Belle famille

"Montréal under the snow and the cold winter. It is the period of the year when the garage owners strike it rich. The automobile at the service of man? This small opus would rather show the contrary. This is one in a series of eight films titled “Chronicle of Everyday Life,” a project that filmmaker Jacques Leduc took four years to realize, and whose goal was to revisit Direct Cinema at a moment when it was already heavily “contaminated” by mainstream TV." - Anthology Film Archives

"This documentary depicts a canoe being built in the traditional manner. Cesar Newashish, a 67-year-old Attikamek of the Manawan Reserve North of Montréal, uses only birchbark, cedar splints, spruce roots, and gum. With a sure hand he works methodically to fashion a craft unsurpassed in function or beauty of design. Building a canoe solely from the materials that the forest provides may become a lost art, even among the Native Peoples whose traditional craft it is. The film is free of spoken commentary but text appears on the screen in Cree, French, and English." - Anthology Film Archives

"This feature documentary is considered to be the forerunner of the NFB's Challenge for Change Program. The film offers in inside look at 3 weeks in the life of the Bailey family. Trouble with the police, begging for stale bread, and the birth of another child are just some of the issues they face. Through it all, the father tries to explain his family's predicament. Although filmed in Montreal, the film offers an anatomy of poverty as it occurs throughout North America." - NFB

"This film is one of the first French Unit productions of the “Société Nouvelle/Challenge for Change” program. When an old area of Montréal is to be demolished to make way for a new low-income housing development, is there anything the residents can do to protect their own interests? The film documents such a situation in the Little Burgundy district of Montréal and shows how the residents organized themselves into a committee that successfully influenced the city’s housing policy." - Anthology Film Archives

Feature-length documentary as part of Pierre Perrault's Abitibian Cycle. The filmmaker questions the past and present of Abitibi and draws up, face to face, the promises of colonization in the 1930s and the great disappointment caused by the closing of the land in the 1970s. There are witnesses to the heroic era, including the cultivator Hauris Lalancette, as well as extracts from films by Father Maurice Proulx (1934-1940).

A documentary about direct-cinema from its very beginnings (Nanook of the North) to the fake-direct-cinema of the Blair Witch Project. All the important direct-cinema filmmakers are portrayed and/or interviewed: Leacock, Wiseman, Maysles, Pennebaker, Reisz and others.

Marina Abramović travels through Brazil, in search of personal healing and artistic inspiration, experiencing sacred rituals and revealing her creative process. The route is comprised of poignant encounters with healers and sages from the Brazilian countryside, exploring the limits between art and spirituality. This external trip triggers in Marina a profound introspective journey through memories, pain and past experiences. 

Combining archival footage with rotoscopic animation, Tower reveals the action-packed untold stories of the witnesses, heroes and survivors of America’s first mass school shooting, when the worst in one man brought out the best in so many others.

A dramatisation based on the exchange of letters between Mary Queen of Scots and her cousin Elizabeth I, detailing the hatred and obsession in their bitter rivalry. Expert historians examine and interpret the royals' motives for the animosity that lasted more than two decades, and which threatened to tear apart the reigning monarch and her kingdom.

For the members of the comedy troupe Asperger’s Are Us, it’s easier to associate with a faceless audience than with their own families. No matter who the crowd, best friends Noah, New Michael, Jack and Ethan have one simple mantra: “We would much rather the audience appreciate us as comedians than people who have overcome adversity.” In this coming-of-age heartfelt documentary, this band of brothers finds themselves at a crossroad. With real life pulling them apart, they decide to plan one ambitious farewell show before they all go their separate ways. People with Asperger’s don’t deal well with uncertainty, and this is the most uncertain time in their lives.

THE BANDIT is a film about 70s superstar Burt Reynolds, his best friend, roommate and stunt-double Hal Needham, and the making of their unlikely smash-hit SMOKEY & THE BANDIT. The film tells the action-packed story of the making of SMOKEY, while tracing the vivid personal journeys of Reynolds and Needham from obscurity to stardom and highlighting one of the most extraordinary relationships in Hollywood history. Featuring new interviews with Reynolds, rare archive material, including footage from Reynolds’ personal archive, as well as candid interviews with the late Hal Needham, the documentary tells an exhilarating and moving story about loyalty, friendship and creative risk.

