Yannick Carrier

Global pandemics are like prairie thunderstorms. Full of terror and havoc, they eventually pass. Bringing a new baby into the world can also feel like a storm.

After marrying a settler, Mary Two-Axe Earley lost her legal status as a First Nations woman. Dedicating her life to activism, she campaigned to have First Nations women's rights restored and coordinated a movement that continues to this day. Kahnawake filmmaker Courtney Montour honours this inspiring leader while drawing attention to contemporary injustices that remain in this era of truth and reconciliation.

As the world learns to live again in the midst of the pandemic, for many Arabic-speaking LGBTQ+ people living in Montreal, this is just a period of time like any other. When you’ve fled homophobic violence in your home country and endured a painful migratory journey, or you still face social prejudices stemming from intercultural and intergenerational conflicts, surviving social isolation is nothing new.

As the world learns to live again in the midst of the pandemic, for many Arabic-speaking LGBTQ+ people living in Montreal, this is just a period of time like any other. When you’ve fled homophobic violence in your home country and endured a painful migratory journey, or you still face social prejudices stemming from intercultural and intergenerational conflicts, surviving social isolation is nothing new.

Una joven se describe a sí misma utilizando los superlativos más deslumbrantes, destacando todo lo que se espera de ella. Sin embargo, la narración visual cuenta una historia completamente diferente, ilustrando con fuerzala la dinámica maligna de nuestra época, el gran malestar: nuestro constante esfuerzo por presentar una imagen de perfección y el miedo paralizante al fracaso y la insuficiencia.

Kenbe La: Until We Win chronicles the inspiring journey of Alain Philoctète, an artist and activist who dreams of developing a permaculture project in his native country even as he fights an ongoing battle with cancer.

A reflection on the fate of humanity in the Anthropocene epoch, White Noise is a roller-coaster of a film, a whirlwind of sounds and images. The fourth feature-length work by Simon Beaulieu, this film essay plunges viewers into a subjective sensory adventure—a direct physical encounter with the information overload of daily life. White Noise transforms the imminent collapse of our civilization into a visceral aesthetic experience.

A reflection on the fate of humanity in the Anthropocene epoch, White Noise is a roller-coaster of a film, a whirlwind of sounds and images. The fourth feature-length work by Simon Beaulieu, this film essay plunges viewers into a subjective sensory adventure—a direct physical encounter with the information overload of daily life. White Noise transforms the imminent collapse of our civilization into a visceral aesthetic experience.

A documentary that explores what it means to be a young person in Quebec after the dissolution of the Quebec sovereignty movement.

Quebec, on the cusp of the 1960s. The province is on the brink of momentous change. Deftly selecting clips from nearly 200 films from the National Film Board of Canada archives, director Luc Bourdon reinterprets the historical record, offering us a new and distinctive perspective on the Quiet Revolution.

A non-narrative hand-painted visual poem about diaspora, homeland, and the tragic mass-deportations of the Kalmyk people during WWII.

Feisty, fiercely independent and firmly rooted in place, 90 year-old Mabel Robinson broke barriers back in the 40s when she became the first woman in Hubbards, Nova Scotia, to launch her own business—a hairdressing salon where she still provides shampoo-n-sets over 70 years later. Weaving animation and archival imagery with intimate and laugh out loud moments in the salon, the film celebrates the power of friendship, doing what you love and staying active. With no desire to retire anytime soon, Mabel gives voice to a generation who are not front and center of cinema or the pop hairstyles of the day, and subtly shifts the lens on our perception of beauty and the elderly.

Carole Laganière dives deeply into personal territory in this beautifully crafted exploration of absence and loss and its painful effect on daily lives. Inspired by her mother’s steadily advancing Alzheimer’s and the inevitability of her estrangement, Laganière weaves their story with the stories of others wrestling with loss: Ines, an immigrant who returns to her birth country of Croatia to find the mother who abandoned her during the war; Deni, an American author who’s finally able to search for his Quebec roots; and Nathalie, who’s desperately looking for her missing sister. Through their experiences the film ponders how absence is often the catalyst for a quest—a quest for information, understanding and often acceptance. Through its many voices, Absences speaks to us of the immense fragility and resiliency of human emotions.

Una historia sobre la eterna búsqueda humana de un hogar, que empieza como deben empezar este tipo de aventuras, con un sueño utópico. Tras un viaje en el que han tenido que llevar a rastras, de forma inverosímil, su preciada bañera, Solomon y Berta son dos recién llegados a una tierra que les promete el merecido reposo tras su largo periplo. (FILMAFFINITY)

In this documentary shot at Canadian Forces Base Petawawa during a troop deployment to Afghanistan, children and teens talk about the particular circumstances of having soldiers as parents. Directed by Claire Corriveau, Children of Soldiers lifts the veil on a reality shared by thousands of young Canadians, and on the difficulty of finding a balance between loyalty to the troops and staying true to themselves.

In this short film, filmmaker Jobie Weetaluktuk mixes archival and new footage to make a statement about the appropriation of Inuit culture throughout history.

“A primary metaphor for dance is simply transformation,” explains Peggy Baker as her image dissolves into a flurry of loose contour drawings and ink splatters. Built around an intimate interview with the acclaimed Canadian dancer and choreographer, Peggy Baker Four Phrases is an artful animation and documentary hybrid that travels through a variety of techniques to celebrate Baker’s work and legacy.

En 1818, la familia Bell empieza a percibir extraños fenómenos. Al principio, son simples sonidos: pequeños ruidos inexplicables, una respiración dificultosa, pasos; pero con el tiempo la potencia de estas manifestaciones paranormales aumenta. El espíritu que las produce se vuelve agresivo y empieza a descargar su ira sobre John Bell y su hija Betsy, víctima de violentos y constantes ataques. En 1998 fue hallado un manuscrito de un maestro de escuela (que había convivido con los Bell), en el que se revelaba la causa del maleficio.