GENRE: Fiction (feature)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: 2SLGBTQIA+ issues, Coming out, Trauma
In the winter of 1970, a small-town plumber from rural New Brunswick must drive his beat-up work truck 1000 miles to Toronto to get his estranged, gay brother out of jail after being arrested for having sex in a public park. The two men are then forced to drive back home together at the behest of their hard-nosed mother before they kill each other. Inspired by a true story.
“Drive Back Home is a story that’s inspired by true events that happened in the 1960s to my grandfather, Ernie Clowater, and his brother, my great uncle, Hedley Clowater. The only time that my grandfather ever left New Brunswick in his life was when he drove up to Montreal to get his brother out of jail for having sex with a man.
However, I could never understand WHY an uneducated plumber who didn’t know anyone outside of New Brunswick would be able to get his brother out of jail for committing an actual crime. What I discovered was that, unofficially, police departments were motivated to get these cases off the books by offering to drop the charges if family members or employers came to vouch for them. By forcing these men to “out” themselves to people that mattered to them, the police were satisfying two needs at once. The first was to relieve themselves of paperwork and the second was to ensure that the people they took so much offense to still had their lives ruined.
If you’re a young black person in 2024 and you want to know what life was like for ordinary black Canadians in the 1960s, you can ask your black grandparents. But if you’re gay, you don’t have gay grandparents to ask. A film like this would have been the only way for him to see that life., I also wanted this to be real and authentic and funny. I wanted the two men to be imperfect and littered with their own personal baggage that we all have. I used western themes and wanted to give it a cinematic feel of a western by using snow and bleak landscape of a Canadian winter in the same way that John Forde or Sergio Leone would use the harsh landscape of a desert."
– Michael Clowater
GENRE: Documentary (feature)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: Family, Suicide, Trauma, Youth
“On August 9, 2006, Leonard Watson dropped off his eight-year-old son Kurtis at summer camp. That’s the last time anyone saw him. No bags packed, no calls, no activity in the bank account, no note: Watson disappeared, leaving his family behind. He was considered missing until 30 days later, when he was found dead by apparent suicide.
Fourteen years later, Kurtis Watson discovers a trove of home videos—hundreds of hours recorded by his father leading up to his death—a discovery that inspires a painstaking search for answers in recorded moments, family testimonials, and conversations with people connected to the event in any way, including the Watson family themselves, who come together for the first time to talk about the weight of this memory in their lives. Discoveries of small details lead to impactful and revelatory moments for them, revealing an ever-present stigma around mental health. My Dad’s Tapes documents the tremendously brave embrace of a reality in which some of our most burning questions may forever be unanswered. To hold each other close is all that matters."
– Hot Docs
Featuring Director Kurtis Watson, Producer Rob Viscardis, family members as well as mental health advocate Valéry Brosseau and moderated by filmmaker and film programmer Mariam Zaidi.
Mariam Zaidi is a filmmaker, film programmer, and arts manager based in Toronto. She has worked on programming teams at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival since 2016 and the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival since 2020, respectively. Previously, Zaidi was the Executive Director of the Breakthroughs Film Festival. Aside from festival programming, Zaidi has also made short films that have been supported by the National Film Board of Canada, the Ontario Arts Council, the Toronto Arts Council and the CBC. Most recently she worked on the distribution and impact campaigns for the Canadian films, Academy-Award Nominated, To Kill a Tiger (TIFF, 2023) and An Unfinished Journey (Hot Docs, 2024).
GENRE: Documentary (feature)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
Purportedly the first documentary feature film made in Gaza, Gaza Ghetto: Portrait of a Palestinian Family highlights the historical precedents of war, dispossession and military control that influence a family’s daily life in the Jabalia refugee camp. Intimate scenes – a child is born, a grandmother dies – are inter-cut with visits to the architects of the Israeli military occupation.
