Round Up (2010)

The Story of the Weeping Camel

When a Mongolian nomadic family's newest camel colt is rejected by its mother, a musician is needed for a ritual to change her mind.

State Funeral

The enigma of the personality cult is revealed in the grand spectacle of Stalin’s funeral. The film is based on unique archive footage, shot in the USSR on March 5 - 9, 1953, when the country mourned and buried Joseph Stalin.

One of Many

A woman with indiginous roots in her 40s goes on a trip into her past: When she was four years old she had been taken away from her mother by the canadian authorities, like many others. This is her very sad story as an example for many others.

In the Time of the Count

At the forests of Östergötland, where land meets sea, rests the old castle Herrborum. Here lives count Magnus Stenbock, 92, according to his own ideas about what is appropriate and what is not. Film-maker Helena Nygren is fascinated by the count and the castle, and is allowed to film on the condition that she takes the role of companion lady. Over one year, Helena returns several times to take part of count Magnus Stenbock and his servants life on castle Herrborum in Östergötland. Time stands still on the castle, and in the movie Helena wants to preserve the fairy tale feeling she gets when she steps into these ancient surroundings. The count is a strong personality with strong opinions and a great interest in history. All kinds of people come to his castle to savor the special atmosphere and follow the old fashioned rules of etiquette. Helena transforms from an observer to a lady who participates in the social games on the estate, where everything moves around its own time axis.

The Lost Colony of Roanoke: New Evidence

In 1587, more than 100 English colonists settle on Roanoke Island and soon vanish, baffling historians for centuries; now, experts use the latest forensic archaeology to investigate the true story behind America's oldest and most controversial mystery.

Our People Will Be Healed

Legendary documentary filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin provides a glimpse of what action-driven decolonization looks like in Norway House, one of Manitoba's largest First Nation communities.

The Lost Children

After a plane crash, four indigenous children fight to survive in the Colombian Amazon using ancestral wisdom as an unprecedented rescue mission unfolds.

Tawai: A Voice from the Forest

Explorer Bruce Parry visits nomadic tribes in Borneo and the Amazon in hope to better understand humanity's changing relationship with the world around us.

Sonaggios

In the Sardinian town of Tonara, where the ancient art of crafting cowbells teeters on the edge of extinction, a family battles to preserve their heritage, passing down skills to a new generation while grappling with personal struggles and the pull of modernity. English subtitles.

The Miracle of Saint Anthony

In the middle of June the village of Santo Antonio de Mixoes da Serra in the Valdreu region of Northern Portugal honours its Patron Saint with a very special festival. On this day the local farmers bring their animals to the church – cows, horses, dogs, cats, chickens, rabbits – to be blessed. This ancient tradition is passed from generation to generation, and today, just as hundreds of years ago, animals and people flock up the mountain roads to the church square to become a part of the religious festival. The film is about this miracle.

Tunniit: Retracing the Lines of Inuit Tattoos

Inuit traditional face tattoos have been forbidden for a century, and almost forgotten. Director Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, together with long-time friend and activist Aaju Peter, is determined to uncover the mystery and meaning behind this beautiful ancient tradition. Together they embark on an adventure through Arctic communities, speaking with elders and recording the stories of a once popularized female artform. Central to the film is Arnaquq-Baril’s personal debate over whether or not to get tattood herself. With candour and humour, she welcomes us into her world, to experience firsthand the complex emotions that accompany her struggle. Past meets present in this intimate account of one woman’s journey towards self-empowerment and cultural understanding.

Omo Child: The River and the Bush

For many generations people in the Omo Valley (tribal southwest Ethiopia) believed some children are cursed and that these 'cursed' children bring disease, drought and death to the tribe. The curse is called 'mingi' and mingi children are killed. Lale Labuko, a young educated man from the Kara tribe was 15 years old when he saw a child in his village killed and also learned that he had 2 older sisters he never knew who had been killed. He decided one day he would stop this horrific practice. Filmed over a five year period we follow Lale's journey along with the people of his tribe as they attempt to change an ancient practice.

