Documentaries are more widely available now than ever thanks to streaming platforms... but who benefits from algorithm curation? Are viewers hopelessly adrift amid formulaic content?
Keep ReadingNetflix has arguably mastered a formula for documentary series with hits like Tiger King, but will the equation hold in the long run?
Keep ReadingPrague’s premiere documentary film festival launched the year I left the Czech Republic in a Trabant, the petite paper car made famous in a scene in Emir Kustirica’s Black Cat, White Cat,
Keep ReadingFilm histories are highly selective and reflect the biases, tastes and viewing experiences of those who write them. I hope that my following sampling of inward-looking political and activist docs may help
Keep ReadingThis year’s Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival opened with Bee Nation, a crowd-pleasing feel-good story about First Nations kids and their families as they fought like hell to win Canada’s Spelling
Keep ReadingSeveral of the conversations I’ve had about the current state of documentary in Canada at this year’s Hot Docs have turned on issues relating to both the cultural politics and the political
Keep ReadingThe notion that an Indigenous spelling bee competition could serve as the cohesive force to unite disparate First Nations children across Canada under one nation, as the title of Hot Docs’s 2017
Keep ReadingAlthough there is nothing new in the content, Documentary succeeds as an important curatorial intervention.
Keep ReadingOf starfish and jellyfish“Isn’t it better to have a lot of people seeing films that convince them to make a little bit of change, instead of only a few people seeing films
Keep ReadingThe New Nordic Documentary Cinema is marked by an impulse toward humanist storytelling that combines the personal with the political.
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