Gaza Ghetto follows the El-Adel family: Itidhal and Mustafa and their many children, including Ra’ida Abdullah, Samar, Shuroug, Riham and Ayed. We see the family’s humdrum daily routines: waking up grumpy, getting dressed for school, brushing their hair, and attending morning prayer at the UNRWA Jabalia Girls’ Preparatory School. The film provides historical context through archival footage from 1948 when the original Israeli invasion of Palestine displaced some 150,000 people, and 1967, when the Six-Day War resulted in the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank and the displacement of a further 300,000 people. We see scenes of the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City, where Mustafa works as a healthcare provider alongside an inadequate international response—the United Nations and Quaker volunteers distributing meager rations—and the grueling daily grind endured by the working-age men and women of the camp, who leave the camp before dawn each day and spend several hours commuting to Tel Aviv or Jaffa to then spend hours, and sometimes entire fruitless days, soliciting jobs in an informal day-labor market.
Discussion to follow with mental health / health care workers/supporters on the theme of workplace mental health to connect to the 2024 World Mental Health Day theme. Participants include Mohamed Abdelhack, Sarah Abusarar, Rayan Anton and Dr. Yipeng Ge.
Mohamed Abdelhack is a Postdoctoral Fellow at CAMH studying neural dynamics of psychiatric disorders using machine learning. He is also the founder of Arabs in Neuroscience, a grassroots organization that aims to improve education in Arab countries and create a network for Arabic-speaking neuroscientists. He is a recipient of Canada Brain Starts Award and The Neuro – Irv & Helga Cooper Foundation Open Science Prize. He originates from Alexandria, Egypt and has international experience working in Japan, the United States, and South Africa.
Rayan Anton MSW, RSW is a Palestinian Social Worker and Psychotherapist. He is a first-generation immigrant from occupied Palestine, and moved here at a young age with his family in hopes of finding a life free of danger and oppression. He works largely with the Arab community and also the 2SLGBTQ community here in Toronto. He is the co-founder of Meem Toronto – a social group for queer and trans people from the Arabic-speaking region.
Dr. Yipeng Ge is a primary care physician and public health practitioner based on the traditional, unceded and unsurrendered territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg. In his clinical practice, he works in family medicine practice and refugee health at a community health centre. He has worked on and studied the structural and colonial determinants of health in both the settler colonial contexts of so-called Canada and occupied Palestine. Having witnessed the atrocities in Gaza firsthand as a humanitarian medical volunteer, Dr. Ge leverages his direct experiences to raise awareness and educate the Canadian public about global injustices.
Workman Arts is delighted to invite you to our Rendezvous with Madness Fundraiser Soirée, an evening to kick off the 32nd year of the festival and raise funds for artists with lived experience.
The fundraiser supports our member artists; a collective of over 600 artists with lived experience with mental health and/or addiction. We empower our artists through creation and presentation, offering access to professional development programs, presentation opportunities in and outside of Workman Arts, and studio spaces free of cost.
Member artists are as different from each other as their artistic practices. They vary in age, ethnicity, education, work experience, goals and aspirations. With your support, our member artists can continue to access our services barrier free, sustaining our commitment to accessibility and uplifting diverse voices in the arts.
We are excited to invite you to this exclusive event! Capacity for the event is limited. To secure your spot for this event, please purchase your ticket(s) by October 10, 2024.
We have partnered with local businesses to curate a vibrant and elegant evening:
Ticket Price: $150 per person
RSVP by October 10, 2024
Tax receipts will be issued for each ticket purchase for the amount donated to Workman Arts.
If you have any questions about the event, please contact our Executive Artistic Director, Amadeo Ventura, at amadeo_ventura@workmanarts.com.
Photo: The Looms We Resemble Opening Reception, Henry Chan.
“The Looms We Resemble” is a group exhibition showcasing textile-based works by 6 artists who bring topics of belonging, the body, healing and ancestry. This unique exhibition is a work in progress as the artists developed their artworks during a weaving class led by instructor Jana Ghalayini. How can collective production of artworks precede curatorial themes and concepts, while we follow the slowness of weaving?
