The Hockey Film (2023)

Nanook of the North

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.

Století Dynama

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Max Gimblett: Original Mind

Max Gimblett: Original Mind documents the life and process of eccentric, creative genius Max Gimblett. One of New Zealand’s most successful and internationally prominent living painters, Gimblett has been working in America since 1962. The filmmakers spent a week in Gimblett’s Soho loft where he and his devoted studio assistants generously revealed the techniques and philosophy behind his beautiful art.

The Corporation

Since the late 18th century American legal decision that the business corporation organizational model is legally a person, it has become a dominant economic, political and social force around the globe. This film takes an in-depth psychological examination of the organization model through various case studies. What the study illustrates is that in the its behaviour, this type of "person" typically acts like a dangerously destructive psychopath without conscience. Furthermore, we see the profound threat this psychopath has for our world and our future, but also how the people with courage, intelligence and determination can do to stop it.

Hot Air

In the years since New Zealand politicians began to grapple with climate change our greenhouse gas emissions have burgeoned. Alister Barry’s doco draws on TV archives and interviews with key participants to find out why.

Chosen One: Alexandre Daigle

Alexandre Daigle was a fairytale solution to all of the Ottawa Senators' many problems, a one-man dream come true for a team and a city that desperately needed goals and fans. The expectations were overwhelming – too much for Daigle to overcome. Now, decades later, following a turbulent career on the ice, Daigle reflects on how he steered the gap between people’s projections and his everyday existence, revealing the pressure and turmoil of not living up to the impossible hype.

We The North: From Prehistoric to Historic

A basketball team born out of an egg, in a hockey-crazed city, playing in a baseball stadium, fights for survival and ultimately conquers a nation and the league. This documentary offers an in-depth look at how a fledgling franchise transformed into a cultural phenomenon, uniting communities and reshaping Canada's identity.

Erebus: Operation Overdue

On 28 November 1979, an Air New Zealand jet with 257 passengers went missing during a sightseeing tour over Antarctica. Within hours 11 ordinary police officers were called to duty to face the formidable Mount Erebus. As the police recovered the victims, an investigation team tried to uncover the mystery of how a jet could fly into a mountain in broad daylight. Did the airline have a secret it wanted to bury? This film tells the story of four New Zealand police officers who went to Antarctica as part of the police operation to recover the victims of the crash. Set in the beautiful yet hostile environment of Antarctica, this is the emotional and compelling true story of an extraordinary police operation.

Untold: Crime & Penalties

They were the bad boys of hockey — a team bought by a man with mob ties, run by his 17-year-old son, and with a rep for being as violent as they were good.

Festival Express

The filmed account of a large Canadian rock festival train tour boasting major acts. In the summer of 1970, a chartered train crossed Canada carrying some of the world's greatest rock bands. The Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, The Band, Buddy Guy, and others lived (and partied) together for five days, stopping in major cities along the way to play live concerts. Their journey was filmed.

La Coupe Stanley à Montréal en 1993

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Martha of the North

In the mid-1950s, lured by false promises of a better life, Inuit families were displaced by the Canadian government and left to their own devices in the Far North. In this icy desert realm, Martha Flaherty and her family lived through one of Canadian history’s most sombre and little-known episodes.

Elementa

A black-and-white visual meditation of wilderness and the elements. Wildlife filmmaker Richard Sidey returns to the triptych format for a cinematic experience like no other.

Tackling the All Blacks

Before the summer of 2022, Ireland had never beaten the All Blacks in New Zealand. Using behind the scenes footage and interviews with players and coaches this documentary reflects on the experience of triumphing in New Zealand for the first time.

Just Watch Me: Trudeau and the 70's Generation

Canadian director Catherine Annau's debut work is a documentary about the legacy of Pierre Trudeau, the long-running Prime Minister of Canada, who governed during the 1970s. The film focuses particularly on Trudeau's goal of creating a thoroughly bilingual nation. Annau interviews eight people in their mid-30s on both sides of the linguistic divide. One tells of her life growing up in a community of hard-core Quebec separatists, while another, a yuppie from Toronto, recalls believing as a child that people in Montreal got drunk and had sex all day long. Annau has all of the interviewees discuss how Trudeau's policies affected their lives and their perceptions of the other side, in this issue that strikes to the heart of Canada's national identity.

