Today is my birthday, and my birthday wish—aside from health and happiness for my friends and especially my family—is for widespread and even sustained! support for alternative and independent media, especially from the anniversary wish-list below. Every time we buy a Globe and Mail newspaper or watch any Canadian news
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ezra winton: Hot Docs turns twenty – Five tips on making a great fest better
IT WAS TWENTY YEARS AGO TODAY It was a year like any other – the ceremonial swap between less liberal and more liberal leader of the US took place when Clinton picked up where Bush left off (launching a cruise missile attack on Iraq just half a year into his
Continue readingezra winton: Free International Women’s Day Films at NFB.ca
The beaten (by the Canadian Conservative budget cuts) but not down National Film Board of Canada is offering a treasure trove of titles for free streaming today, in celebration and recognition of International Women’s Day. Included in the bunch is the 2012 experimental short by Jenn Strom, below (after the
Continue readingezra winton: The Documentary Download Dilemma – A Conversation with Doc-streamers Thought Maybe
Much ink has been spilled and pixels punctuated regarding the ongoing controversial topic around the copyright, downloading, streaming and file sharing of creative content — yet there has been little discussion (outside of organizational listserves and at festival forums) of documentary cinema and file sharing. This may be in large part due
Continue readingezra winton: Scrap America – A conversation with Scrapper filmmaker Brian Ashby
This week’s Friday Film Pick is the beautifully shot and tenderly rendered Scrappers, a documentary that quietly follows two Chicago residents as they eke out a living from the salvaging of metallic refuse. It’s not fist-in-the-air advocacy filmmaking for the downtrodden, but in its own way Scrappers gets under the
Continue readingezra winton: Russian LGBT Film Fest pushes ahead despite attacks – A conversation with the founder of the Side By Side Festival
It is an extreme act of bravery and commitment to put on a queer film festival in many parts of the world, where the cultural politics of film festivals play out in ugly and often violent manifestations of hatred and ignorance. Homophobia is rampant the world over, but in countries
Continue readingezra winton: Love and death on the side of the road – A conversation with taxidermy sculptor Kate Puxley
Kate Puxley is a visual artist whose work has drawn attention to the Harper government’s damaging policies toward art and culture as well as our relationship with animals and the natural environment. Arresting, breathtaking, and inimitable, her drawings, paintings, installations, and most recently her taxidermy sculptures, are provocations and interventions
Continue readingezra winton: Let’s Do This – Book review of Making is Connecting by David Gauntlett
The optimism in David Gauntlett’s Making is Connecting (published by the fantastic UK outlet polity) is difficult to escape. Much like the plethora of networks, groups, clubs and civil society manifestations he describes, the book is largely held together with positive attitudes about culture and communication combined with a philosophy
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