Weaving ideas, actions, memories, and stories together is a practice of care that we all share in time and space. This exhibition includes works by Aga Forfa, Apanaki, Tara Hakim, Merle Harley, Saretta Khan and Helen Kong. Our public programming includes a Storytelling Circle led by Sarah Abusarar and Tea Gathering by Helen Kong.
Jana Ghalayini (b.1993, Jeddah) is an artist based between Tkaronto, Canada and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Ghalayini holds a BFA in Printmaking from OCAD University and is a self-taught weaver who draws inspiration from her Palestinian heritage. Between intuitive weaving, mixed-media work and printmaking, she is interested in repetition and mark-making as process-based forms that act as rituals leading up to the final form of an artwork. She consistently investigates and reflects on the connection between tangible materials and fragmentation while exploring layers in her work and mindfully uses her practice to keep a record of gestural marks documenting personal memory, experience and ideas that can evolve as time goes on.
Curatorial Tour:
Saturday, November 30, 2 – 4 PM
Led by Fatma Hendawy
Saturday, November 23, 2024 | 12-3 PM
WA Offsite Gallery – 180 Shaw St. Unit 302
Registration Required
Maximum Capacity: 14
Storyteller, Sarah Abusarar will be accenting the exhibit by weaving Palestinian stories of long ago. The Palestinian traditional stories were told by women in the villages. It is a tradition that was passed down from generation to generation. Often the women would tell these stories while engaging in other folk art such as embroidery and weaving.
Saturday, December 7, 2024 | 1-3 PM
Hallway Galleries, Youngplace, Third floor, 180 Shaw St.
Free Entry
In this tea gathering, Helen will demonstrate a Chinese tea ritual and serve teas to the participants and attendees. This will serve as context to her piece “Tea by the Apricot Tree” made during the “Way of Weaving” course facilitated by Jana Ghalayini.
Agnieszka (Aga) Forfa is a Tkaronto based artist, working mainly in the material culture of her ancestors, practicing textile, paper and straw craft. She was born on the Baltic shores of Soviet-occupied Poland.
Tapestry for the Dead, 2024
Apanaki Temitayo is a Toronto-based, disabled, mixed-media textile artist, art facilitator, and mental health advocate. Her work combines African fabrics and storytelling, often exploring themes of identity, heritage, and resilience. She has exhibited in various galleries and her workshops focus on the therapeutic aspects of art, aiming to foster mental wellness and community connection.
apanaki-temitayo-m.pixels.com
Arokin Iwure, Yoruba for Griot’s Prayer, 2024
Originally Palestinian, born and raised in Jordan with an Austrian grandmother, Tara Hakim creates public displays of vulnerability that invite the viewer to meditate on notions of self, diasporic existences, and spaces in between – both physically and mentally. Her first short film ‘Teta, Opi & Me’ screened in festivals around the world including RIDM, and won Best Documentary and Audience Choice at MOMO in Zurich 2019. Since then, Tara has been creating short films, experimenting with gallery spaces and currently exploring tactile mediums including ceramics, Tatreez, weaving and glass work.
Merle Harley is an artist and maker who continuously creates visual alternate realities balancing the line between beautiful and uncanny. With no specific fixed media they work eclectically with what is readily available or collected. Using mediums such as drawing, painting, knitting, weaving, comic books, videos, built structures, as well as working in theatre and TV. They have exhibited work across Canada and beyond, in galleries and outdoors in site-specific locations and are particularly interested in stories based in nature, animals, mental health and queer themes.
