Une identité dans la diversité (2016)

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.

All American

In this modern, coming of age documentary, Naomi, Jojo and Arham grapple with economic divides, gender roles, and family dynamics while competing in the fastest growing high school sport in the country: girl’s wrestling.

Separated

Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Errol Morris confronts one of the darkest chapters in recent American history: family separations. Based on NBC News Political and National Correspondent Jacob Soboroff’s book, Separated: Inside an American Tragedy, Morris merges bombshell interviews with government officials and artful narrative vignettes tracing one migrant family’s plight. Together they show that the cruelty at the heart of this policy was its very purpose. Against this backdrop, audiences can begin to absorb the U.S. government’s role in developing and implementing policies that have kept over 1300 children without confirmed reunifications years later, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

Visions of Europe

Twenty-five films from twenty-five European countries by twenty-five European directors.

Percé on the Rocks

This quirky little short by Gilles Carle was filmed on the pierced rock that stands near Quebec’s Gaspé peninsula. It is perhaps the most photographed natural phenomenon on Canada’s East Coast. Shot in the 1960s, the film has a very psychedelic feel to it, with animation, special effects, and a trio of women to guide us through.

Boys on Film 23: Dangerous to Know

Boys on Film presents ten encounters from across the globe, where the dangerous allure of a risky attraction yields emotional results — proving that the age-old adage of taking the plunge is as relevant — and sexy — as ever before. The 10 short films are: My Uncle's Friend [O Amigo do Meu Tio] (2021); Budapest, Closed City [Budapest, zárt város] (2021); Eden (2020); Chaperone (2022); Break Me [Knus meg] (2018); By His Will [שעשני כרצונו] (2021); Red Ants Bite (2019); Jim (2022); Hornbeam (2022); Too Rough (2022).

Perdus entre deux rives, les Chibanis oubliés

Plot unavailable

Venezuela at Home

Two groups of Venezuelan dancers, while preparing for a dance battle, survive at traffic lights in the streets of Medellín. A group reflection on love, family and identity, far from home.

Rivers of Blood: 50 Years On

An exploration of immigration in Britain over the half century since Conservative MP Enoch Powell made his controversial speech. Issues surrounding race, religion, integration and multiculturalism are examined.

VOÏVOD: We Are Connected

From unlikely origins in northern Québec at the height of the Cold War, Voïvod’s post-apocalyptic sci-fi aesthetic, fuelled by a youthful obsession with their instruments, took them from underground success to sharing dates and tours with Iron Maiden, Rush, and Metallica. Despite adversity, and perhaps by cosmic intervention or just serendipity, Voïvod found guitarist Daniel “Chewy” Mongrain; subsequently, the band re-ignited their engines and laid a course back to Morgöth via numerous live shows around the world, a comeback album in Target Earth, singles, EPs, and finally, the late-career triumph, The Wake. In 2019, Voïvod were recognized by the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences with a Juno Award for best hard rock/metal album of the year for The Wake.

Fog in February

On the eve of the publication of a biography of Claude Jutra, one of the most famous and celebrated filmmakers in Quebec and Canada, a leak leaked to the press reveals that the book contains anonymous allegations of pedophile acts committed by the filmmaker. The rumor spread like lightning, suddenly igniting the entirety of Quebec society. By finding today some of the main witnesses propelled overnight into the heart of an unparalleled media tornado, the documentary reconstructs with archive images and other previously unpublished images, the sequence of events which led to a rewriting of the story.

Made in Miami

Made in Miami is the story of Camila's journey from arriving in Miami from Cuba as a kid to finding her voice and releasing her debut album. The film explores how generations of strong women have shaped the Cabello family and inspired Camila to become the artist she is today.

Le déluge du Saguenay : une tragédie humaine

Plot unavailable

Immigrants

A fascinating, unsettling study of immigration in 1960s English cities.

The Devil's Share

Quebec, on the cusp of the 1960s. The province is on the brink of momentous change. Deftly selecting clips from nearly 200 films from the National Film Board of Canada archives, director Luc Bourdon reinterprets the historical record, offering us a new and distinctive perspective on the Quiet Revolution.

Christmas at Moose Factory

A study of life at Christmastime in Moose Factory, an old settlement mainly composed of Cree families on the shore of James Bay, composed entirely of children's crayon drawings and narrated by children.

RapLine

Between 1990 and 1993, at a time when rap was not yet on the radio in France, Olivier Cachin hosted a musical TV show on M6 called "RapLine". The show exclusively devoted to rap and other alternative music. This cult show presented all the facets of these emerging movements through interviews, lives and clips made especially for the show, around fifty clips were produced by RapLine. Another sequence of the show consisted of broadcasting new US rap clips subtitled in French.

Action : The October Crisis of 1970

A long and thoughtful look at those desperate days of October 1970, when Montréal awaited the outcome of FLQ terrorist acts. This film puts the October Crisis in the long perspective of history. Compiled from news and other films, it shows independence movements past and present, and their leaders; it reflects the mingled relief, dismay, defiance, when the Canadian army came to Montréal; and it shows how political leaders viewed the intervention.

A letter to Nikola

As a letter to her son, the filmmaker testifies her experience as a photographer aboard the Aquarius, a ship that rescued 29,523 people in the Mediterranean between 2016 and 2018.

The Invisible Nation

The Algonquin once lived in harmony with the vast territory they occupied. This balance was upset when the Europeans arrived in the 16th century. Gradually, their Aboriginal traditions were undermined and their natural resources plundered. Today, barely 9,000 Algonquin are left. They live in about 10 communities, often enduring abject poverty and human rights abuses. These Aboriginal people are suffering the threat to their very existence in silence. Richard Desjardins and Robert Monderie have decided to sound the alarm before it's too late.