Bad River

Wisconsin's tribe's ongoing fight to protect Lake Superior for future generations. "Bad River" shows the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa's long history of activism and resistance in the context of continuing legal battles with Enbridge Energy over its Line 5 oil pipeline. The Line 5 pipeline has been operating on 12 miles of the Bad River Band's land with expired easements for more than a decade. The Band and the Canadian company have been locked in a legal battle over the pipeline since 2019.

La purge LGBT : La sombre histoire

The Purge traces a dark and little-known moment in Canadian history: the systemic discrimination faced by members of the LGBT community within the Armed Forces and the federal public service. From 1950 to 1996, it was yesterday, no effort was spared to flush out these men and women deemed "immoral" and representing a "danger to national security": intensive and coercive interrogations, humiliating tests, polygraphs, forced confessions and denunciations.

June 17th, 1994

Do you remember where you were on June 17, 1994? Thanks to a wide array of unrelated, coast-to-coast occurrences, this Friday has come to be known for its firsts, lasts, triumphs and tragedy. Arnold Palmer played his last round at a U.S. Open, in Oakmont, PA, the FIFA World Cup kicked off in Chicago, the New York Rangers celebrated on Broadway, Patrick Ewing desperately pursued a long evasive championship in Madison Garden and Donald Fehr stared down the baseball owners. And yet, all of that was a prelude to O.J. Simpson leading America on a slow speed chase in a white Ford Bronco around Los Angeles.

Kings Ransom

On August 9, 1988, the NHL was forever changed with the single stroke of a pen. The Edmonton Oilers, fresh off their fourth Stanley Cup victory in five years, signed a deal that sent Wayne Gretzky, a Canadian national treasure and the greatest hockey player ever to play the game, to the Los Angeles Kings in a multi-player, multi-million dollar deal. As bewildered Oiler fans struggled to make sense of the unthinkable, fans in Los Angeles were rushing to purchase season tickets at a rate so fast it overwhelmed the Kings box office. Overnight, a franchise largely overlooked in its 21-year existence was suddenly playing to sellout crowds and standing ovations, and a league often relegated to “little brother” status exploded from 21 teams to 30 in less than a decade.

The Hollow Men

The 'stolen' insider emails that informed Nicky Hager's best-selling account of National's 2005 election campaign return in Alister Barry's (Someone Else's Country) new film - just in time to caution us against campaigning politicians in 2008. Addressing each other like schoolboy Machiavellis, party leader Don Brash and his advisors spelled out how they'd copy the big boys in Australia and the US in order to win the votes of people who'd never support the kind of policies such men are widely presumed to represent. The dividing and conquering began at Orewa.

Cirque du Soleil: La Magie Continue

One of the earliest Cirque du Soleil releases, filmed during a tour of the troupe's native Canada in 1986 and filled with their trademark costumes, music and extraordinary feats.

The White Stripes: Under Great White Northern Lights

In 2007 the legendary American duo White Stripes toured Canada. Besides playing the usual venues they challenged themselves and played in buses, cafés and for Indian tribal elders. Music video director Emmett Malloy followed the band and managed to capture both the special tour, extraordinary concert versions of the band's minimalist, raw, blues-inspired rock songs and the special relationship between the extroverted Jack White and the introspective Meg White - a formerly married couple who for a long time claimed to be siblings. The film makes striking use of the band's concert colors: red, white and black.

Prayer for a Lost Mitten

The night is falling and Montreal is under the snow. People line up at the lost and found office of the city’s transit company. They all have lost something, which, upon reflection, becomes the symbol of a deeper loss. Prayer for a Lost Mitten is a creative documentary by turns melancholic and festive, yet ever compassionate. A film that helps us get through the winter.

It's Our Game: Team Canada's Victory at the 2004 World Cup of Hockey

It's Our Game documents one of the Canadian national hockey teams, showcasing how passionately their countrymen love the sport. The filmmakers follow the team as they travel to Finland to play in international competition.

Kolébka hokeje

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The Man of a Thousand Songs

A feature length documentary about extraordinary Canadian singer songwriter, Ron Hynes... an insightful and entertaining exploration of the creative process, the genesis of song, the meaning of performance and the vulnerability of an artist compelled to bare his soul through his music. The film is comprised of Ron performing his music (distinct and live for the camera), interwoven with very intimate black box 'interviews' with Ron (shot tightly and directly addressed to the camera), in which he discusses the songs and the life that informed them: late nights, dark alleys, marriage, children, divorce, his near death and recovery from drug addiction... and punctuated with back stage moments, insight from the street, and Ron's nephew author Joel Thomas Hynes, taking the role of 'chorus of the people'.