Women Don't Cycle (2022)

Not Bad for a Girl

A documentary on women musicians of the 1990s from the indie rock music genre, grunge and riot grrrl including Hole, Babes in Toyland, L7 and more.

Step Up and Be Vocal

Interviews from 1999, with some queer artists, activists and bands about queer punk, feminist concepts and actions. Filmed during a trip to San Francisco.

Escape the Corset

During the Joseon Dynasty, hair that was black and rich, like mud, was a prerequisite for a beauty, while the hair of a woman who was short and stiff was described as negative and ugly. In 1920, the new woman was called Modan (毛斷). Short hair had a strong meaning for women to challenge the established system. Now in 2019, women also cut their hair. It is a movement that rejects the social definition of “feminine”, escaping “Corset” movement.

Wild Women

At the beginning of winter, a filmmaker retires for six months to a hermit's cabin in the middle of the forest, cut off from the world and its means of communication. Through the words of four women she has filmed previously, all of whom have dedicated their lives to different forms of spirituality, she embarks on a mysterious inner adventure, on the edge of solitude and nature. A journey that invites us to connect with the world in a different way.

El laberinto de las lunas

A film about Karla Ojeda and Maira Ramírez, two transvestites going through adoption, and Gabriela Mansilla, mother of a trans girl. Their stories are intertwined with songs and poems by Susy Shock, a trans artist, poet and writer.

What Will I Be?

Vancouver s two leading authorities on sexism in the school system, Linfa Shuto and Reua Dexter, relate their opinions on the problem and some solutions that they are working on. The tape also includes a short historical look at women s position in education and a critical discussion on sex stereotype roles by Grade 6 students.

Pornography: A Respectable Lie

A video essay using images and interviews to critically explore the history and current role of pornography.

bell hooks: Cultural Criticism & Transformation

bell hooks is one of America's most accessible public intellectuals. In this two-part video, extensively illustrated with many of the images under analysis, she makes a compelling argument for the transformative power of cultural criticism.

Fashion As A Social Control

A look at the ways fashion has been used to socially control women in Canada, both historically and in the 20th century.

The Women's Suffrage Movement In Canada

Moira Mulholland narrates the history of (European) women's rights through images, interviews, and performances focusing in on the Women's Suffrage Movement in Canada.

Rock Chicks

Rock'n'roll was a man's world they say. The film documents the often ignored female impact on rock's history, from the groundbreaking guitar stylings of Memphis Minnie and Sister Rosetta to the gnarly singing of Big Mama Thornton. Musicians as different as Suzi Quatro and Kristin Hersh tell about their experiences on and off the grid of stardom and the music industry.

Rape Is A Social Disease

A presentation of the historical process of rape, followed by a more recent approach of current studies that reinforce ÒRape Reliefs own statistics.

Women Composers

Female composers' names are mentioned throughout history.

After Winter Comes Spring

A locomotive journey traversing the North to the South of the German Democratic Republic on the eve of its dissolution. Labourers, punks, mothers, intellectuals, young and old are implored to reflect on their life choices, the sacrifices they've made, and their place in the world. Despite everything, hope persists.

Alaska-Patagonie, La grande traversée

Plot unavailable

Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing

Shut Up and Sing is a documentary about the country band from Texas called the Dixie Chicks and how one tiny comment against President Bush dropped their number one hit off the charts and caused fans to hate them, destroy their CD’s, and protest at their concerts. A film about freedom of speech gone out of control and the three girls lives that were forever changed by a small anti-Bush comment

DIYSEX

DIYSEX is a film that reflects on the use of the image and the language of mainstream pornography, and wonders how far this use can transcend when making your porn film.

Karen: Women In Sports

Guest speakers from "Women In Motion" Conference, Vancouver, B.C. 1975.

Men's Madness - The Myth of Male Reason

Provocative, feminist critique of man’s technological progress.

Beyond Borders: Arab Feminists Talk About Their Lives... East and West

In the Arab world, women are fighting a two-front war against repressive internal constraints and intrusive Western interference. In this program, a feminist delegation composed of author Nawal Saadawi and other renowned activists from the Middle East and North Africa gathers at the UN, on college campuses, and in church basements to speak out about deterioration of women's rights in the Arab states in an effort to heighten awareness of the Arab feminist struggle for equality--and the effects of U.S. foreign policy on their efforts.

