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Stream Canadian documentaries at NFB.ca

Essays - Page 2

Deep dives that explore the world through the lens of documentary.

Filmmaker Spike Lee sits atop a discarded mattress outside a house. He is wearing white pants and a white shirt with white sneakers.

The Truth, Ruth

by Alexander Mooney
February 13, 2026
Essays/Features

On the documentaries of Spike Lee and an artist who never shies away from the truth, whatever form the story takes.

Keep Reading
Two male high school students lean against a brick wall. The one on the left is wearing a red t-shirt with a dark striped tie, and the one on the right is wearing a tan trench coat, white shirt, and loose black tie. He is holding the lapels of the coat.

Faking It: Mockumentaries Tell the Truth — or Do They?

by Winnie Wang
February 9, 2026
Essays/Features

How mockumentaries like The Dirties, Punishment Park, and The Clowns play with our suspension of disbelief and the line between fiction and non-fiction.

Keep Reading

Pyrrhic Victories: Stories from Palestine and Israel

by Daniel Glassman
December 22, 2025
Essays/Features

Documentaries reflect stories from Israel and Palestine with varying struggles to be seen and heard--and to satisfy everyone amid the culture wars.

Keep Reading
Actress Pamela Anderson stands on a beach and looks reflectively at the water. Her hand is raised to her mouth. She is wearing a white sweater.

Investigating the Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

by Rachel Ho
December 18, 2025
Essays/Features

Celebrity documentaries like Pamela, a love story; Pee-Wee as Himself; and Elvis Presley: The Searcher represent varying degrees of access and exploration in a growing field of docs about famous names.

Keep Reading
Maya Abdallah speaks into microphones during a press scrum. She is wearing a keffiyeh and a black hijab.

The Kids Are Alright: Student Protest in A Night of Knowing Nothing and The Encampments

by Nidhil Vohra
November 10, 2025
Essays/Features

Documentaries The Encampments and A Night of Knowing Nothing share the art of student protest with distinct methods.

Keep Reading
A image from a police body camera shows a neighbourhood and a field. There is a police car on the right with a crowd of people nearby.

Caught Live: Body Cams, Surveillance Videos, and the New Era of Found Footage

by Jason Gorber
October 15, 2025
Essays/Features

Documentaries like The Perfect Neighbor and 2000 Meters to Andriivka elevate the found footage genre via body-cams and surveillance videos.

Keep Reading
A man in a dark cave stands with his back to the camera, holding a flashlight towards the cave wall while looking at a white spiral on the rocks.

A Travelling Spirit: The Journeys Within While the Green Grass Grows

by Marc Glassman
September 28, 2025
Essays/Interviews

Director Peter Mettler discusses his seven-part documentary epic While the Green Grass Grows and its exploration of life, place, family, and time.

Keep Reading
A black and white archival photo of a group of Black women in the 1960s, sitting against a white brick wall and talking.

How True North Captures the Black Power Movement in Canada and Abroad

by Pat Mullen
September 3, 2025
Essays/Interviews/TIFF

An interview with True North director Michèle Stephenson on her documentary about the 1969 occupation at Sir George Williams University and the larger global currents of which it was a part.

Keep Reading
An image of a man's hand's holding a tablet and a wand above a messy desk. The tablet has a black screen with the letters AI in a white rectangle in the centre, while the screen is dotted with white lines and markings.

Does Generative Artificial Intelligence Represent Reality in Filmmaking?

by Nidhil Vohra
August 21, 2025
Essays/Industry

On the ethical and environmental dangers of a growing practice of generative artificial intelligence and its use in filmmaking.

Keep Reading
In a vintage photograph, an elderly Black man stands beside a dark blue car. The man is wearing a white shirt, blue slacks, and a white brimmed hat. He is holding a cane.

Shifting Forms: Black Auteurs Explore Diverse Canvases

by Courtney Small
August 18, 2025
Essays/Features

Films by Kahlil Joseph, Steve McQueen, Alice Diop, Mati Diop, John Akomfrah, and Isaac Julien navigate fiction and non-fiction while explore diverse Black experiences.

Keep Reading
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Prime Minster Brian Mulroney appears in a fantastical image. He is pictured from the waist up wearing a flamboyant Liberace-style coat. There is a dazzling background behind him with campaign signs. He looks pale and a bit like a vampire.

CURRENT ISSUE

Issue 126: Fall/Winter 2026

Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney is Matthew Rankin's irreverent docufantasia about Canada's 18th PM.

