A Foreign Language

This 1959 documentary short is a frank portrait of the daily operations inside the Montreal General Hospital’s emergency ward.

A light, humorous look at the motor car and the great North American itch for a place on the road. From the comparative peace of Honest Joe's used-car lot, this film hustles you onto our public speedways, where hot rubber erases any distance between all points. Slow-motion and pop-on-pop-off photography make this a provocative, revealing study of motormania unlimited. A 1960 black and white production. (Also released under the title 1/3 Down and 24 Months to Pay.)

This short documentary features Canadian contralto Maureen Forrester as she sings at the Festival Casals, a musical event founded by the great Spanish cellist and conductor Pablo Casals and sponsored annually by the Puerto Rican government. Part concert film, part tourism film, Festival in Puerto Rico offers viewers candid glimpses of mid-20th century Puerto Rico intercut with performance footage of Forrester and her husband, violinist-conductor Eugene Kash.

St. Joseph's Oratory, a picturesque shrine silhouetted against Mount Royal, draws pilgrims by the thousands every year. They come from California by Greyhound bus, from Vancouver by plane, and on foot from many parishes surrounding Montréal. What is the fame of this shrine, that it attracts the devout and the curious alike? The story is told by Brother Placide Vermandère of the Order of the Holy Cross, who was personally acquainted with Brother André, after whom the shrine's famous temple is named. Cameras follow a procession of the League of the Sacred Heart through the streets of the city to the famous sanctuary and show many of the religious observances conducted in the church, including Mass attended by invalids who come in the hope of being healed of various afflictions.

The misbehaving public performs for the camera in a half-hour miscellany of misdeeds. In a behind-the-scenes look at the hour-by-hour operation of a large metropolitan police force, this film presents a fair sampling of what keeps Toronto's police officers busy twenty-four hours a day.

An attempt to recapture the magic of childhood as the cameras follow children at play.

Features interviews with two-time Palme d'Or winner Michael Haneke and his key collaborators, alongside excerpts from his films.

A BAFTA award winning documentary investigating the work undertaken by the Ancient Monuments Division of the Department of the Environment in preserving the fabric of structures from Neolithic to Georgian.

A study of the major empires—including the Dutch, the British, and the American—putting into perspective the “Big Cycle” that has driven the successes and failures of all the world’s major countries throughout history. Revealing the timeless and universal forces behind these shifts and using them to look into the future, offering practical principles for positioning oneself for what’s ahead.

An Indonesian documentary about the destructive impact of coal mining.