Saretta Khan is Bangladeshi-Canadian born and raised in Toronto. Ever since being a child she has always been doing some form of art such as drawing and painting. She’s heavily influenced by her mother who is also an artist/painter. Her mother recognized Saretta’s talents at an early age and allowed her to explore and discover her passion for art. Currently, Saretta is a multidisciplinary graphic designer/artist who graduated from an advanced graphic design program at George Brown. She is also teaching art for The GEM (Giving Education Meaning)community program which allows her to introduce the wonders of art to students with learning disabilities. Her goal is to facilitate an inclusive space for them to express their creativity.
Helen Kong is a second generation Chinese Canadian living and working in Tkaronto (Toronto). She studied her first ritualized tea while living in Japan. Chado (the Way of Tea) is a meditative life journey through tea and hospitality. It is the gateway into art, culture, and philosophy. After returning to Canada, she studied ceramics as a way to better understand tea vessels. She established Secret Teatime, a clay studio where people play with clay and sip tea. She has expanded from making tea wares for Japanese teas to also studying and making wares for her own heritage of Chinese tea.
Tea by the Apricot Tree, 2024
Image: Film still from SEASON OF GOODBYES, Philippa Ndisi-Herrmann.
3405 Central Ave NE
Albuquerque, NM
A program of recent short films presented at Toronto’s Rendezvous With Madness Festival, connecting personal stories and deep sentiments through magical flickering frames and dancing pixels. Emotions in Motion is an attempt to create a space for emotional filmmaking and an experiment in centering cathartic approaches to storytelling.
Sitting in the dark is a communal invitation to connect our relationship to grief, loss and wellness with these five creators’ unique expressions of grief, of struggles and of survival. Bring your heart and mind to this program that aims to anchor us for an hour-long voyage of emotion-full cinematic splendors.
TRT 62 minutes
Christopher Gilbert Grant / 2019 / Canada / 1:40
XO Rad Magical is a personal lyrical poem about the daily struggle of living with schizophrenia. This psychedelic and hypnotic animated film shows that there is beauty in the brains of those who are at war with themselves. Provided courtesy National Film Board of Canada / Office national du film du Canada.
Chadi Bennani / 2023 / Canada / 22:30
In this short documentary, filmmaker Chadi Bennani accompanies his mother, Dominique, as she sets out to empty Nicole’s apartment, her mother who passed away two years prior. Through their discoveries, Dominique and Chadi share their memories of Nicole, as well as apprehensions of a future without her. Provided courtesy Les Films du 3 Mars.
Philippa Ndisi-Herrmann / 2018 / Kenya / 14:30
An intimate portrait grappling with love and loss that takes us on an essayistic journey of mourning, paying homage to the dearly departed. “A Season of Goodbyes, I wrote beneath a photograph I had taken of dry sunflowers strewn on my kitchen counter; their petals like hair flaying, their seeds like tears scattered; the windswept hair of four adolescent sisters, their tears frozen in time, as the last image of their father fades as the distance from the town they can no longer call a home widens. Beneath that photograph, A Season of Goodbyes, I wrote.”- P.N.-H. Provided courtesy the artist.
Amar Chebib / 2022 / Canada / 15:30
Joe Buffalo is a Cree skateboarding legend. He’s also a survivor of Canada’s notorious genocidal residential school system. Following a traumatic childhood and decades of addiction, Joe must face his inner demons to realize his dreams. Provided courtesy the artist.
Theo J. Cuthand / 2021 / Canada / 7:30
TJ Cuthand and his mother Ruth Cuthand have a candid conversation about TJ’s last hospitalization for Bipolar Disorder in 2007. While TJ only knew his manic episode from the inside, Ruth had to deal with caregiving decisions and trying to find help. While they reminisce, they also have to reckon with the feelings of animosity that arose between them during these challenging events. Provided courtesy Vtape Distribution
Film still from Home Movies Gaza by Basma Alsharif. Courtesy the artist.
Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) 1025 Queen Street West, 2nd floor
Toronto, Ontario
Following up on the successful online screening and facilitated storytelling with Emily Jacir’s documentary “Letter to a Friend” on November 27 there was strong interest by Workman Arts’ staff to hold a followup event to again hold space for difficult discussions about current events and the mental health impacts of violence, of discrimination and the constant stream of news and how the information out of Palestine affects us as artists, as mental health workers and how these issues impact the Workman Arts membership and the public.
Taysir Batniji / 2012 / Palestine / 15 minutes
The narrative thread in Taysir Batniji’s video is a telephone conversation between the artist located in France and his mother located in Gaza. Starting from this intimate, fragmented, difficult and sometimes indistinct exchange, the artist questions the resonance of words like displacement, in-between and exile. Through a triple point of view, Ma mère, David et moi explores how to look at one’s home from elsewhere and how to establish connections by combining narration, souvenirs, impressions, the personal stories and news coverage.
Basma Alsharif / 2013 / Palestine/France / 24 minutes
Home Movies Gaza introduces us to the Gaza Strip as a microcosm for the failure of civilization. In an attempt to describe the everyday of a place that struggles for the most basic of human rights, this video claims a perspective from within the domestic spaces of a territory that is complicated, derelict, and altogether impossible to separate from its political identity.
Mustafa Abu Ali / 1973 / Palestine / 14 minutes
A rare film by Mustafa Abu Ali, one of the founders of the Palestine Film Unit, the first filmic arm of the Palestinian revolution. Shot by a French news team, the footage was edited by Mustafa in Lebanon to produce one of the earliest films on the occupied territory in Gaza. Scenes of the Occupation from Gaza employs experimental editing techniques to produce a cinematically and politically subversive film. The film won the prize as best film at the Damascus Film Festival in 1973 and was the only film produced by the Palestine Cinema Group, which in 1974 became the Palestine Cinema Institute.
Rosalind Nashashibi / 2015 / Palestine/UK / 18 minutes
In Electrical Gaza, Rosalind Nashashibi combines her footage of Gaza, and the fixer, drivers and translator who were her constant company alongside animated scenes. She presents Gaza as under a spell; isolated, suspended in time, difficult to access and highly charged. She shows us Gaza as she experienced it in the quiet pause before the onslaught of Israeli bombardment in the summer of 2014.
Taysir Batniji / 2010 / Palestine / 5 minutes
“Every time I return to Gaza, feelings of frustration, sadness and anxiety come over me, especially in the first days. So much had changed for the worse in my absence ! As my city gradually deteriorated, I was torn between my desire to stay (to hold on to it) and to leave…Being born in Gaza, as well as other reasons I cannot explain, certainly nurtures my fascination with the place. I want to record my daily life the way others keep a journal."
– T.B.
Trauma and bariatric surgeon practicing in Canada. Dr. Al-Kassem received his MD in Damascus and completed general surgery training at University of Ottawa. He is the co-founder of UOSSM, the Union of Medical Care and Relief Organizations and is active in many humanitarian organizations and was in Gaza as part of a medical convoy in December 2023.
Building and venue are wheelchair accessible.
Enter on Queen Street main doors, just east of Ossington, elevators from main lobby to 2nd floor or take stairs at the rear of the lobby up one flight of stairs.
Films presented with English subtitles and/or captions; introductions and discussion will use microphones.
Active listener available during and after program
Fully accessible and gender neutral washroom just outside Auditorium, additional washrooms nearby.Fixed chair seating plus moveable chairs (various sizes), mats and cushions available.
‘In this bold experimental documentary, four artists talk about suicide: the role the recurring thought has played in their life and art, the struggle to understand and overcome the impulse, and the ongoing confrontation with a form of stigma that renders the very concept of suicide as a kind of pariah even among mental health issues and discussions. With a frankness that is both bracing and illuminating, Artist Steve Sanguedolce’s subjects tell their stories, and the filmmaker responds with a striking visual scheme that permits us something rarely attempted in the engagement with this most misunderstood of conditions: a sense of first person understanding.’