The Pearl Button

The ocean contains the history of all humanity. The sea holds all the voices of the earth and those that come from outer space. Water receives impetus from the stars and transmits it to living creatures. Water, the longest border in Chile, also holds the secret of two mysterious buttons which were found on its ocean floor. Chile, with its 2,670 miles of coastline and the largest archipelago in the world, presents a supernatural landscape. In it are volcanoes, mountains and glaciers. In it are the voices of the Patagonian Indigenous people, the first English sailors and also those of its political prisoners. Some say that water has memory. This film shows that it also has a voice.

Jesa

Jesa is a Korean tradition honoring one's ancestors. The filmmaker interviewed her parents about this ritual. However, it goes totally unexpected.

Khaïma

Plot unavailable

Seven Songs from the Tundra

An anthology of stories about the indigenous Nenet peoples of the Northern Russian tundra, and how their way of life was disrupted by the advent of Soviet power.

Heartbeat of a Nation

A short documentary that celebrates Dene cultural reclamation and revitalization, in which a father passes on traditional knowledge to his child through the teachings of a caribou drum.

You Are on Indian Land

The territory of Akwesasne straddles the Canada-U.S. border. When Canadian authorities prohibited the duty-free cross-border passage of personal purchases - a right established by the Jay Treaty of 1794 - Kanien'kéhaka protesters blocked the international bridge between Ontario and New York State.

Still We Rise

50 years on, the Aboriginal Tent Embassy is the oldest continuing protest occupation site in the world. Taking a fresh lens this is a bold dive into a year of protest and revolutionary change for First Nations people.

Monica in the South Seas

Finnish filmmaker and artist Sami van Ingen is a great-grandson of documentary pioneer Robert Flaherty, and seemingly the sole member of the family with a hands-on interest in continuing the directing legacy. Among the materials he found in the estate of Robert and Frances Flaherty’s daughter Monica were the film reels and video tapes detailing several years of work on realising her lifelong dream project: a sound version of her parents’ 1926 docu-fiction axiom, Moana: A Romance of the Golden Age.

Warrior Women

Through the figure of Lakota activist and community organizer Madonna Thunder Hawk, this inspiring film traces the untold story of countless Native American women struggling for their people's civil rights. Spanning several decades, Christina D. King and Elizabeth A. Castle's documentary charts Thunder Hawk's lifelong commitment, from her early involvement in the American Indian Movement (AIM), to her pivotal role in the founding of Women of All Red Nations, to her heartening presence at Standing Rock alongside thousands protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline. She passed her dedication and hunger for change to her daughter Marcy, even if that often meant feeling like comrades-in-arms more than mother and child. Through rare archival material—including amazing footage of AIM's occupation of Wounded Knee—and an Indigenous style of circular storytelling, Warrior Women rekindles the memories and legacy of the Red Power movement's matriarchs.

Stories Are in Our Bones

In this layered short film, filmmaker Janine Windolph takes her young sons fishing with their kokum (grandmother), a residential school survivor who retains a deep knowledge and memory of the land. The act of reconnecting with their homeland is a cultural and familial healing journey for the boys, who are growing up in the city. It’s also a powerful form of resistance for the women.

The Fourth Dimension

This is an elegant meditation on time, travel, and ceremony in the form of a journey. In her first foray into digital video, Trinh T. Minh-ha deconstructs the role of ritual in mediating between the past and the present.

We Were Children

For over 130 years till 1996, more than 100,000 of Canada's First Nations children were legally required to attend government-funded schools run by various Christian faiths. There were 80 of these 'residential schools' across the country. Most children were sent to faraway schools that separated them from their families and traditional land. These children endured brutality, physical hardship, mental degradation, and the complete erasure of their culture. The schools were part of a wider program of assimilation designed to integrate the native population into 'Canadian society.' These schools were established with the express purpose 'To kill the Indian in the child.' Told through their own voices, 'We Were Children' is the shocking true story of two such children: Glen Anaquod and Lyna Hart.

