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One of a series of French-Canadian folk songs, this film was illustrated by Norman McLaren for the Chants populaires series. White gouache drawings on black cards were photographed with overlapping ‘zooms’ to suggest the forward movement of a canoe along rivers and lakes. This film appears in Chants populaires no. 5 and in Chants populaires no. 6.
Apples and Oranges is designed to raise children's awareness of the harmful effects of homophobia and gender-related name calling, intolerance, stereotyping and bullying. In the course of a lively in-class discussion among elementary students and an equity educator, children's paintings magically dissolve into two short animated stories. In Anta's Revenge, Anta finds out that creativity--not revenge--is the best way to deal with a school bully who makes fun of her for having two moms. Defying Gravity tells the story of Habib and Jeroux, two skateboarding friends whose relationship comes to a screeching halt when one of them finds out the other is gay.
A young Japanese orphan, and her mystical friend, exact poetic justice on a malevolent samurai lord.
The first thematic mini documentary about revolutionary filmmaker Norman McLaren.
This short animation is bleak and apparently grim, but it is an assertive statement on self-determination and the fundamental need for both dark and light. This film was made as part of the first edition of the NFB's Hothouse apprenticeship.
Two skaters looking for their next big adventure help an old person with their groceries.
Under camera short animated film following the story of a weeping willow.
The film's soundtrack is an original musical composition produced with synthetic sound - through photographing unusual geometric shapes and running them through an optical sound head. The images are an artistic rendering of this soundtrack.
The film emphasizes the wartime need for remodelling old clothes, to avoid the purchase of new garments.
Video Intstallation
The Madballs are a zany animated rock band who rock and roll their way across the galaxy. Music is illegal on their home planet so they make a break for it on Earth.
A montage of watercolour images of the work and occasional play of a farm family.
Exploring the business of inventing stuff
In this very short animation, an apparition reveals itself through celluloid and transmits vestiges of a forgotten provenance. Have the onlookers interpreted its signs correctly or was the message misunderstood? Inspired by found sound of two people’s discovery of a mysterious event in the sky. Produced as part of the 11th edition of the NFB’s Hothouse apprenticeship.
A brand-new little book gets lost in the vast maze of a grand library and journeys through every section in search of where he belongs, only to realize that the most meaningful place to be isn't always where you fit in best.
Astride his motorcycle, Oskar is confronted with an impossible choice: should he face his inner turmoil or keep riding away from it?
To a percussive soundtrack, a succession of more complex animals forms and is consumed by their successors (all formed from beads). Finally, We reach man, who develops ever more sophisticated forms of war.
Storms manufactured with linocut and monotype.
The delightful handiwork of directors Benoit Therriault and Pierre-Hugues Dallaire with the team at Montreal’s Rodeo FX, this animation charms viewers with the story of a boy and a bird who find hope and connection in the deepest and darkest of places.
What could the illness afflicting Henri Castagnette be? Filled with anxiety, the young man puts his fate in the hands of the off-puttingly exuberant Dr. Von Strudel. In The Turtle Syndrome, Samuel Cantin, author of the popular “motormouth” graphic novels Phobie des moments seuls and Whitehorse, recounts the story of an endearing anti-hero’s frenzied and hilarious medical appointment. Produced by the NFB, The Turtle Syndrome is part of the Comic Strip Chronicles collection.
Jean-François Boisvenue tells us about his childhood fears and his history of mental illness. On the screen, we can see a series of hand-drawn animations projected onto his body that plunges us into psychosis and depersonalization. The whole was captured by the camera without postproduction effects.
Non-narrative short film featuring a cowboy frog, LEGO minifigures, and a character dressed as a fish in a cosmic universe.
At Archer’s Aunty Gladys’ funeral, he hears a tap on the window — it’s a bear named Jesus, who has come for Archer’s mom. “A Bear Named Jesus” is an allegory for religious interference, with an aching yet humorous look at estrangement and mourning for the loss of someone still living.
Lessons is an animated poem, rendered on paper in home made ink, about growing up, summers spent at the family cottage, and the impact our actions have on our environment.
A man exchanges his shadow for wealth, then, disappointed with the result, he has to be content with the seven-league boots, which will help him to find his way.
Bailouts, stimulus packages, debt piled upon debt…Where will it all end? How did we get into a situation where there has never been more material wealth & productivity and yet everyone is in debt to bankers? And now, all of a sudden, the bankers have no money and we the taxpayers, have to rescue them by going even further into debt! Money as debt II explores the baffling, fraudulent and destructive arithmetic of the money system that holds us hostage to a forever growing DEBT… and how we might evolve beyond it into a new era.
In a rural Philippine market, a street dog scavenges for scraps while a mother and son, fleeing Canada, search for a fresh start. All are torn apart by their own kind, one for stolen meat, the others for a debt that can never be paid.
In this short animation, the archetypal hero takes a journey through seven stages: birth, childhood, mission, labyrinth, monster, battle and death/rebirth. Through purely abstract, moving images, the corresponding emotional states are conveyed: calm, love, joy, surprise, fear, anger/hate, and death/rebirth leading again to calm. The cycles continue until the stars burn out and there is nothing left. Minotaur was created stereoscopically in IMAX® Sandde (Stereoscopic ANimation Drawing Device) , the world's first freehand stereoscopic 3D animation software.
This short animation transports us from the farthest conceivable point of the universe to the tiniest particle of existence, an atom of a living human cell. The art of animation and animation camera achieve this exhilarating journey with a freshness and clarity. Without words.