She's Beautiful When She's Angry

A documentary that resurrects the buried history of the outrageous, often brilliant women who founded the modern women's movement from 1966 to 1971.

Bloodroot

Douglas Tirola’s latest documentary traces the evolution of feminism through the lives of two exceptional women, Noel and Selma, who came of age in the ’50s when women were relegated to the roles of wives and mothers. During the height of the women’s movement, Noel, a former teen model and Playboy bunny, meets and falls in love with Selma, a tough, outspoken radical feminist. Both women choose to leave their comfortable, yet unsatisfying marriages and children to come out as lesbians. The two share a love of cooking and gardening and, in the ’70s, open Bloodroot, the first vegetarian collective restaurant and bookstore in Bridgeport, Connecticut. By interspersing archival footage and clips from The Stepford Wives, Tirola affectionately chronicles the cultural shifts of the last 40 years as Noel and Selma attempt to keep Bloodroot open as an indispensable gathering spot for progressive women.

Moi, agricultrice

Plot unavailable

Town Bloody Hall

Norman Mailer and a panel of feminists — Jacqueline Ceballos, Germaine Greer, Jill Johnston, and Diana Trilling — debate the issue of Women's Liberation.

A virxe roxa

Plot unavailable

I Am FEMEN

Oxana is a woman, a fighter, an artist. As a teenager, her passion for iconography almost inspires her to join a convent, but in the end she decides to devote her talents to the Femen movement. With Anna, Inna and Sasha, she founds the famous feminist group which protests against the regime and which will see her leave her homeland, Ukraine, and travel all over Europe. Driven by a creative zeal and a desire to change the world, Oxana allows us a glimpse into her world and her personality, which is as unassuming, mesmerising and vibrant as her passionate artworks.

Radical Harmonies

Interviews and performance footage are used to provide an overview of the women's music scene.

Teaches of Peaches

Peaches - artist, feminist, rock star. She has been challenging gender stereotypes for over 20 years and is on par with the icons of the pop and rock world. With exclusive private archive material and current footage of preparations and concerts of her 2022 jubilee tour “20 Years of Teaches of Peaches”, we learn how the Canadian Merrill Nisker became the internationally celebrated musician and electro-clash icon Peaches.

All the Women I Know

From the personal to the political, the experiences of diverse women speak of how masculinized and violent the streets still are nowadays. In three insightful conversations with female friends, collaborators and high school students, the director looks for a discourse about fear that is not fearsome, a discourse on violence that is not violent. Direct cinema, horizontal process, self-criticism and narrative breaks. Mostly, this is a tale of universal sorority.

Make Love Not Porn

Against the stereotypes of the “ideal” woman and the symbols of Pornography, the women in the works of Greek comic artist Stavros Kioutsioukis preserve their personality: they are the girls next door who try and get their rights in Happiness and Love.

Kathleen Shannon: On Film, Feminism & Other Dreams

With quiet intelligence and wry humour, retired documentary filmmaker Kathleen Shannon takes us through the arc of her life and career. Beginning with childhood, moving through her formative years, to her overwhelming desire to give women a chance to tell their stories, this film paints a vibrant portrait of one woman who blazed the way. It's a story of struggle, persistence, and success… and of course, of the NFB's Studio D.

To Spanish Women. María Lejárraga

A fictionalised documentary that tells the story of María Lejárraga, writer and pioneer of feminism in Spain during the 1920s, whose work was produced under the name of her husband, the theatre impresario Gergorio Marinez Sierra. Lejárraga was the most prolific Spanish female playwright of all time. She is the author of works such as "Cancion de cuna", as well as a member of parliament for the Second Republic and founder of pioneering projects for women's rights and freedoms.

!W.A.R.: !Women Art Revolution

Through intimate interviews, provocative art, and rare, historical film and video footage, this feature documentary reveals how art addressing political consequences of discrimination and violence, the Feminist Art Revolution radically transformed the art and culture of our times.

Poly Styrene: I Am a Cliché

The death of punk icon and X-Ray Spex front-woman Poly Styrene sends her daughter on a journey through her mother's archives in this intimate documentary.

Let Us Be Seen

How do feminist and queer identities operate in contemporary Belfast? Let Us Be Seen is a documentary film that presents the work and ideas of individuals on the ground in Belfast, who have campaigned tirelessly for change and continue to do so. On 21st October 2019, abortion was decriminalised and same-sex marriage legalised in Northern Ireland. This important law change however has shed light on more nuanced barriers facing people locally.