This documentary is the story (saga) of whiskey-swilling, chain-smoking Joanna, who tries out for the University of Texas pom pom squad. In her words, “I don’t want to stand on the sidelines doing nothing, I want to stand on the sidelines doing something!” This funny video explores the relationship between gender and performance.
Filter Films
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On her immigration flight to Canada, Lailey, a young Iranian woman, encounters Snailfingers, an ancient aboriginal water-spirit. When Lailey and Snailfingers make contact, their stories become intertwined and unfold simultaneously. The drama chronicles a slice from the lives of Lailey and her sister Parvaneh, attending ESL school. Here Lailey meets Claire, the teacher’s assistant, a disillusioned lesbian of colour who represents the Sapphic voice. The secular lives of the three women are juxtaposed with Snailfingers’ spiritual existence. A poetic narrative presents glimpses of Snailfingers as she embarks on a healing quest. Several montages featuring water as the quintessential Yin element fragment the narrative flow as they elucidate the subtext. The film ends with the beginning of Claire’s journey into the Canadian bush.
Snailfingers
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Set in South Carolina on the eve of the 1969 Apollo 11 moon walk, “One Small Step” is a dramatic comedy about a rambunctious 8-year-old tomboy, Ernestine “Teen” Miller. Taught by her parents that she can be anything she wants to be, Teen learns that there is one exception to this rule when she announces to her mother that she is determined to “marry” the neighbour girl. Told from the point of view of an extremely creative and self -confident young girl, the film is a visual mixture of Teen’s real family interactions juxtaposed against her fanciful daydream life. Teen’s desire and hopes crash against the social limitations of her parents’ world in this compelling family drama.
One Small Step
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“Fries with That” is the story of one boy’s heroic triumph over the fear and awkwardness Western culture often associates with death, as explained through the eyes of his sister – a girl still too young to be tainted by negative predisposition and unnatural paranoia. As the boy sets out into the world to discover whatever good fortune may lie in what’s left of his future, we are reminded by his sister’s gift to him that in times of difficulty, often the only solution is to be found in something as simple as a box of french fries… With music provided by one of Canada’s preeminent young classical musicians – Robert MacDonald – “Fries with That” is a touching and humorous look at the natural process of death through the calm of a child.
Fries with That
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“‘Mothers of Me’ is a visually glorious, abstract study in which the filmmaker explores, partly out of fear, the women in her family, their history of insanity and their response to a repressive environment. Through the use of close-ups and fragmented composition we are compelled to participate in her examination.” – Stacey Donen, Toronto Intenational Film Festival, 1999 Awards: 2nd Prize Danzante de Plata, Festival de Cine de Huesca, Spain; Marian McMahon Award, Images Festival, 2001
Mothers of Me
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“Zyklon Portrait” is about Zyklon B – the pesticide transformed into a genocidal weapon by the Nazis in the 1940s. It is also an elegy for the filmmaker’s grandparents. After years of silence, the filmmaker’s mother finally talks about her parents’ horrific fate. “Zyklon Portrait” is a Holocaust film without Holocaust imagery: family photographs, underwater photography and hand-painted imagery draw a personal story out of historical minutiae. “Elliptical and eerily beautiful.” – John Doyle, The Globe & Mail Awards: Grand Prize, Bilbao International Festival of Documentary and Short Film, Spain; Best Short, Best Editing and Vision TV Humanitarian Award, Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival; Best Documentary Debut, New York Exposition of Short Film & Video; Special Mention, Fipresci Jury, International Documentary Filmfestival Amsterdam.
Zyklon Portrait
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As the wheel turns, the religion of the body moves to and through the physical into the psychological. We see the feared, all is moved. There is a hint of seclusion, an idea from the past re-worked and still dangerous. The participants unsure choose a convent and are still revealed. Through a window there appears a tree, and then a forest. Too many options. The monastic life, safe and sure. We cluster for the cloister. Sound by Michael Snow and John Kamevaar.
Cloister
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This film sets the focus sharply on the often maligned and misunderstood world of sadomasochism. It gives us a glimpse into the life of the Marquesa, a Toronto Dominatrix who guides the audience on a journey through the SM community, its rituals and motivations. The marquesa explores and examines her own relationship to SM, and to the submissives that make the scenes possible. There is not a deliberate attempt to justify the practices of this unique sub-culture to the mainstream, but nonetheless, this piece and the Marquesa dismantle the myths and fallacies surrounding it by straightforward and frank talk. The piece itself is a collage of film, video and animated photgraphs. Aesthetically, it possesses a warm and appealing visual dynamic that stands in contrast to the images themselves. This, coupled with the charismatic narration of the Marquesa, and the formal metaphors that underlie the subject matter, discourage the audience from engaging in a merely voyeuristic experience, but rather force them to confront these tendencies in themselves, be they initiated or not.
Marquesa – Portrait of a Dominatrix, The
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This film follows a loose narrative thread dealing with the torture of a 16-year-old runaway, leading into the darkest moments of self-realization for its three main characters. Each grapples with the reality that they have perpetuated the cycle of violence that has permeated their own lives. The film deals with how violence can seem to empower us, yet defeat us at the same time. The work exists to stress the importance of understanding this empty, desperate, territory of humanity – to acknowledge the strength of violence as a stone that may cause us to stumble if we do not keep our eyes open and firmly placed upon our common path.
All Broke Down
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“Unfortunately, not a lot of research has been done on woman-to-woman transmission,” says the Planned Parenthood Counselor. Chloe is a lesbian who discovers that her ex-girlfriend’s ex-lover has tested HIV positive. Chloe is faced with the realization that though she knows the facts about AIDS, she never thought it posed a threat to her. This frightening scenario serves as a wake-up call to lesbians who haven’t thought enough about female-to-female HIV transmission.
Chloe
