“Nuuhkuum uumichiwaapim” (« My Grandmother’s Tipi ») is an exploration of the sensorial and textural experience of a grandmother’s tipi. It is based on memories of being in a tipi, observing in the bliss of cooking and the time in-between.
Five Bolivian indigenous women share one goal: climbing the highest mountain in America.
The story of the Quebec Mosque Shooting—the first ever mass shooting in a mosque in the West—is known around the world, but the story of the community that survived the attack is all but unknown. The Mosque: A Community's Struggle is an intimate portrait of the resilient Muslim community of Ste-Foy, Québec, as they struggle to survive and shift the narrative of what it means to be a Muslim, one year after the devastating attack that took the lives of six of their members. As the world moves on, this small mosque and its community fights Islamophobia, harassment and hate speech. How will the community heal and how will they stop the rhetoric that threatens to precipitate further violence?
A documentary portrait of Utopia, loosely framed by Plato’s invocation of the lost continent of Atlantis in 360 BC and its re-resurrection via a 1970s science fiction pulp novel.
This documentary short is the first film made by an all-Aboriginal film crew, training under the NFB's Challenge for Change Program. It was shot at Akwesasne (St. Regis Reserve). Two spokesmen explain historical and other aspects of Longhouse religion, culture, and government and reflect on the impact of the white man's arrival on the Indian way of life.
In this brand new featurette, executive producer T Bone Burnett and the Coen brothers discuss the history of some of the songs that heard in Inside Llywin Davies and possible origin of the stories they tells, the folk movement during the 1960s and the social and cultural ideas that it represented, the authenticity and the identity of folk music and the balance between the two, the future of folk music, etc. Included with the featurette are illustrations by Drew Christie. The featurette was created exclusively for Criterion in 2015.
On the Kainai (Blood) First Nations Reserve, near Cardston, Alberta, a hopeful new development in Indigenous enterprise. Once rulers of the western plains, the Bloods live on a 1 300-square-kilometer reserve. Many have lacked gainful employment and now pin their hopes on a pre-fab factory they have built. Will the production line and work and wages fit into their cultural pattern of life? The film shows how it is working and what the owners themselves say about their venture.
Documentary that recovers the figure of the singer Terremoto de Jerez and his legacy.
When Masset, a Haida village in Haida Gwaii (formerly known as the Queen Charlotte Islands), held a potlatch, it seemed as if the past grandeur of the people had returned. This is a colourful recreation of Indigenous life that faded more than two generations ago when the great totems were toppled by the missionaries and the costly potlatch was forbidden by law. The film shows how one village lived again the old glory, with singing, dancing, feasting, and the raising of a towering totem as a lasting reminder of what once was.
A documentary that charts the never ending hustle of up and coming, as well as seasoned hip-hop producers.
The people of Unamenshipu (La Romaine), an Innu community in the Côte-Nord region of Quebec, are seen but not heard in this richly detailed documentary about the rituals surrounding an Innu caribou hunt. Released in 1960, it’s one of 13 titles in Au Pays de Neufve-France, a series of poetic documentary shorts about life along the St. Lawrence River. Off-camera narration, written by Pierre Perrault, frames the Innu participants through an ethnographic lens. Co-directed by René Bonnière and Perrault, a founding figure of Quebec’s direct cinema movement.
The documentary accompanied the work of the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela.
Camoflauge is the true story of Jason Johnson (aka Camoflauge) a rapper from Savannah, GA. He is known for representing his city to the fullest, putting Savannah on the hip hop map. In May 2003, his life was tragically cut short when he was fatally shot outside of Pure Pain Recording Studio. He was 21 years of age. Thirteen years later, his murder still unsolved, family, friends and fans break the silence by reflecting on how the city he loved turned against him. This documentary invites audiences to watch Savannah finally heal over the death of their hero.
A fun-filled documentary that tells the unique 60-year history of WPKN in Bridgeport, CT, through in-depth interviews and extraordinary film footage.
This short documentary film is a fascinating portrait of urban and rural Quebec in the late 1960s, as the province entered modernity. The collective work produced for the Quebec Ministry of Industry and Commerce calls on several major Quebec figures.
Gilles Groulx's first film shot in 1955 with a camera borrowed from his brother and edited during his spare time when he worked as an editor at the Radio-Canada news service a few years before he joined the NFB. Silent film, presented as its author left it, where the soil and the dialectic of Groulx's work are already there: documentary realism, the social space to be explored, daily life, the relationship between individual and society, social disparities, the consumer society, seduction and happiness.
Pouvoir Oublier is a political documentary first constructed from the words of the speakers whose lives changed on the tragic day of May 10, 1972 in Sept-Îles. Their word will be juxtaposed with archival material from the events, some of which are unpublished, which will reflect the collective euphoria in which Sept-Îles and all of Quebec were then bathed.
A perspective and reflection on the work of Gabriel Ferrandini.
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.
Bravo proudly presents the first-ever documentary of Icelandic mega-star Bork (above), whose unique musical style redefined the role of "female pop soloist" - and won the hearts of critics along the way. Bravo Profiles: Bjork is highlighted by rare performance footage, breathtaking scenic views of Iceland, and exclusive interviews with the singer and fellow musician Bono.