Genres: narrative

  • Stargaze

    Toronto, 1952. 18-year-old Derek undergoes painful aversion therapy designed to “cure” his homosexuality. After the quiet literal shock of his first session, he leaves the hospital, finding refuge beneath the artificial skies of a planetarium. Eventually, he flees Toronto altogether, heading back to his small-town home. His doctor quickly finds him and threatens to notify the police if Derek doesn’t return. So again, Derek escapes, this time to the Peterborough Exhibition (which has advertised their own planetarium), in the hope of recreating the wonder and transportation he felt earlier.

  • Fires of Joanna, The

    Set against the bleak landscape of Depression-era Eastern Ontario, this film tells the story of Joanna McVeigh and her struggle to endure a harsh and unforgiving life. Epileptic since childhood and past the age of marriage, Joanna lives alone on a run-down farm with Frank, her alcoholic father. Bound by a promise to her dying mother and haunted by a dark and shameful childhood secret, Joanna illuminates her loneliness with secret imaginings and the pleasure of her one great gift, the ability to set fires with her mind. Joanna’s desire to break free from the confines of her lonely existence…

  • Are You There? Are You Listening?

    “A surreal dinner movie … not to be missed … goes beyond spaghetti, beyond goldfish, and yet again, beyond what some people may call good taste. Too strange to be successfully described on paper … the sets were neat-o, the acting perfect, and the total sound, dialogue and music was absolutely suited to the total ridiculousness.” – Elizabeth Weissman, The Link

  • MURDER and murder

    Mildred is a professor who has lived as a lesbian for as long as she can remember. Doris, a mother of grown children, is taking classes and is falling in love with a woman for the first time. From different backgrounds and circumstances, Mildred and Doris try to carve out a life together. The film investigates the pleasures, uncertainties and ambiguities of late-life emotional attachment and lesbian identity within the confines of a culture that glorifies youth and heterosexual romance. The story is haunted by the ghosts of Doris’ mother Jenny and an 18-year-old Mildred. Running parallel is a commentary…

  • Offering, The

    This is a film about the progression and the passing of life. Without dialogue and music, the story centres on the evolution of love and friendship between a Japanese monk and the young novice who has come into his life, from their initial encounter to their final parting. In rejecting his own faith and drowning in self-doubts, the novice leaves his life of unfulfilled potentials. The passing of life is demarcated by the progression of seasons. The only force that propels the narrative forward is the poetic seasonal variations in nature. The passing of life, in this life, in this…

  • Badger’s Paw, The

    A contemporary fairy tale. Robert, an aspiring filmmaker, isn’t getting laid. His live-in lover of three years, Susan, has lost her desire for him. He attempts to rectify the situation by employing a Celtic anti-frigidity spell. Susan becomes more mysterious, inspiring jealousy in her spouse. Desperate to find out whether Susan is cheating, Robert places her under video surveillance. Upon viewing the footage he sees his lover making love to an elderly man. What Robert discovers, at a devastating personal cost, is the impossibility of ever conrolling or even knowing another person.

  • Lesbian Tapes (After Ilene Segalove), The

    A dyke whines about her boredom with vanilla sex and her lover offers suggestions to solve the problem. “The Lesbian Tapes (After Ilene Segalove)” is a remake of an early 1974 black-and-white video called “The Mom Tapes” by Ms. Segalove, in which Ilene is whining to her mother about her boredom. Her mother offers suggestions of things Ilene might do instead.

  • Death Threat

    A comic farce about Yasmeen Siddiqui, a young Muslim woman. She has just written her first novel and can’t understand why no less than fifty-nine publishers would reject a romantic epic like “The Unquenched Wench of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.”

  • Makbul – His Favoured One

    An historic film, set in the 16th century. There are two characters, the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent and Irbahim the Makbul, his favoured one. Ibrahim, as the chief caretaker of the royal chambers, comes into the room where the Sultan is awaiting him and brings the neccessary material for foot washing. The royal feet are washed and the toenails cut. These functions are practiced as a silent homo-erotic ceremony. History in “Makbul” is subjectively read. “Makbul” is a film about power and passion. It aims at questioning power. Who is more powerful, the sultan or the slave that he…

  • Sabor a Mi (Savour Me)

    A sensual and erotic short drama about secrets and desires. By covertly watching the most intimate moments of each other’s lives, two neighbours discover their mutual longing for each other. Selected screenings: Vancouver International Film Festival; Montreal World Festival; Northwest Film & Video Festival