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More reviews from Toronto! 👍👍 📽 Musk 📽 The Final More reviews from Toronto! 👍👍

📽 Musk
📽 The Final Act
📽 Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney 
📽 Rescue
📽 2.6 Seconds: Fresh in the Outback
📽 Re/Pair
📽 Tehran, Under the Skin

🔗 visit POVmagazine.com for all our Tehran from the festival. 

#tiff26 #tiff #moviereview #movies #documentary
The #tiff26 reviews keep rolling in! 🔗 Visit POVm The #tiff26 reviews keep rolling in!

🔗 Visit POVmagazine.com for our critics' takes on:
📽 Darlene Love: I Know Where I've Been
📽 Turtle Island Rap
📽 Black Sunflowers
📽 Edward Said: Between Worlds
📽 Still Night, Burning House 

#moviereview #tiff #film #documentary
Canadian hero Rick Hansen introduces MAN IN MOTION Canadian hero Rick Hansen introduces MAN IN MOTION at #tiff26!

#maninmotion #rickhansen #disability #tiff
#BleedingHearts is love at first sight. 🫶 Ahead o #BleedingHearts is love at first sight. 🫶

Ahead of the film's @tiff_net premiere, director Andrew Morgan tells us about filming the @chaparelle story from the beginning.

📽 premieres at @tiff_net 
🔗 link in bio

#tiff26 #Chaparelle #music #country
At the world premiere of #BlackSunflowers! 🇺🇦 Hug At the world premiere of #BlackSunflowers! 🇺🇦

Huge standing ovation for story of young Ukrainians soldiers, ravers, and photographers in wartime.

Executive producer Sean Penn introduces, while director James Marcus Haney reads a letter from Sofia, a soldier who couldn't attend, and a local Ukrainian choir sets the mood. 👏👏

#tiff26 #tiffdocs #seanpenn #slavaukraini
The TIFF Docs reviews are rolling in! Expect to h The TIFF Docs reviews are rolling in!

Expect to hear a lot more about these films in the fall circuit:
📽 Union Town
📽 Once Upon a Time in Harlem
📽 Low Lies the Land
📽 Rapinoe
📽 Like Magic
📽 Gail 

🔗 Read more at POVmagazine.com and stay tuned for more!

#tiff26 #movies #documentary #moviereview #film
"You only need two buyers to make a bidding war." "You only need two buyers to make a bidding war."

Full house for the State of Documentary panel at TIFF: The Market. Despair and optimism with equal measure. 💰

#documentary #filmmaking #tiff #TIFF26
A hero's journey comes full circle in MAN IN MOTIO A hero's journey comes full circle in MAN IN MOTION: THE RICK HANSEN STORY. 👩‍🦼

Director Adrien Buitenhuis tells @filmfest_ca how the doc came to be. 

📽 premieres today at @tiff_net 
🔗 interview link in bio

#tiff26 #maninmotion #rickhansen #movies #disability
Drink deep with #LowLiesTheLand. Emanuele Gerosa t Drink deep with #LowLiesTheLand. Emanuele Gerosa tells us about "slowly, slowly" observing hard working hands in Piemonte's wine region. 🍇

📽 Premieres at @tiff_net 
🔗 Interview link in bio
🍷Santé!

#TIFF26 #wine #movies #piemonte
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  • Anchors Aweigh Review: Down with the Ship
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A crowd of people protest in Iran. A few people stand in the foreground, while a large picture of the Shah is in the background.

Rehearsals for a Revolution Offers a Personal Act of Resistance

September 17, 2026
The face of a white man with an early 2000s' hairstyle is pictured beside a fuzzy TV screen showing a scene from Family Guy, where an overweight man in a suit sits at a table with a white dog.

Anchors Aweigh Review: Down with the Ship

September 16, 2026
A collage of film film stills includes a pair of Chinese-Canadian kids in a restaurant booth, an animated cityscape, a Cree mother and daughter making bannock, an animated beadwork design, and a black and white photo of a delivery driver.

How Five Filmmakers Redefined What It Means to Be Canadian through Film

September 16, 2026
An Iranian woman is pictured in close up, lying beneath a teal surgical sheet. The sheet covers her body, with a hole cut that exposes her face from the nose to her chin.

Tehran, Under the Skin Review: Women, Life, Face Lifts

September 15, 2026

Musk Review: Or, the Totality of Dread

September 15, 2026

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Prime Minster Brian Mulroney appears in a fantastical image. He is pictured from the waist up wearing a flamboyant Liberace-style coat. There is a dazzling background behind him with campaign signs. He looks pale and a bit like a vampire.

CURRENT ISSUE

Issue 126: Fall/Winter 2026

Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney is Matthew Rankin's irreverent docufantasia about Canada's 18th PM.

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