– Geoff Pevere
Film subjects + actors: Marina Black, Maria de Sanctis, Janieta Eyre, Michael Hoolboom, Vivien Kiss, Lulu Hazel Turnbull, Emily Vey Duke.
Filmmaker: Steve Sanguedolce has been an active member of Toronto’s independent film community for over thirty years winning numerous international awards. He has had retrospectives at the Cinematheque Quebecoise in Montreal, the National Film Board in Toronto as well as the the Arsenal Institute for Film and Video in Germany. Over the past 15 years he has been hand developing and hand colouring motion picture film to great acclaim. Much of his time has been spent teaching at local universities, community colleges or conducting independent filmmaking workshops across Canada.. His work incorporates documentary, narrative and experimental genres. His film work include Blinding (2011), Dead Time (2005), Smack (2000) and Away (1996). He lives Toronto.
Programmer: Scott Miller Berry, Managing Director and Programmer, Rendezvous with Madness, Toronto, Canada. Scott has been working at film festivals for 20+ years – previously as Director of the Images Festival and now at Rendezvous. He’s also a film programmer, instructor and mentor. Since 2009 he has presented touring screenings in Jakarta, Singapore, Taipei, Tokyo, Seoul, Kuala Lumpur, Bangalore, Bangkok and Amsterdam, among others. Scott also makes short diary films and is on the Board of the Toronto Media Arts Centre and Long Winter Music + Arts Festival.
Rendezvous With Madness và Hoa Quynh Cinema giới thiệu:
“LAND OF KNOWING NOTHING” (Steve Sanguedolce, 2017, 72 phút)
“Trong bộ phim tài liệu thể nghiệm táo bạo này, bốn nghệ sĩ nói về tự tử: ý nghĩ về việc tái diễn nó đã đóng vai trò như nào trong cuộc sống và trong các thực hành nghệ thuật của họ, những khó khăn để hiểu và vượt qua được cám dỗ của cái chết cũng như cuộc đấu tranh trường kỳ với sự kỳ thị đã khiến khái niệm về tự tử bị bỏ qua như nào trong các cuộc thảo luận về sức khỏe tâm thần. Với sự chân thành mãnh liệt, những nhân vật của tác giả Steve Sanguedolce đã kể lại câu chuyện của mình trong phim. Bằng việc phản hồi lại những câu chuyện đó qua một đường dây hình ảnh ấn tượng, nhà làm phim đem đến cho chúng ta một trải nghiệm mang tính cá nhân hiếm thấy khi đưa người xem trực tiếp tiếp cận với câu chuyện qua một trong những phương diện dễ bị hiểu lầm nhất: cảm thức thấu hiểu từ góc nhìn thứ nhất.” – Geoff Pevere
– Geoff Pevere
Phim nói tiếng Anh và phụ đề tiếng Việt
Thời gian: 7h30 tối thứ bảy, 9 tháng 12
Địa điểm: babau AIR, 82A Thợ Nhuộm
Buổi chiếu phim sẽ có sự tham gia góp mặt của tác giả Steve Sanguedolce và giám tuyển chương trình Scott Miller Berry, Giám đốc điều hành và người sáng lập chương trình Rendezvous with Madness, Toronto, Canada.
Steve Sanguedolce là một thành viên tích cực trong cộng đồng phim độc lập của Toronto trong hơn ba mươi năm và đã giành nhiều giải thưởng quốc tế. Anh đã có các buổi triển lãm tại Cinematheque Quebecoise ở Montreal, National Film Board ở Toronto cũng như Arsenal Institute for Film and Video ở Đức. Trong 15 năm qua, anh đã tự tráng rửa, tô màu bằng tay cho những bộ phim và nhận được sự khen ngợi nồng nhiệt. Anh đã dành nhiều thời gian giảng dạy tại các trường đại học địa phương, trường cao đẳng cộng đồng hoặc tổ chức các khóa học làm phim độc lập trên khắp Canada. Công việc của anh bao gồm các thể loại phim tài liệu, phim truyện và thử nghiệm. Các tác phẩm điện ảnh của anh bao gồm Blinding (2011), Dead Time (2005), Smack (2000) và Away (1996). Anh hiện sống ở Toronto.
