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Economic and Industrial Development (22)

  • Background to Latin America
    Background to Latin America
    1963 58 min
    This feature documentary is a curious example of the mid-20th century ethnographic film and its depiction of non-Western peoples. We begin our tour of Central and South America in the Caribbean and move along to the vast agricultural and urban locales of Mexico, a socio-economic profile of the so-called “banana republics”, and the rich oil fields of Venezuela and its neighbours. Across the vast Andes mountain range and down towards the coffee industry in Colombia, we continually see the contrast between Spanish colonial architecture and the ruins of ancient Indigenous temples. The film shows the proud history of twenty republics and their growing unrest.
  • Bombay Calling
    Bombay Calling
    Ben Addelman  &  Samir Mallal 2006 1 h 10 min
    This feature documentary chronicles the lives of young call-centre workers in Bombay (Mumbai), India. The film profiles several characters who attempt to sell phone services to clients in the UK, showing both sides of globalization’s impact on India – the economic benefits as well as the break with tradition and loss of innocence. A compelling insider’s look at youth culture in India and the growing number of young people who choose to follow the American dream, Indian-style.
  • The Bright Land
    The Bright Land
    Morten Parker 1959 30 min
    This short documentary from Morten Parker takes audiences on a tour of the islands in the West Indies Federation, circa 1959. While there, we see the various resources of the islands, including sugar, coffee, bananas, oil, and bauxite.
  • The Chocolate Farmer (Short Version)
    The Chocolate Farmer (Short Version)
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    Rohan Fernando 2010 52 min
    This full-length documentary takes us to an unspoiled corner of southern Belize, where cacao farmer and father Eladio Pop manually works his plantation in the tradition of his Mayan ancestors: as a steward of the land. The film captures a year in the life of the Pop family as they struggle to preserve their values in a world that is dramatically changing around them. A lament for cultures lost, The Chocolate Farmer challenges our deeply held assumptions of progress.
  • The Chocolate Farmer
    The Chocolate Farmer
    Rohan Fernando 2010 1 h 11 min
    This full-length documentary takes us to an unspoiled corner of southern Belize, where cacao farmer and father Eladio Pop manually works his plantation in the tradition of his Mayan ancestors: as a steward of the land. The film captures a year in the life of the Pop family as they struggle to preserve their values in a world that is dramatically changing around them. A lament for cultures lost, The Chocolate Farmer challenges our deeply held assumptions of progress.
  • The Coca-Cola Case
    The Coca-Cola Case
    Germán Gutiérrez  &  Carmen Garcia 2009 1 h 25 min
    For decades, Colombia has ranked first among countries in the number of social leaders assassinated. From 2002 to 2009, more than 470 leaders were killed by paramilitary militias in the pay of companies ready to do anything to crush the unions. Among these unscrupulous corporate brands were bottling plants of Coca-Cola company products.

    These unpunished crimes spur U.S. activists Dan Kovalik, Terry Collingsworth and Ray Rogers into an ambitious crusade against the soft drink giant, accusing them of turning a blind eye to the misdeeds brought to their attention. By following the relentless efforts of this unshakeable trio, The Coca-Cola Case takes us on a fascinating legal road-movie, against a backdrop of denunciation campaigns claiming: Stop Killer Coke!

    After five years of struggle, will Coca-Cola yield in the end? And on the verge of a settlement, what will the victims choose—cash, or power and integrity?
  • The Coca-Cola Case (Short Version)
    The Coca-Cola Case (Short Version)
    We're sorry, this content is not available in your location.
    Germán Gutiérrez  &  Carmen Garcia 2009 52 min
    For decades, Colombia has ranked first among countries in the number of social leaders assassinated. From 2002 to 2009, more than 470 leaders were killed by paramilitary militias in the pay of companies ready to do anything to crush the unions. Among these unscrupulous corporate brands were bottling plants of Coca-Cola company products.

