Genres: documentary

  • Paper Age and Ancient Flight, The

    It was in Egypt 4000 years ago when mankind first developed the aircraft. Using the pyramids as launch pads, ancient civilizations had mastered the air before the invention of the wheel. For over a thousand years cultures around the world used papyrus, or paper, to construct simple yet effective means to travel through air. Is it possible that this age of paper thrived for so long, but has remained virtually unnoticed? In in-depth interviews, William Deiches describes how he rediscovered this ancient technology. While researching pyramid contruction, he stumbled unexpectedly onto secret plans for hot air balloons, gliders and hang…

  • Past History

    Adventure, romance, politics and exile are themes in this unique combination of live action, archival photographs, and animation. Stories of people long ago and far away are brought to life, tracing a history of the effects of progress and development in Latin America on past and present generations.

  • Paul Horn in China

    The famous Canadian jazz flautist visits China with a tour group and finds himself on stage before an audience of five thousand. This remarkable trip, full of both Chinese music and the unmistakable melodies of Paul Horn, is captured on film by the filmmakers who travelled with him.

  • People in Black, The

    A lyrical and gentle protrait of a traditional Saskatchewan Hutterite community. Luminous slow motion images of this dignified people performing their daily chores are accompanied by a soundtrack of Hutterite songs and prayers. They can be found in scattered retreats across the grasslands of our three prairie provinces and five American states. Study guide available.

  • Perestroyka

    Shot in the spring of 1992 in St. Petersberg and Moscow, “Perestroyka” is a collage of conversations with Russian people, mostly artists, about life in Russia and about their hopes and fears for the future of their country. The position of artists and filmmakers in contemporary Russian society, the position of women in the new Russia, problems of unemployment, the politics of sexuality, and the erosion of traditional values are debated and discussed. Appearing in the tape are (in order of appearance): Sergey Letou Jazz Band, Vladik Mamyshev Monroe (performance artist), Bella Matveeva (painter), Alexandr Sakurov (film director), Liubov Polga…

  • Performance by Jack Smith, A

    In October of 1984, the highly acclaimed New York artist, Jack Smith, came to Toronto for a week long performance/Halloween ritual at the Funnel Experimental Film Theatre. This performance, true to Smithesque form, went by three different titles: “Dance of the Sacred Foundation Application,” “Brassieres of Uranus,” and “Impacted Croissants From Outer Space.” Accompanied by the music of Yma Sumac, this short piece remains the last film documentation of this historic event.

  • Perfumed Nightmare

    “One of the year’s ten best films.” – J. Hoberman, Village Voice “There’s nothing even remotely nightmarish about ‘Perfumed Nightmare.’ It’s an enchanting and poignant experience, a totally original seriocomic creation with an infectious and exuberant energy. The film is a semi-autobiographical fable by a young Philippino named Kidlat Tahimik, about his awakening to, and reaction against, American cultural colonialism. Born in 1942 during the Occupation, Kidlat spent ‘the next 33 typhoon seasons in a cocoon of American dreams.’ This, then, is his perfumed nightmare: the lotus land of American technological promise. “In his primitive village he worships the heroism…

  • Pioneers of X-Ray Technology

    “In Ann Marie Fleming’s ‘Pioneers of X-Ray Technology’ (a film about Grandpa), super-8 home movies are only one part of the film’s cooly complex structure. The first time I saw ‘Pioneers’ it looked like an uncomplicated portrait of Fleming’s grandfather, Dr. Ernest To, who was a photographer, amateur filmmaker and Hong Kong radiologist. On second viewing, the film’s ambivalence towards its subject becomes clear. “Fleming (‘You Take Care Now,’ ‘New Shoes’) is known for the ‘quirkiness’ of her films, but she’s above all a brilliant editor, both cinematographically and conceptually. Like nearly all her films, ‘Pioneers’ benefits from remarkable compression.…

  • huit juillets / eight julys

    This experimental documentary explores intergenerational transmission through the story of Dolorès; almost a century of women’s history and Quebec history. Through intimate audio encounters, she invites us to relive her life in a non-chronological way, revealing her victories, her regrets, but above all the feminist roots of a woman who always wanted more than she was allowed to dream for. With a fiery character, a resilience tinged with optimism and a spirit of perpetual questioning, she offers us a retrospective on the last century marked by a quest for intellectual and financial independence. The image, for its part, is a…

  • FREE JOAN LITTLE

    Free Joan Little tells the story of the 1975 groundbreaking case of Joan Little (pronounced Jo-Ann), who was one of the first women in U.S history to be acquitted for using deadly force to resist sexual assault. Joan was a Black incarcerated woman in North Carolina who killed her white prison guard who was trying to rape her. Little’s murder trial became an international cause célèbre, uniting fractured social movements—Civil Rights activists, feminists, Black Power advocates, and death penalty opponents—in an unprecedented intersectional coalition that challenged systemic racism and sexism in the criminal justice system.