Scott Miller Berry, Giám đốc điều hành và người sáng lập chương trình Rendezvous with Madness, Toronto, Canada. Scott đã và đang làm việc tại các liên hoan phim trong hơn 20 năm – nguyên giám đốc của The Images Festival và hiện làm việc tại Rendezvous. Anh cũng là một film programmer, giảng viên và người hướng dẫn. Kể từ năm 2009, anh đã tổ chức các buổi chiếu phim diễn tại Jakarta, Singapore, Taipei, Tokyo, Seoul, Kuala Lumpur, Bangalore, Bangkok và Amsterdam, và nhiều nơi khác. Scott cũng làm phim ngắn nhật ký và là thành viên Hội đồng Quản trị của Trung tâm Nghệ thuật Truyền thông Toronto và Liên hoan Âm nhạc và Nghệ thuật Long Winter.
19:30 (+GMT 7), babau AIR,
82A Thợ Nhuộm street
Hà Nội, Việt Nam
To celebrate the Canadian premiere of the German film BLUE SKY WHITE CLOUDS at Rendezvous With Madness, join us for an insightful talk about filmmaking featuring accomplished director Astrid Menzel.
The film BLUE SKY WHITE CLOUDS is streaming across Canada from November 6 – 12. You do not have to watch the film before attending the seminar but it is encouraged. The film page is found here Tickets to watch the film online are purchased through a donation of $0 -20.
SEMINAR – Behind the Scenes Insights on Directing the Award-Winning Documentary BLUE SKY WHITE CLOUDS
Filmmaker Astrid Menzel explores the process of directing a feature film, dissecting her latest documentary BLUE SKY WHITE CLOUDS. Participants of this seminar will walk away with a deeper understanding of various aspects of film direction, production and techniques as well as uncover personal insights about the highs and lows of the process, including:
Topics Covered
5:30 – 7:00 PM
Artscape Youngplace
180 Shaw Street, Toronto, Unit 302
The cost of this seminar is free
Capacity is 20
GENRE: DOCUMENTARY
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: ISOLATION | ADDICTION | HOMELESSNESS | TRAUMA | ABUSE | MENTAL HEALTH
Canadian filmmaker Stephen Hosier focuses the lens of his feature debut uncomfortably close to home as he joins his childhood friend, Richard Csanyi, in investigating the life and death of the latter’s twin brother, Attila. Found dead on a Hamilton rooftop in May 2020, the 28-year-old was expelled from a long-term care residence even as he grappled with addiction and schizophrenia.
A creative expression of grief and healing, this stirring home-grown film compassionately explores the intersection of personal trauma and the systems that fail those in need, while striving toward a place of forgiveness and understanding. ATTILA is a beautiful portrait honouring one man’s tragedy and the family he left behind, while providing the audience with a valuable window into the extreme systemic obstacles experienced by far too many in Canada and around the world.
Tuesday, October 10, 2023 marks the 75th Anniversary of World Mental Health Day. This year’s theme is ‘mental health is a universal human right’. The sentiment aligns with the ambitions of ATTILA the film. In presenting an authentic and local portrayal of homelessness, addiction and schizophrenia, we hope to destigmatize these circumstances and create a space for dynamic conversation that leads to change.
Join us after the film screening for a post-film panel discussion moderated by Aisha Jamal (filmmaker and film programmer) featuring Dr. Naheed Dosani (palliative care physician and health justice activist), Chris Summerville (Schizophrenia Society of Canada), Diana Chan McNally (community and crisis worker) and other special guests to be announced.
This film is unavailable for streaming.