Les Rose

In October 1970, members of the Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ) kidnapped and murdered Minister Pierre Laporte, part of an unprecedented crisis in Quebec. Fifty years later, Félix Rose tries to understand what could have led his father and uncle to commit such crimes. Thanks to his uncle Jacques, who agrees for the first time to speak on the subject, and to the traces left by his father Paul, he revives the heritage of a Quebec working class family. The fruit of ten years of research, Les Rose allows us to revisit a time and people that we knew through clichés, and gives a glimpse of the experiences of a rebellious youth and the crimes that followed.

The Trans List

A documentary that explores the range of experiences lived by transgender Americans.

Metallica: Quebec Magnetic

Recorded live at Colisée Pepsi in Quebec City, Quebec on 31 October - 1 November, 2009. Rock legends Metallica captured live in performance in Quebec City in autumn 2009. The two gigs in Quebec were part of the bands 'World Magnetic Tour' and saw them play a host of their most popular songs including 'Master of Puppets', 'The Four Horsemen' and 'Enter Sandman'.

Jews of the Wild West

“Jews of the Wild West” is a feature-length documentary completed in December 2021. The independent not-for-profit project is produced by Electric Yolk Media and directed by award-winning filmmaker Amanda Kinsey. Through on-camera interviews, compelling footage, and historical photographs, the film tells the positive immigration story and highlights the dynamic contributions Jewish Americans made to shaping the Western United States.

Chez Jolie Coiffure

Rosine Mbakam is invited to step in Sabine’s small hairdresser’s because it is dangerous in the street. She accepts and pushes in with her camera. Sabine’s stories and the customers’ joys, worries, problems and fears bring depth and life into the premises. At times, it feels like the entire African quarter of Brussels had squeezed in. Laughter abounds, anecdotes and life stories elicit emotions, and a male visitor brings a touch of flirt into the salon.

The Shimmering Beast

A documentary film about a group of hunters who gather annually to hunt moose near Maniwaki, Quebec.

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.

The Shelter

It is winter at an emergency shelter for the homeless in Lausanne. Every night at the door of this little-known basement facility the same entry ritual takes place, resulting in confrontations which can sometimes turn violent. Those on duty at the shelter have the difficult task of “triaging the poor”: the women and children first, then the men. Although the total capacity at the shelter is 100, only 50 “chosen ones” will be admitted inside and granted a warm meal and a bed. The others know it will be a long night.

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.

Handsworth Songs

The Black Audio Film Collective’s acclaimed essay film, 'Handsworth Songs', examines the 1985 race riots in Handsworth and London. Interweaving archival photographs, newsreel clips, and home movie footage, the film is both an exploration of documentary aesthetics and a broad meditation social and cultural oppression through Britain’s intertwined narratives of racism and economic decline.

Borderless

Lauren Southern investigates what is really happening at Europe’s borders. From interviews with human traffickers in Morocco to secret recordings of illegal NGO activity in Greece, Borderless will blow the European Border Crisis wide open.

My Life in China

In America, everyone has a family story of immigration. Every family, at some point, has had somebody leave their native country behind to search for a better life. How did they hold onto their identity? How did they adapt to their new life? Every family has a special story. In my case, it's my Chinese-American story. My father would always tell us his story about walking for 7 days and 6 nights, before swimming for 4 hours to Macau to escape communism in 1966. His story would fall on my deaf ears until I returned to China with him.

Not My Job

The documentary follows the life of Farroukh, a young Tajik immigrant who lives in Moscow outskirts with his family and does odd jobs in dreams of becoming an actor.

Things We Won't Say About Race That Are True

Trevor Phillips confronts some uncomfortable truths about racial stereotypes, as he asks if attempts to improve equality have led to serious negative consequences.

La poudre aux yeux

With its 33,000 kilometers of marked trails and its tens of thousands of kilometers of off-trail circuits, Québec is a snowmobile paradise. In this documentary, a dozen French tourists, accompanied by their flamboyant guide, live an incredible adventure in Quebec's wilderness.

The last whale hunters

The Lamalera village is located in a small volcanic Island, a poor, barren land, and they catch whales to eat. It is the only way for them to survive. The harpooners are called lamafa in the local language. They are the village's pride because they take the whole responsibility for the very dangerous hunting. In 2018. a tragedy struck the village. Benjamin, a young lamafa, was killed during a spear hunting. His father, Ignatius, was devastated, and Benjamin's brother, Demo, was shocked and unable to go hunting. They blame accidents at sea on a victim's family discord in Lamalera. Ignatius, the master boat-builder, decided to build a new traditional whaleboat to reunite the family bond. The whaling boat is 12 meters long, made entirely of hand-crafted wood, not using a single nail, and is considered an intangible cultural asset.

Le goût d'un pays

Focused on an inspiring and touching dialogue between Gilles Vigneault and Fred Pellerin, the documentary tells the story of Quebec by digging deep into an ancestral tradition etched into our cultural DNA: the production of maple syrup.

Entretien en six temps avec Gilles Groulx

Plot unavailable

The Hearing

After crossing 11 countries irregularly to seek asylum in Canada, Peggy, Simon and their three children are waiting for the hearing that will determine whether they get refugee status or not. Having fled political repression in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the family tries to rebuild a peaceful life in Montreal, in spite of the constant threat of deportation. Between ghosts from the past, hopes for the future, a complex legal maze and seemingly endless trial, the film delves into the struggle of the Nkunga Mbala family to remain in Canada. Offering unprecedented access to their hearing before the Immigration and Refugee Board, the film unveils the opaque process of claiming asylum in Canada.