After an airship suffers a mid-air collision, a fellow captain initiates a rescue mission.
animation by Sabrina Ratté
A hauntingly beautiful film about the world's flight into chaos. Rimmer has taken McLaren's camera-less technique to new heights. He paints directly on clear 35mm leader, using odd materials such as household cleaners, varnish, inks and sometimes fish scales and ferns. He feeds the loops through a film editing machine, overlays them with music and records the result with a mini DV camera. A production of the National Film Board of Canada.
Plastic dolls dance in the sky to a pop song. In a posthuman world, the perfect body is made of orange-yellow plastic in a factory in China. This figure without gender exists in a virtual space where illness, death and aesthetics are only absurd concepts. In 3-D animations, the film ponders on capitalism, virtuality and the human body.
For Every Apricot drifts through the shifting terrain of memory, illustrating a grandmother’s journey in search of a “miracle drug” to cure her father’s illness. What begins as a simple family story, unfurls into a meditation on aging, fragility, and the circinate patterns that shape life. Through live-action interview, 16mm and 8mm archival footage, and a tapestry of handcrafted animation, the film moves between what is remembered, what is imagined, and what time has eroded. As she reflects on her father’s illness alongside her own, For Every Apricot becomes a deeply personal family portrait.
Inspired by an Inuit poem first assigned to paper in 1927, this animated short evokes the beauty and power of nature, as well as the bond between mother and daughter. As her daughter looks on, an Inuit woman creates a wall hanging filled with images of the spectacular Arctic landscape and traditional Inuit objects and iconography. Soon the boundaries between art and reality begin to dissolve.
A young girl must take part in a dangerous task in order to complete her doll collection.
The "stick people" in Bully Dance are imaginary, but this gritty tale is all too familiar. Like the dance beat pulsating throughout the film, the bully's intimidation of a smaller victim is unrelenting; no one stops the dance until serious harm is inflicted. While Bully Dance offers no simple solutions, it does compel viewers--teachers, parents and children--to take stock of their actions and to find ways to end peer abuse.
Arkelope is an animated short that takes a pointed look at endangered species and human indifference. When a middle-aged couple come across a nature documentary on the decline of the arkelope while channel-surfing, they learn that although the species has managed to survive a variety of natural disasters, it is now in imminent danger of extinction due to man's short-sightedness. With a serious yet funny approach, this little film illustrates human passivity in the face of the ubiquitous TV set.
The sun rises over a planet deep in winter, bringing light, life and togetherness. It is a reminder, even in the darkest moments, that there will eventually be light.
How Death Came to Earth is a 14 minute cutout animation film by Ishu Patel produced in 1971 by the National Film Board of Canada. The film deals with an Indian myth of creation, and is notable for its trippy visual style.
This hilarious short animation offers over 40 safety tips for homes with infants and young children. The film's hero is a very earnest, somewhat pompous, but endearing dog called Wally. A "professional" in home safety, Wally is assigned to a house with an infant whose parents have little safety consciousness. Accidents and near-accidents succeed each other with lightning speed, constantly putting Wally to the test.
A woman walks down the sidewalk, avoiding the cracks in the pavement like a child. Her body remains on high alert, remembering the horrors of a war that continues to haunt her. The Sounds of Things Ablaze is a charcoal-drawn animated short film about the resilience of women.
This animated short produced during WWII shows how Plugger helped the war effort by renting out his spare room so that a new worker could be brought in to work an idle machine at the munitions plant.
2016 Short Film by Sabrina Ratté
A richly visual film that explores the impact of colonization on Canada's Indigenous peoples in a manner that's both beautifully simple and profoundly moving.
Acclaimed Canadian artist Cliff Eyland looks back on his life after a successful double lung transplant.
The Sun and the Moon are born, as a woman searches to reveal the identity of her mystery lover in this strikingly animated Inuit creation tale.
Follow the animated journey of an Indigenous photographer as she travels through time. The oral and written history of her family reveals the story — we witness the impact and legacy of the railways, the slaughter of the buffalo and colonial land policies.
In the small Ontario town of Echo, deep underground a typical post-war apartment building, there is a machine – massive and seemingly endless. What is its purpose? What is it for?
When an elder in the community offers him a small piece of pipestone, Maq carves a little person out of it. Proud of his work, the boy wants to impress his grandfather and journeys through the woods to find him. Along the path Maq meets a curious traveller named Mi’gmwesu. Together they share stories, medicine, laughter and song. Maq begins to care less about making a good impression and more about sharing the knowledge and spirit he's found through his creation. It is only when Maq joins his grandfather that he understands who Mi’gmwesu really is.
An animated vignette. A lively dance of painted wooden dolls that twirl, swing and sway to gay music.
Jacques Drouin's artistic trajectory is closely tied to the Alexeïeff-Parker pinscreen. No other filmmaker has employed the device with such dedication since Alexeïeff himself, who created the design in 1931. Consisting of a perforated board with 240,000 adjustable pins, the pinscreen can be manipulated to create evocative moving images.
54 Hours is a remarkably vivid account of the 1914 tragedy in which 132 men were stranded on the ice during a severe snowstorm off the coast of Newfoundland. Seventy-eight men froze to death on the ice pack.
A hobo Santa shows up on a conservative fathers doorstep one Christmas Eve and sings his way into their hearts and home.
Based on a text message from their Kokum, the artist imagines planting the seeds for future generations.
A deer attempts to get lost in the woods only to be confronted by what he was hoping to escape from.
1930's found-footage, slowed down with original music.
Experimental short film about a birch log with a soul and a pair of skis.
Blending gorgeous interviews with dreamy animation, director Shana Myara assembles personal stories from a diverse, captivating cast whose horrors, triumphs and commitment to dreaming large offer BIG inspiration -- especially for those of us who don't often see our BIPOC, LGB2TQ+, disabled and/or fat selves celebrated on screen.