Online cinema
Geek Girls
Gina Haraszti
Nerdy women – the “hidden half” of fan culture – open up about their lives in the world of conventions, video games, and other rife-with-misogyny pop culture touchstones. While geek communities have recently risen to prominence, very little attention is paid to geek women. Filmmaker Gina Hara, struggling with her own geek identity, explores the issue with a cast of women who live geek life up to the hilt: A feminist geek blogger, a convention-trotting cosplayer, a professional gamer, a video-game designer, and a NASA engineer. Through their personal experiences in the rich cultural explosion of nerdom, Geek Girls shows both the exhilaration of newfound community and the ennui of being ostracized. These women, striving in their respective professions and passions, face the cyberbullying, harassment, and sexism that permeate the culture and the industry at large. A rich conversation-starter for any class on Pop Culture and Feminism.
Bonbons bijoux
Sylvie Laliberté
“A very self-filmed and narcissistic video composed of brief chattering sequences, since the truth is short. And the frame? I am the frame. Bonbons bijoux also transports us into the intimacy of the home. The artist uses the ridiculousness of language to underline the difficult presence of the direct, the self-referential, the authentic. Bonbons bijoux takes us to the grating borders of the “suave feminine”. The ingenue, the naughty, the naïve get rid of their negative connotations. By making incongruous associations of words, objects and ideas, the artist blurs the lines, disintegrating the preconceived limits between girl and woman, between naivety and perversity.”
Waning
Gina Haraszti
She is captured, possessed and framed by a white border, her face will only exist in photos from this point forward. As the film progresses the viewer’s focus becomes more strained as varied layers of the story are laid out before her in varied ordered. As the memory repeats itself over and over again the order in which we remember will change. What was the truth, does it remain? Did you say the right thing at the right time or have your memories replaced the truth with your perceived reality? Waning investigates the questions of memory and death through the use of multiple layers of canted angles in one stationary shot. Layer upon layer builds up as Haraszti delivers the source, and the horror of the opening shot.
Sidings of the Afternoon
Gina Haraszti
Follow my train of thought, my shifting perception of the space around me, my fleeting relationships with nature and my urban cell. Seasons passing by while I stare at the same three objects in my house. What is outside, what will we find when we emerge? How will we move on when our toxic relationship with a virus that paralyzed our urban bodies end? Scathed or unscathed? Dreams, algae, shadows, flowers and knives. What can a filmmaker do when they are locked in during a pandemic? They make a film using a computer. With the participation of game scholars and academics from the Technoculture, Art and Games Research Centre, a town was built in Minecraft following the principles of Bauhaus. Just like the designers and artists of Bauhaus, we also need to rethink the way we use spaces, objects, cities. Beyond thinking about medical safety, as humans we need spaces that expand beyond our bodies’ physical circumference. Just like the light-shadow structures built by Moholy-Nagy, our inner worlds are bigger than the space our bodies take up. In Siding of…
Blanc comme neige
Geneviève Poulette
A father, a son. A snowy retreat, once busy, deep in the woods. A tête-à-tête that will change their lives forever…
Meet-Market.ca
Geneviève Poulette
Marie-Hélène (director) and Zoé (stylist), two friends who have been single for (too) long, get together every Friday night to party and forget about their marital status. One Friday, very drunk, they decide to register on the dating site (www.meet-market.ca) Meet-Market.ca. From virtual exchanges to face-to-face meetings, they will go from surprise to surprise… And so will their partners!
Jingle
Geneviève Poulette
Simon Paquet, an advertising copywriter in an agency, becomes so obsessed with his work that he gradually sees his life slipping out of control. The arrival of Magic Dave, an exceptional ideator, at the agency, provokes a merciless confrontation where Simon’s lucidity will be put to the test.
Juan Antonio Muñoz López: El mago del Coyoácan (Le magicien de Coyoácan)
Geneviève Poulette
Scraps of metal, a piece of cardboard, a soda can… From everything and nothing, Juan Antonio Muñoz López recycles insignificant objects into toys for children. He recreates a colorful universe where traditions are perpetuated and where the curiosity of young and old is solicited. A passion that has been with him for… sixty-three years.
Kafarnaüm
Geneviève Poulette
Sisters: Dream & Variations
Catherine Legault
Tyr and Jasa grew up in an artistic household where art was a way of life. Quirky and insightful sisters, Tyr is a musician and singer while Jasa is an interdisciplinary artist. Inspired by their great-grandmother’s recordings of Icelandic folk songs, they have developed artistic practices that draw on their colourful imaginations and Icelandic roots. Their exploration leads them to journey to Iceland for the first time and collaborate on a project that brings together their artistic disciplines and cultural heritage. In her debut feature film Sisters: Dream & Variations, Catherine Legault immerses us in an oneiric world made up of animation, performances and cinema vérité. More than a portrait, the film is an inspiring look at the artistic approach, its various forms and how it can simultaneously express and explore who we are.
Amoureuses
Louise Sigouin
For the first time, cloistered nuns agree to be filmed for a year in all aspects of their lives. The nuns of Berthierville, the only French-speaking community of Dominican nuns in North America for nearly a century, reveal themselves in a rare and unique documentary in which testimonies and exceptional archives are interwoven. We invite you on a spiritual journey to the heart of the monastery’s intimacy.
Shift
Liz Singh
A black, or possibly gray, comedy about hamburgers, strap-ons and one waitress’ defining moment.