    These unpunished crimes spur U.S. activists Dan Kovalik, Terry Collingsworth and Ray Rogers into an ambitious crusade against the soft drink giant, accusing them of turning a blind eye to the misdeeds brought to their attention. By following the relentless efforts of this unshakeable trio, The Coca-Cola Case takes us on a fascinating legal road-movie, against a backdrop of denunciation campaigns claiming: Stop Killer Coke!

    After five years of struggle, will Coca-Cola yield in the end? And on the verge of a settlement, what will the victims choose—cash, or power and integrity?
  • Chair of Gold
    Chair of Gold
    Thomas Farley 1956 30 min
    In this film, Jack Scott, a Vancouver newspaper columnist, visits Bolivia, South America, to bring us a report on conditions in that country and on the technical assistance program undertaken in the late 1950s by member countries of the United Nations, including Canada. We hear from Canada's Dr. Hugh Keenleyside, who headed a U.N. Commission, and from specialists from other countries who are helping to create a new economy for Bolivia.
  • Eye Witness No. 1
    Eye Witness No. 1
    1947 11 min
    In this installment of the Eye Witness series from 1947, we visit Chalk River, Canada's atomic energy project, for an update. We see the production and handling of radioactive isotopes destined for medical and agricultural research. Then we visit South Africa for a report on the Canadian trade mission while surveying the industrialization that's taken place and affected the Commonwealth nation.
  • The Emperor's New Clothes
    The Emperor's New Clothes
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    Magnus Isacsson 1995 53 min
    This feature documentary focuses on the reality of life before, during, and after the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and the profound effects the economic agreements between big business and government can have on human lives.

