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Community and Society (16)
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Cinéma Vérité: Defining the MomentPeter Wintonick 1999 1 h 42 minCrisis, Lonely Boy, Chronicle of a Summer. You may not know these films, but you see their influences every day--in everything from TV news to music videos to Webcams. The cinéma vérité (or direct cinema) movement of the '50s and '60s was driven by a group of rebel filmmakers tired of stilted documentaries. They wanted to show life as it really is: raw, gritty, dramatic. Rich in excerpts from vérité classics, Cinéma Vérité: Defining the Moment is the first film to capture all the excitement of a revolution that changed movie-making forever. Director Peter Wintonick's Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media is one of the bestselling documentaries of all time; co-producer Éric Michel won the Cannes Palme d'or for 50 ans, by director Gilles Carle, and co-producer Adam Symansky won an Oscar for Flamenco at 5:15. -
Drawing from LifeKaterina Cizek 2008 30 minThis short documentary follows a group therapy workshop for people who have attempted to end their lives more than once. A hybrid of vérité and animation, the film is a candid portrayal of 12 people who together, for 20 weeks, take on their fears, their behaviours and their ghosts to move towards life and away from suicide.
Drawing from Life is a production of the National Film Board of Canada's Filmmaker-in-Residence project, produced with the creative participation of Seneca College of Applied Arts & Technology, Animation Arts Centre. -
The Films of Fogo IslandDerek Norman & Jeff Webb 2019 43 minIn 1967, NFB and MUN made a series of 27 films on Fogo Island that pioneered using film as a tool in community economic development.
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Film and YouJean Palardy & Donald Peters 1948 21 minHow film councils are organized, and what they can do for the community are shown. Different people like different films--for instance, Grandpa, who goes to sleep during a sequence on kitchen planning, wakes joyfully at the sound of a square dance. But all groups agree that they want films on their programs, if they can get them, and that is where the film council comes in. Animation shows how a council is set up, and how a number of organizations in an area can collaborate in buying a projector. We see projectionist training, and the public library becoming a distribution centre for films as well as books. Finally we see film in action, as a variety of successful community projects are carried out, each directly the result of film showings.
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The Great ResistanceDenys Desjardins 2008 1 h 17 minIn the 1930s, in the throes of the Great Depression, the government relocated more than 80,000 citizens to found a new settlement in the virgin forests of Quebec's Abitibi region. After enduring backbreaking work to clear the land, however, many left, seeking a better life in the city or as labourers for the large corporations that had come to exploit the North's valuable resources. The Lalancette family, however, have persisted in forging their future on the land from one generation to the next, earning their keep from farming, and defying the constraints of globalization and the mining and forestry companies that control the area. Revisiting the heritage of Quebec filmmakers who documented Abitibi, following in the footsteps of Pierre Perrault, among others, this documentary traces a defining chapter of Quebec history and raises fundamental questions about regional development.
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Introduction to Fogo IslandColin Low 1968 16 minThis film introduces the Fogo Island/Newfoundland Project series which is an experiment in how film can be a catalyst for social change by serving as a direct means of communication. It gives some basic facts about Fogo Island, Newfoundland, and explains why it was chosen for the film project.
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Let's Talk About FilmsJulian Biggs 1953 18 minAn approach-to-film discussion showing some of the problems encountered and how they may be overcome. A group of leaders tries to recognize the factors leading to successful film discussion by observing an audience actively discussing a familiar film. In retrospect one of the group recalls being unable to arouse any response whatever with the same film. Why did one effort fail and the other succeed? These questions are closely examined by the group leaders in a workshop meeting; the centring of discussion in the group rather than in the leader is seen to be an effective technique.
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Movie ShowmanHarvey Spak 1989 29 minThis short film portrays the NFB's itinerant projectionists during the ’40s and early ’50s who travelled throughout Canada, bringing films and discussions to rural communities. The film uses a mix of dramatic re-enactments with archival footage and interviews with veterans of the movie circuit to shed light on an important period in Canadian film history.
