, contrary to its popular image, is working towards a more positive future.
Wandering Marxwards(en)
A political and poetic wondering/wandering about the relevance and context of re-reading Marx 150 years after the publication of The Communist Manifesto
You Can't Do That on Film(en)
What happens when you travel to the birthplace of green slime? For an entire generation of classic Nickelodeon fans, it's like finding the Holy Grail.
The Great Buffalo Saga(en)
By the late 1800s the free-ranging buffalo of the western plains of North America were almost extinct. This documentary is the story of the buffalo's revival. Live action, eye-witness accounts and archival photos document our fascination with this ancient and legendary animal.
Spellbound(en)
This documentary follows 8 teens and pre-teens as they work their way toward the finals of the Scripps Howard national spelling bee championship in Washington D.C.
Quest(en)
For over a decade, this portrait of a North Philadelphia family and the creative sanctuary offered by their home music studio was filmed with vérité intimacy. The family's 10-year journey is an illumination of race and class in America, and it's a testament to love, healing and hope.
God Grew Tired of Us(en)
Filmmaker Christopher Quinn observes the ordeal of three Sudanese refugees -- Jon Bul Dau, Daniel Abul Pach and Panther Bior -- as they try to come to terms with the horrors they experienced in their homeland, while adjusting to their new lives in the United States.
H.A.G.S. (Have a Good Summer)(en)
A portrait of growing up told through filmmaker Sean Wang's middle school yearbook. Go Hornets.
Some Kind of Heaven(en)
Behind the gates of a palm-tree-lined fantasyland, three residents and one interloper at America’s largest retirement community strive to find happiness.
A Pinto for the Prince(en)
In 1977, Prince Charles was inducted as honorary chief of the Blood Indians on their reserve in southwestern Alberta. The ceremony, conducted in the great Circle of the Sun Dance, commemorated the centennial anniversary of the original signing of Treaty 7 by Queen Victoria.
Stone Street(en)
Stone Street documents the life and experiences of a Trinidadian diaspora family and their enduring connection to the long standing family home in Port of Spain. Through the intersecting journeys of this extended and extensive family, the filmmaker explores themes of home, belonging and identity in a life defined by the fragmentary nature of a migratory Caribbean culture. This experimental documentary combines a lyrical first person voice with a family archive of home made audio visual artifacts, interviews and events. As the documentary explores the fragmentary nature of Caribbean identity, it simultaneously celebrates the fragments of domestic memorializing found in home movies, videos and photographs. Stone Street uses these various forms to evoke the experience of a complex and diverse Caribbean and Caribbean diaspora identity.
Latvian Coyote(lv)
An absurd game of “finding happiness” is being played by local Latvian coyotes* and illegal immigrants on the Russian and the European Union border. It is a game with no winner – all participants are driven to play by the sense of despair. While one side leaves home and undertakes a perilous journey to the other side of the globe, hoping to spend the rest of their lives in a free country, the other side risks their freedom to earn a chance to stay right where they are, in their homeland. *coyote – someone who smuggles illegal immigrants
A Life Reimagined: The George Masa Story(en)
In 1915 a young, charismatic Japanese man with a mysterious past entered into the Appalachian culture of Asheville, North Carolina, is suspicioned a spy, targeted by the Klan, but perseveres with a passion for photography and the mountains he adopts, bringing to life Great Smoky Mountains National Park & the Appalachian Trail.
Paul Tomkowicz: Street Railway Switchman(en)
A self-narrated portrait of a Polish immigrant in Winnipeg whose unglamorous job keeping streetcar switches working reveals dignity, resilience, and pride in everyday labor.
Across This Land with Stompin' Tom Connors(en)
Stompin' Tom performs live at the Horseshoe Tavern on Queen St. in Toronto.
Recommendations Movies
Italianamerican(en)
Filmmaker Martin Scorsese interviews his mother and father about their life in New York and family history back in Sicily.
