Videoteca

location_onOttawa, OntariopublicCA

The Queen of My Dreams 2024 star_border 10
Azra is worlds apart from her conservative Muslim mother. When her father suddenly dies on a trip home to Pakistan, Azra finds herself on a Bollywood-inspired journey through memories, both real and imagined; from her mother’s youth in Karachi to her own coming- of-age in rural Canada.

Asog 2023
This unique narrative incorporating documentary elements follows Rey, a 40-year-old non-binary teacher and typhoon survivor, on a roadtrip to fame. With surreal comedy and social portrait realism, filmmaker Seán‌ Devlin explores climate change, LGBTQ+ issues, and the impact of colonialism on contemporary Philippines.

Retrograde 2023 star_border 3
A minor traffic citation spirals into an all-consuming obsession for a neurotic young woman.

Cabbage 2023
An intimate film made in collaboration with the filmmaker's family, Cabbage looks at the complexities of bodily autonomy within an ableist paradigm. Taking place in the months leading up to an international move from Canada back home to Ireland – a country they had to leave a decade prior due to severe cuts in disability services – the film focuses on her brother’s writings using eye tracking technology and her mother’s memories to explore how we shape a sense of self under the pervasive weight of unspoken assumptions and fixed definitions that get placed onto bodies. Dissecting layers of language, agency and power, the film is a subtle examination of how a human life is measured and valued.

Ratgirl 2023 star_border 10
Ratgirl, a diffident 19 year-old woman, as she and her older roommate Alice discover their apartment is infested with rats — a claim which is adamantly ignored by their miserly landlord. Over the course of a hellish fourty-eight hours, Ratgirl unconfidently navigates sexual harassment, housing instability, ex-friendships, and suppressed mental illness.

occhiolino 2022

Geographies of Solitude 2022 star_border 8.2
An immersion into the rich landscapes of Sable Island and the life of Zoe Lucas, a naturalist and environmentalist who has lived over 40 years on this remote strip of sand.

Dreams on Fire 2021 star_border 10
Fleeing to Tokyo with the hopes that she can fulfil her dream of becoming a dancer, Yume is met with the harsh reality that success isn’t something that comes quickly or easily. Whilst juggling her job as a hostess in Tokyo’s red-light district, Yume throws herself headfirst into studying the artform and integrating herself into the underground dance community.

The Embrace of the Valkyries 2019
Four dancers perform in a violent, wild and organic landscape. A metaphor for what unites human with the biosphere.

It's Nothing 2019
A recent graduate is urged by an impossibly perfect woman to start digging a hole in a nearby park, setting in motion a chain of events that threaten her emotional balance and carefully maintained routines.

Handler is crazy 2019
A short documentary following Koyote Moone and her medical and psychiatric service dog Banner. This film explores issues surrounding non-visible disabilities and discrimination against service dog teams.

Labour/Leisure 2019
The Okanagan Valley in the southern interior of British Columbia is marketed as a destination of leisure, recreation, retirement and wealth. Behind this facade is a largely invisible agricultural labour force, comprised of temporary migrant workers from the Global South. These workers are placed in a system that is inherently precarious and potentially exploitative, wherein their legal status is tied directly to their employer, with no path to permanent citizenship. While the workers pay into Canadian health care and pension plans, they do not benefit from these social goods as temporary citizens. This film aims to make this labour visible, while contemplating the prescribed aesthetics imposed on the landscape within the region. Formally, the film resides at the intersection of photography and the moving image, while embracing the generative structural limitations of early cinema.

Digging Up the Last Spike 2019
"Digging Up the Last Spike" is a video from Kamala Todd's installation piece at the exhibition Hexsa'a̱m: To Be Here Always, shown at the Morris and Helen Belkin Gallery in 2019. It documents Todd's journey to the Kingcome Inlet fish farms via boat, the only access to the remote area.

Twice Upon a Time 2017
Twice Upon a Time is a fairy tale for all generations about a king with split personality, split time and a split screen. It is a story about dual nature of kings and things and how playing cards came to be. One half of the King represents a barbaric King, a crude but fearless warrior. The other half of his is a King-poet, a man of graceful poise and manners. They share their conscience, but have opposing wishes and desperately want to get rid of each other.

Did You Wonder Who Fired the Gun? 2017 star_border 6.2
“In 1946, my great-grandfather murdered a black man named Bill Spann and got away with it.” So begins Travis Wilkerson’s critically acclaimed documentary, DID YOU WONDER WHO FIRED THE GUN?, which takes us on a journey through the American South to uncover the truth behind a horrific incident and the societal mores that allowed it to happen. Acting as narrator and guide, Wilkerson spins a strange, frightening tale, incorporating scenes from TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, the music of Janelle Monáe and Phil Ochs, and the story of Rosa Parks’ investigation into the Recy Taylor case, as well as his own family history, for a gripping investigation into our collective past and its echoes into the present day.

Shepherds in the Cave 2017
An international team of art restorers and archaeologists begin work on the restoration of medieval frescoes inside a network of ancient caves. Faced with local bureaucratic challenges and systemic neglect of archaeological sites, the team encounters a community of shepherds and migrants that have used the caves for centuries and discover a living culture worth preserving most of all.

Illegal_its Impact on the Body 2016
A compilation from histories of illegal immigrants in Canada, nomadic friends who quickly disappeared into new identities or were forcibly deported. There are around approx. 200.000 illegal immigrants in Canada. This video is just a spark of their constant re-invention of freedom, endurance, and resistance. The last amnesty was in the 1980’s, and the only pathway to legal status is under a Humanitarian & Compassionate application with an estimated 5% success rate..

Legend of the Storm 2015
Nine-year-old Otsí:tsa's innocence is destroyed when violence engulfs her community during the Oka Crisis, a 78-day standoff that erupted between the Mohawk Nation and the Canadian Government during the summer of 1990. Otsí:tsa, however, has something to prove - not only to herself, but to the world. She's a tough Mohawk girl who will not be defeated.

2.57k 2015 star_border 1
Far away, inexplicable forces shape matter into form. And so life begins: people arise from dust and are drawn to each other by the magical frequency of 2,750 Hz. Captivating, beautiful and stirring, the short film 2.57k allows us to see and hear the extraordinary.

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