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Mai en décembre (Godard en Abitibi)2000 25 min1968. France is in the throes of worker and student protests, and a handful of outraged filmmakers disrupts the Cannes Festival. In Quebec, the rise of nationalism leads to clashes during St. Jean Baptiste Day festivities. Against this backdrop, Jean-Luc Godard, on the heels of his hit films À bout de souffle (Breathless, 1959) and Pierrot le fou (1965), is invited to “Les dix jours du cinéma politique” (ten days of political cinema) at Montreal’s Verdi Theatre. But Godard doesn’t make the trip merely to hobnob with admirers. He has another project in mind. In Rouyn-Noranda, a television station has given him carte blanche, and he starts a revolution… This film is part of the Libre Courts collection of first documentary shorts. Seven documentaries, seven filmmakers, a fresh outlook. Daring. Emotional. Cinema.
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NFB 70 YearsJean-François Pouliot 2009 7 minAs clever and sly as any good commercial, NFB 70 Years is the work of a filmmaker in full control of his medium and his message. With humour and self-deprecation – and not a whiff of complacency – Jean-François Pouliot smartly deconstructs the backward-looking perception often attributed to films from the National Film Board. Even the way the film is made pays homage to the filmmaking techniques that have earned Canada's public film producer and distributor its enviable reputation. This artful and skilfully produced mix of genres effectively borrows from direct cinema and flirts with virtuoso animation techniques. With its funny and clever direction, tight yet ingeniously wild and furious editing, brilliantly juxtaposed sequences with powerful relevance to the present, this film confirms the essential role of the NFB within the social fabric of Canada and the world.
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Reel InjunNeil Diamond , Catherine Bainbridge , … 2009 1 h 28 minIn this feature-length documentary, Cree filmmaker Neil Diamond takes an entertaining and insightful look at the portrayal of North American Indigenous people throughout a century of cinema. Featuring hundreds of clips from old classics as well as recent releases, the film traces the evolution of the “Hollywood Indian.” Diamond guides the audience on a journey across America to some of cinema’s most iconic landscapes and conducts candid interviews with celebrities like Clint Eastwood, Robbie Robertson and Jim Jarmusch. The film is a loving look at cinema through the eyes of the people who appeared in its very first flickering images and have survived to tell their stories in their own way.
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The Summer of '67Albert Kish & Donald Winkler 1994 57 minThis feature documentary follows up on 2 important NFB documentaries that captured the turbulent year of 1967, a time when social and cultural revolution, as well as generational change, were on everyone’s mind. The first, Christopher’s Movie Matinée, followed the travels of 14 Toronto teenagers over the course of the summer, while the second, Flowers on a One-way Street, documented the conflict between the hippies of the day and Toronto City Council, over the future of the Yorkville neighbourhood, then Canada's counter-culture capital. More than 2 decades later, the filmmakers have sought out some of the films' participants, not as an exercise in nostalgia but to discover what traces remain in the lives of those who most deeply felt the impact of the '60s
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Still LongshotsDavid Finch & Maureen Marovitch 2007 52 minThis documentary demonstrates the transformative power of video through the stories of four at-risk youths. These young people have issues ranging from addiction to a life spent on the street, or in foster homes. In learning to make videos about their lives, they've discovered a creative outlet that allows them to heal. The group completes their experience by spending a weekend with a group of former street kids who did a similar workshop a decade earlier. Now in their 30s, they share their stories with their younger counterparts. Surprising, and often disturbing, parallels emerge between the two groups, along with glimmers of hope for the youth.
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Two Films by LipsettDonald Rennick 1968 28 minIn this short documentary, teenagers discuss experimental Arthur Lipsett films they have just watched. What do these films mean? What feelings or thoughts do they evoke? What do they suggest about the evolution of mankind and the future of life on Earth? The 2 Arthur Lipsett films being discussed, Free Fall and A Trip Down Memory Lane, are also included.
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V.T.R. Rosedale1974 31 minUsing video recording technology, the citizens of Rosedale, once referred to as "the rear end of Alberta" by a frustrated citizen, pulled themselves together as a community. They formed a citizens' action committee, cleaned up the town, built a park, and negotiated with the government to install gas, water and sewage systems. And all this happened within five months.
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Wapikoni - Encounter in KitcisakikMathieu Vachon 2010 51 minWapikoni – Encounter in Kitcisakik documents a visit by the Wapikoni Mobile, the celebrated studio on wheels that for the past six years has travelled through Aboriginal communities in Quebec providing production training to youth. Viewers accompany the Wapikoni Mobile team and young Algonquin singers and filmmakers into a world steeped in history, where they discover a little-known reality, a space-time where the wild beauty of the landscape contrasts with human misery and decay, where self-destruction commingles with an irrepressible will to live.
