Women-filmmakers

Une bien belle ville

A documentary about housing issues in Montreal and the large-scale demolitions that took place in working-class neighbourhoods, particularly on Saint-Jacques and Saint-Norbert streets.

The Big Sweep

_The Big Sweep_ is a caustic and humorous challenge to the traditional male and female roles and stereotypes inculcated by our upbringing. The film illustrates two opposing worlds: that of the “eternal masculine” and that of the “eternal feminine” through the behaviors, concerns, work and aspirations of women and men, and through the games, projects and dreams of children.

Barbaracadabra

Sixty years after playing a cult role, Barbara—recovering from a debilitating injury—is torn between her desire to direct her first film and her fear of failure. With only Renaud, her friend in his thirties, to help her, they attempt the impossible, defying time and doubt. Creation, like healing, requires courage and patience. _Barbaracadabra_ is a magic trick unfolding in real time: chaotic, u...

Negra

Filmmaker Medhin Tewolde Serrano was around seven years old when, for the first time, someone shouted “negra” at her in the street. That day, she realized she was Black — and the laughter around her quickly made it clear that this probably wasn’t a good thing… Through the stories of five women of African descent living in Mexico, _Negra_ explores what it means to inhabit the body of a Black wom...

Une nef... et ses sorcières

For a year, thirteen authors and actresses teamed up to stage \_La nef des sorcières\_, played at the Théâtre du Nouveau Monde in Montréal in 1976. In addition to excerpts from the six monologues on the situations and contradictions experienced by the women, the film presents the comments of the participants in this adventure.

Un toit, un droit

Is it normal for a family to find itself homeless on July 1st? Is it normal for immigrants to be evicted from their apartments? Camera in hand, the Collectif (...) Parenthèses went to meet tenants and landlords in Quebec and Europe to answer this vital question: shouldn't housing be a right for every citizen?

Pushing Through

In the stark Québec winter, ice floes cover the St. Lawrence River. Otherworldly, determined silhouettes appear, and we fall into the cadence of ice canoes rowing into an unfathomable landscape. Producing sensations as extreme as the surroundings, the voyage immerses us in the elements and confounds us with a close focus on astonishing, minute details. The film explores how our interior and ext...

OrHoDa

Along the Amur River, mountains abound with mysterious lively treasures. The gifts of the sky were only visible to those who honor the powers that flow through the vast taiga. To find what human desires, ritual offerings to the mountain’s guardian spirits must be properly performed. But most importantly, one must face the gods with a serene, translucent heart. An animated reinterpretation of an...

Okurimono

Noriko Oi, a Japanese Canadian who has lived in Montreal for more than 20 years, is preparing to return to Nagasaki, her hometown, to help her siblings clear out the family home that will soon be sold. Within the walls of this old house lie fragments of the Oi family’s history. Noriko decides to reconstruct the past of her mother, Mitsuko, an atomic bomb survivor, in the hope of coming to terms...

Manicouagan

Porté par une quête, ce film dévoile de manière onirique la rencontre d'individus hors du commun qui habitent le vaste territoire de Manicouagan-Uapishka et qui contribuent ensemble à en définir les empreintes géomorphologiques et socioculturelles à travers le temps. Il explore avec sensibilité les liens profonds qui existent entre les humains et la nature. Les Innus de Pessamit partagent leur ...

Les femmes me touchent

A musical film based on a song by _Les Folles Alliées_, illustrating the unacceptable insults directed at the female body and intellect: sexual harassment, sexist advertisements and music videos, pornography, domestic violence, and rape.

Don't Worry, The Doors Will Open

Shot over summer and winter seasons on _elektrychkas_, typical Soviet commuter trains that travel between the Ukrainian capital Kyiv and small provincial towns, _Don’t Worry, The Doors Will Open_ invites us to share a ride with working class, mostly marginalized passengers and vendors. Following a number of people from one grimy wagon to another, from station to station, from day to night, we a...