How the West Was Won(en)
The epic tale of the development of the American West from the 1830s through the Civil War to the end of the century, as seen through the eyes of one pioneer family.
Everything Everywhere All at Once(en)
An aging Chinese immigrant is swept up in an insane adventure, where she alone can save what's important to her by connecting with the lives she could have led in other universes.
Public Speaking(en)
Martin Scorsese’s portrait of writer and social commentator Fran Lebowitz, celebrated for her sharp wit and observations on modern life. Filmed at New York’s Waverly Inn and intercut with archival footage and interviews, the documentary captures Lebowitz’s distinctive worldview through her spontaneous monologues and public appearances.
A Decade Under the Influence(en)
A documentary examining the decade of the 1970s as a turning point in American cinema. Some of today's best filmmakers interview the influential directors of that time.
My Mom Jayne(en)
Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.
Beyond Infinity: Buzz and the Journey to Lightyear(en)
Explore the evolution of Buzz Lightyear from toy to human in the making of Pixar’s Lightyear. Dive into the origin and cultural impact of everyone’s favorite Space Ranger, the art of designing a new “human Buzz,” and the challenges faced by the Lightyear crew along the way.
Spider-Man: All Roads Lead to No Way Home(en)
JB Smoove and Martin Starr host a celebration of 20 years of "Spider-Man" movies, from the Sam Raimi trilogy to Marc Webb's movies and the trio from Jon Watts.
Ploey: You Never Fly Alone(en)
A plover chick has not learned to fly when his family migrates in the fall. He must survive the arctic winter, vicious enemies and himself in order to be reunited with his beloved one next spring.
Stories We Tell(en)
Canadian actress and filmmaker Sarah Polley investigates certain secrets related to her mother, interviewing a group of family members and friends whose reliability varies depending of their implication in the events, which are remembered in different ways; so a trail of questions remains to be answered, because memory is always changing and the discovery of truth often depends on who is telling the tale.
Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier(en)
Legends (and myths) from the life of famed American frontiersman Davy Crockett are depicted in this feature film edited from television episodes. Crockett and his friend George Russel fight in the Creek Indian War. Then Crockett is elected to Congress and brings his rough-hewn ways to the House of Representatives. Finally, Crockett and Russell journey to Texas and the last stand at the Alamo.
Two Rode Together(en)
Two tough westerners bring home a group of settlers who have spent years as Comanche hostages.
The Final: Attack on Wembley(en)
As England reach the final of the Euros at last, 6,000 ticketless football fans storm Wembley stadium, leaving destruction in their wake.
This Place Rules(en)
Acclaimed for his unfiltered reporting and deadpan humor, Andrew Callaghan brings his gonzo style reporting to the undercurrents that led to the January 6 Capitol Riot. As one of the best-known and hardest working journalists of his generation, the 25-year-old ventures on a wild RV journey through America to take the pulse of a divided nation.
Rio Grande(en)
Lt. Col. Kirby Yorke is posted on the Texas frontier to defend settlers against depredations of marauding Apaches. Col. Yorke is under considerable stress by a serious shortage of troops of his command. Tension is added when Yorke's son (whom he hasn't seen in fifteen years), Trooper Jeff Yorke, is one of 18 recruits sent to the regiment.
Hideaways(en)
The elder one of each generation in the Furlong family is equipped with an extraordinary capacity. James discovers the nature of his at the time of an accident which causes the death of his father and his grandmother. Haunted by this mysterious evil he hides in a forest not to harm anybody. A few years later, Mae also takes refuge it in the forest and meets James.
Hitchcock/Truffaut(en)
Filmmakers discuss the legacy of Alfred Hitchcock and the book “Hitchcock/Truffaut” (“Le cinéma selon Hitchcock”), written by François Truffaut and published in 1966.
Cimarron(en)
The epic story of a family involved in the Oklahoma Land Rush of April 22, 1889.