What remains of the 2012 Quebec student protests? Little has changed in the decade that ensued. Rodrigue Jean and Arnaud Valade exhume images of the battles, recorded live and relayed through the mass media, that flared up as anger and indignation went head-to-head with the rhetoric of power. Against these divisive images, the filmmakers overlay a historical perspective of the state and its police in Montreal, Quebec and Canada, delving into the roots of sanctioned violence. Their compelling glance at the past is, of course, a cry that continues to echo in the present day. While the voices have been silenced, revolt still brews. All it takes is a spark...
This feature-length documentary by Alanis Obomsawin examines the plight of Native people who come to Montreal searching for jobs and a better life. Often arriving without money, friends or jobs, a number of them quickly become part of the homeless population. Both dislocated from their traditional values and alienated from the rest of the population, they are torn between staying and returning home.
In the heart of the Boreal forest lives a family renowned as much for their gourmet forest pickings as for their life of self-sufficiency.
Through family archives, drawings, animations and performances that draw on her long experience with illness, Brigitte Lacasse takes an incisive, critical look at the Quebec health care system.
After the failed Umbrella Revolution in 2014, lives go back to normal, but the scenes of the great protest are like yesterday for Billy and Popsy, students in the University of Hong Kong who took part in the movement. One of them now becomes a student leader, while the other chooses a low-profile life as a private tutor. Amid the rapid social changes, when the Communist Beijing government is extending their influence to Hong Kong to take away the freedom and democracy, how would the youths see their future? Do they still see hopes, when both peaceful protests and radical actions seem to be futile?
When the Chinese Communist Party backtracks on its promise of autonomy to Hong Kong, teenager Joshua Wong decides to save his city. Rallying thousands of kids to skip school and occupy the streets, Joshua becomes an unlikely leader in Hong Kong and one of China’s most notorious dissidents.
A short documentary on the charms of cross-country skiing. Beyond the formal beauty of the images, there floats a certain nostalgia for unknown landscapes. Something rare that pushes the neophyte to want to follow these free men, on the white paths, on exhilarating walks, taking the time to look at the landscape. Film without words.
Focused on an inspiring and touching dialogue between Gilles Vigneault and Fred Pellerin, the documentary tells the story of Quebec by digging deep into an ancestral tradition etched into our cultural DNA: the production of maple syrup.
Through concerts and interviews, folk-progressive group Harmonium takes Quebec culture to California. This documentary full of colour and sound, filmed in California in 1978, recounts the ups and downs of the journey of the Quebec musical group Harmonium, who came to feel the pulse of Americans and see if culture, their culture, can succeed in crossing borders.
After crossing 11 countries irregularly to seek asylum in Canada, Peggy, Simon and their three children are waiting for the hearing that will determine whether they get refugee status or not. Having fled political repression in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the family tries to rebuild a peaceful life in Montreal, in spite of the constant threat of deportation. Between ghosts from the past, hopes for the future, a complex legal maze and seemingly endless trial, the film delves into the struggle of the Nkunga Mbala family to remain in Canada. Offering unprecedented access to their hearing before the Immigration and Refugee Board, the film unveils the opaque process of claiming asylum in Canada.
Since its adoption in June 1955 by the Congress movement, the Freedom Charter has been the key political document that acted as a beacon and source of inspiration in the liberation struggle against Apartheid. It was reputedly the main source that informed democratic South Africa’s liberal constitution and a constant reference point for the ruling African National Congress (ANC) and rival political parties that it spawned since 1994, all claiming the Freedom Charter’s legacy. Freedom Isn’t Free assesses the history and role of the charter, especially in relation to key political and socio-economic aspects of developments in South Africa up to the present period. It includes rare archival footage with interviews of a cross-section of outspoken influential South Africans.
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 documentary that explores what it means to be a young person in Quebec after the dissolution of the Quebec sovereignty movement.
This documentary focuses on the goose hunt, a ritual of central importance to the Cree people of the James Bay coastal areas. Not only a source of food, the hunt is also used to transfer Cree culture, skills, and ethics to future generations. Filmmaker Paul M. Rickard invites us along with his own family on a fall goose hunt, so that we can share in the experience.
This short film retraces the life of Herman Smith Johannsen – the man who introduced the sport of cross-country skiing to Canadians. From past to present, his life story is portrayed through pictures from sports newsreels, Norwegian archives and his family album. The film catches up with him at both the Canadian Ski Marathon, where he is the honoured guest, and on a return trip to his native Norway.