Tales from Vesta Lunch

Crash 'n' Burn is an experimental film shot in and named after Toronto, Ontario's first punk rock club. (Not to be confused with Peter Vronsky's similarly titled 1977 documentary on the Toronto punk scene made for the CBC television network.) The film, shot on 16mm black-and-white stock, features performances by Dead Boys, Teenage Head, The Boyfriends, and The Diodes".

Ten women in Canada talk about being lesbian in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s: discovering the pulp fiction of the day about women in love, their own first affairs, the pain of breaking up, frequenting gay bars, facing police raids, men's responses, and the etiquette of butch and femme roles. Interspersed among the interviews and archival footage are four dramatized chapters from a pulp novel, "Forbidden Love".

Displaying the faces and voices of transgender youth, the documentary short shows the authenticity of queer and trans people living in Toronto, while simultaneously discussing the struggles for self-acceptance that people who do not conform to cisgender and heteronormative ideals of gender face. Andy Nguyen, trans director and film student, captures his trans friends in their natural state on 16mm film shot on a Bolex h16 camera. Accompanied by narration written and recited by Salem Rao, this film represents that trans people exist and this is what we look like. Regardless of the obvious everyday transphobia, trans people find community and uniqueness within each other and themselves.

After an unsuccessful attempt at establishing himself in the early 1970s music scene, Jamaican-born reggae legend Stranger Cole opens a record store, the first Caribbean business in Toronto's Kensington Market.

Kindness, creativity, inclusivity, and a touch of magic makes the world a brighter place. Explore the story and impact of Canadian entertainer Ernie Coombs and his iconic series, Mr. Dressup, which enriched the lives of five generations.

Here in Toronto, four young Somali refugees are finishing high school. What did they bring with them? What did they find in Canada? Their testimonies, about us and about themselves, interspersed with newsreel footage and sequences of a theatrical creation in which they put all their soul, make them immediately endearing and overturn many prejudices held against refugees. A film that makes you want to get to know them better.

This ground-breaking cinéma-vérité classic documents five weeks in the lives of twelve residents of a home for emotionally disturbed children. It is the first in the form that King later described as actuality drama. All the action is spontaneous and undirected, with neither interviews nor narration. The theme is the outrage of life. The children asked the filmmakers, Why is it that whenever pictures of us are put in the papers, our faces are blacked out. What is so awful about us that we cant be seen? They wanted to be filmed so that they could be seen.

This incisive, urgent documentary examines the history of anti-Black racism in hockey, from the segregated leagues of the 19th century to today’s NHL, where Black athletes continue to struggle against bigotry.

A retrospective documentary on 9/11 in connection with the 2001 Toronto International Film Festival.

A young and ambitious team of chefs face the life-changing challenges of competing in the world's most prestigious culinary competition.

Stompin' Tom performs live at the Horseshoe Tavern on Queen St. in Toronto.

Faceless is a documentary film about the workings of an inpatient psychiatry unit, seen through the eyes of both the patients trying to get well and the staff trying to help them.

From a boy on the streets of the Congo to becoming an NBA champion, Serge Ibaka has risen to a level even he can hardly believe. Watch as he brings the Larry O'Brien Championship Trophy back to Africa for the first time, and re-visits all the places he used to go as a young man in this emotional journey.

1988 CBC docudrama on Canada's role in WW1. Terence McKenna tours the Battlefields of Ypres, the Somme, Vimy Ridge and Paschendaele. Actors portray several Canadian soldiers in WW1 in re-enactments based on their memoirs, diaries and letters.

Lisa is a middle-class white woman from Toronto, Canada. She's also addicted to crack cocaine. To maintain her habit, she works as a prostitute while living in a hotel room. She's tried to get clean, but knows too well how easy it is to relapse. Meanwhile, she participates in Toronto's needle exchange program to reduce her risk.

An intimate, behind-the-scenes look at performance, glamor, fame, family, love and sacrifice as some of the world's most renowned drag queens come together for World Pride in Toronto.

A biopic of the legendary Paul Bellini, by Bellini, of Bellini, for Bellini.

The Bruce McArthur serial killer case shocked Canada’s largest city, and the whole country, when he was convicted of eight grisly murders. How did McArthur avoid arrest for nearly a decade? This film explores the untold story of Toronto’s Gay Village, and the victims of these horrific crimes.

Based on the 40th Annual Carnival of the Toronto Skating Club.

Canadian actress and filmmaker Sarah Polley investigates certain secrets related to her mother, interviewing a group of family members and friends whose reliability varies depending of their implication in the events, which are remembered in different ways; so a trail of questions remains to be answered, because memory is always changing and the discovery of truth often depends on who is telling the tale.