Eami

Eami means ‘forest’ in Ayoreo. It also means ‘world’. The story happens in the Paraguayan Chaco, the territory with the highest deforestation rate in the world. 25,000 hectares of forest are being deforested a month in this territory which would mean an average of 841 hectares a day or 35 hectares per hour. The forest barely lives and this only due to a reserve that the Totobiegosode people achieved in a legal manner. They call Chaidi this place which means ancestral land or the place where we always lived and it is part of the "Ayoreo Totobiegosode Natural and Cultural Heritage". Before this, they had to live through the traumatic situation of leaving the territory behind and surviving a war. It is the story of the Ayoreo Totobiegosode people, told from the point of view of Asoja, a bird-god with the ability to bring an omniscient- temporal gaze, who becomes the narrator of this story developed in a crossing between documentary and fiction.

The Lebanese Burger Mafia

The heir to a Burger Baron franchise, the filmmaker chases clues through rural Alberta, capturing the trials and tribulations of Arab immigrants while uncovering the saga of a rogue fast-food chain with mysterious origins and a cult following.

Kanehsatake, 270 Years of Resistance

In July 1990, a dispute over a proposed golf course to be built on Kanien’kéhaka (Mohawk) lands in Oka, Quebec, sets the stage for a historic confrontation that would grab international headlines and sear itself into the Canadian consciousness.

Savages: The Story of Human Zoos

For more than a century the great colonial powers put human beings, taken by force from their native lands, on show as entertainment, just like animals in zoos; a shameful, outrageous and savage treatment of people who were considered subhuman.

Golden Era

A look into the history and tradition of Queen's Football in it's golden era, featuring never before seen footage of the university in the 1960s.

When Two Worlds Collide

In this tense and immersive tour de force, audiences are taken directly into the line of fire between powerful, opposing Peruvian leaders who will stop at nothing to keep their respective goals intact. On the one side is President Alan Garcia, who, eager to enter the world stage, begins aggressively extracting oil, minerals, and gas from untouched indigenous Amazonian land. He is quickly met with fierce opposition from indigenous leader Alberto Pizango, whose impassioned speeches against Garcia’s destructive actions prove a powerful rallying cry to throngs of his supporters. When Garcia continues to ignore their pleas, a tense war of words erupts into deadly violence.

Honeyland

When nomadic beekeepers break Honeyland’s basic rule (take half of the honey, but leave half to the bees), the last female beehunter in Europe must save the bees and restore natural balance.

In My Blood It Runs

The story of Dujuan, a 10-year-old Aboriginal boy living in Alice Springs, Australia, who is struggling to balance his traditional Arrernte/Garrwa upbringing with a state education.

Through These Eyes

A 1970s American elementary school program encouraging students to figure out for themselves the universal building blocks of human community — family, work, faith, etc. — inflamed political sensitivities so intensely it was shelved and forgotten. Archive footage of the documentary film series at the program's core, classroom exchanges, and the ensuing controversy frames larger issues of education, politics and ideology.

Ghostland: The View of the Ju'Hoansi

Remember the culture clash in THE GODS MUST BE CRAZY? This time it's real. One of the most ancient cultures on our planet is undergoing a major change. The Ju/Hoansi Bushmen in Namibia are not allowed to hunt anymore and need to converge with our so called “civilized” lifestyle. For the first time the Ju/Hoansi Bushmen travel through the Kalahari and then right into the heart of Europe. What starts as a look at their fascinating culture becomes an even more fascinating look at our Western lifestyle. A warm and humorous reflection of our habits through the eyes of people who are about to give up their million year old traditions.

The Noise of Time

In the town of Xoco, the spirit of an old villager awakens in search of its lost home. Along its journey, the ghost discovers that the town still celebrates its most important festivities, but also learns that the construction of a new commercial complex called Mítikah will threaten the existence of both the traditions and the town itself.

#Familiar #Touch #Lost #Figures

Can we reinvent our lost queer histories? #Familiar #Touch #Lost #Figures is about queer ancestry and diaspora, a hybrid of cultural traditions and contemporary queer identity. It explores feelings of guilt and joy, and intimacy between femmes of colour.

Horse Drawn Magic

This documentary short introduces us to the Caravan Stage Company, the world's only horse-drawn open-air theater. Every summer it tours British Columbia and Alberta, bringing live entertainment to communities where television is often the main diversion. In a montage of short sketches, the film shows the troupe on the road and in performance. Hard work and laughter are basic ingredients of this unconventional lifestyle.