The trials and tribulations of those who breed exotic birds in the world of competitive poultry; three remarkably rich and diverse personalities who come together to compete in their shared passion to raise the perfect chicken. The film will follow the struggles and triumphs of these characters, along with a wide array of competitors-both human and chicken-from the Ohio National Poultry Show, considered the Westminster of Chickens, to the Dixie Classic in Tennessee.

A glimpse into the unique mind of Brooklyn-based artist and entrepreneur Stefan Pokorny. Director Josh Bishop weaves memories of Stefan’s tumultuous childhood with his current struggles and triumphs to paint a mesmerizing portrait. An art prodigy obsessed from a young age with Dungeons & Dragons, Stefan navigates absurd adventures—from Wisconsin to Venice to Bushwick—on a quest to bring his most personal project to life through an ambitious multimillion dollar Kickstarter campaign.

John Daly didn't fit into the world of golf when he burst onto the scene in 1991, gripping it and ripping it all the way to the top. An immense natural talent, he’s had improbable highs on golf's biggest stages and brutal lows like suspensions, divorces, rehabs and relapses. Through it all, this "rockstar of golf” has remained loved by his loyal fans. HIT IT HARD is a journey into the early years of John’s tumultuous career while also observing him today, two decades after his glory days. The film explores why, despite his myriad mistakes, he’s still so universally loved for being John Daly.

In 1980s Los Angeles, a professional dwarf basketball team composed of recognizable-but-typecast actors finds itself the unwitting vanguard of a revolution to represent little people as something other than objects of curiosity.

THE SLIPPERS pulls back the Wizard’s curtain on the unbelievable story and cultural impact of Dorothy's Ruby Slippers from The Wizard of Oz.  Through first-hand accounts and archival interviews, THE SLIPPERS will detail the life of the Ruby Slippers after their sale at the famed 1970 MGM auction. Discovered by costumer Kent Warner, it is unclear how many pairs were found and how many pairs exist. That mystery has only helped to propel the shoes to the forefront of the Hollywood memorabilia market. They have been bought, stolen, and coveted by many. They are considered the most important piece of Hollywood memorabilia and the catalyst for the creation of Hollywood memorabilia collecting.

With a career spanning decades Photographer Rose Hartman is known for her iconic photos from Studio 54 and the fashion world, her boisterous personality, and ever presence capturing the New York social scene. The film follows Rose through her life of entrée as she put the lives of the glamorous and famous on film that serves as one of the few visual histories of NYC.

At the age of 26, innovative chef and inventor Homaro Cantu helped put Chicago on the culinary map when he opened his first restaurant “Moto” in the city’s untapped Fulton Market meatpacking district. Virtually overnight, Cantu rose to the rank of celebrity chef and became famous for his “molecular gastronomy” approach to cooking. Cantu’s meteoric rise to fame masked an early life of poverty, homelessness, and even physical and emotional abuse. Filmed over a period of three years with remarkable access, INSATIABLE follows Cantu at a pivotal moment in his career and takes you on a dizzying and thrilling ride, in a story that moves from redemption and inspiration to tragedy and back again.

Struggling with a mid-life crisis, Robert Oelman leaves his psychology career in the early 1990s to photograph rare and exotic insects. After moving from the United States to Colombia, he forms a special bond with his subjects in the Amazon rainforest. This connection enables him to make striking photographic images of new and undocumented species. After more than 20 years of traveling, searching, and photographing, his quest culminates with a New York City gallery show where he finally shares his images with the public.

The intimate story behind our changing relationship with death. A terminal diagnosis used to mean death within months. Modern medicine allows patients to live on for years. A passionate and touching film about uncertainty, about the future that faces all of us, following five patients who choose to sing their way through life, with a score by Mark Orton.