    Filmed over a three year period in Canada, the United States, and Mexico, this documentary poses a sobering question: In this global war of cut-rate economies, are people on the losing side?
  • Elisha and the Cacao Trees
    Elisha and the Cacao Trees
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    Rohan Fernando 2010 17 min
    This charming short documentary takes us on a trip to Belize, where we meet 13-year-old Elisha, the daughter of a cacao farmer. What links a village in Belize and millions of North American kids? Chocolate! We learn about Elisha's daily life and her dreams as she and her father show how cacao is grown, harvested and turned into chocolate.
  • Four Million Threads
    Four Million Threads
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    Jackie Hurwitz 2016 25 min
    "Imagine leaving your lifelong home for a one-room flat in a city with a husband you barely know. You work beside 5,000 others in a factory, sewing 180 zippers on 180 sweaters each day. You’re the first woman in your family ever to earn a paycheck, but it’s barely enough to survive." Welcome to Monira’s world, and that of countless other women in Bangladesh’s booming garment trade—a complex world full of difficult choices and competing values. It’s a brand new world made possible by Western consumers, each time we purchase clothes from a major retailer. And it’s the world you’re invited to explore in Four Million Threads.
  • Gateway to Asia
    Gateway to Asia
    Tom Daly 1945 10 min
    With the distance between Canada and Russia, China and India cut by high-speed planes, new international links are being forged. In this Pacific world, British Columbia is a unit of growing importance. In a brief survey of the province, this film covers the people, natural resources, industries, and some of the social problems of British Columbia - specifically the imprisonment of Japanese citizens and brief references to the lives of Chinese and Indian migrants. Located on the Pacific Coast, it is the jumping-off place for planes bound for East Asia, and a vital link between the rest of Canada and her neighbours across the Pacific.
  • Haiti
    Haiti
    Léonard Forest 1957 30 min
    This short film from the Perspective series highlights social and economic development in Haiti circa 1957. It depicts customs and traditions used to pass along the history of a people, and offers a look into their daily lives — lives that looks very different from their experiences today.
  • Marilyn Waring on Politics: Local & Global Show One
    Marilyn Waring on Politics: Local & Global Show One
    Terre Nash 1996 30 min
    In 1975, 22-year-old Marilyn Waring became the youngest member in the New Zealand Parliament. At the age of 24, she became Chairperson of the prestigious Public Expenditures Committee, which reviewed all the parliamentary budgets of her government. She travelled to over 35 countries in this capacity, and discovered that the rules which governed the finances of her own country were operating worldwide. By approaching politics from the viewpoint of an average citizen, Waring challenges the assumption that the systems that currently determine how the world does business are adequately meeting the needs of both local and global communities. Using plain language laced with ironic humor, Waring makes it clear that classic economics work to benefit one particular group, while the rest of us--the vast majority--pay the price.
  • Manufactured Landscapes
    Manufactured Landscapes
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    Jennifer Baichwal 2006 1 h 26 min
    For almost three decades, internationally renowned Canadian artist Edward Burtynsky has been creating large scale photographs of landscapes transformed by industry: quarries, scrap heaps, factories, recycling yards, dams. Manufactured Landscapes follows Burtynsky to China as he travels the country capturing the evidence and effects of China's massive industrial revolution. Rarely witnessed sites such as the Three Gorges Dam (50% larger than any other dam in the world), the interior of a factory which produces 20 million irons a year, and the breathtaking scale of Shanghai's urban renewal are subjects for his lens and our motion picture camera. Shot in sumptuous super 16mm film, Manufactured Landscapes extends the narratives of Burtynsky's photographs, meditating on human impact on the planet without trying to reach simplistic judgements or reductive resolutions. In the process, the film shifts our consciousness about the world and the way we live in it.
  • Mexico Today
    Mexico Today
    1947 10 min
    The film provides a short history of Mexico and then looks at its current situation and its expectations for future development. Trade ties between Canada and Mexico are outlined.
  • The Riches of the Indies
    The Riches of the Indies
    Ian MacNeill 1958 30 min
    Part three of New Nation in the West Indies takes stock of the economic situation as it exists in the British West Indies in the year of federation. It visits various islands in the Caribbean and shows the development programs being carried out to stimulate industry and all forms of production. The interest of Canada in helping this new nation achieve a sound economy is made evident in the film.
  • Shipbreakers
    Shipbreakers
    Michael Kot 2004 1 h 12 min
    This feature documentary profiles a bustling Indian shantytown where 40,000 people live and work in the most primitive conditions. Dismantling the rusting hulks of the world’s largest ships, the workers have no protection from injury or death. On average, one worker dies every day, some from explosions or falls, but many from cancers caused by asbestos, PCBs and other toxic substances. This visually stunning film vividly captures the haunting shells of decaying industrial machinery as well as the deplorable conditions of workers in 21st century global economics.
  • Super-Companies
    Super-Companies
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    Boyce Richardson 1987 56 min
    The super-companies of this film are multi-national corporations that treat the world as one market. They take raw materials from one place, process them in another, and sell them everywhere. Shot on four continents, Super-Companies provides a provocative view of the way our world is being shaped by economic powers that are often at odds with the needs of people.
  • Up the Yangtze
    Up the Yangtze
    Yung Chang 2007 1 h 33 min
    This award-winning documentary follows the Shiu family as their home is destroyed by the rising waters of China’s Yangtze River - a consequence of the Three Gorges Project, the largest hydroelectric dam in history.
  • Who's Counting? Marilyn Waring on Sex, Lies and Global Economics
    Who's Counting? Marilyn Waring on Sex, Lies and Global Economics
    Terre Nash 1995 1 h 34 min
    Warning: This film discusses and depicts mature subjects related to sex, sex trafficking and prostitution of people of various ages. Viewer discretion is advised. In this feature-length documentary, Marilyn Waring demystifies the language of economics by defining it as a value system in which all goods and activities are related only to their monetary value. As a result, unpaid work (usually performed by women) is unrecognized while activities that may be environmentally and socially detrimental are deemed productive. Waring maps out an alternative vision based on the idea of time as the new currency.