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

• Different aspects and challenges of filming one’s own family.
• How to turn subjective thoughts and struggles into a dramaturgical outline of an intensive and personal documentary.
• The mix of materials and techniques used during the editing of the film.
• Open Q&A

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.

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE), DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: NEURODIVERGENCY | SIGN LANGUAGE | FAMILY

Janet Sharrock and Buddha Barnes are in dire need of a holiday, but the universe has other plans. Together, along with the couple’s five adult children, they form a blended, neurodiverse family. Their exhausted and cash-strapped family must routinely navigate financial hardships in addition to the challenges that neurodivergent individuals face day-to-day. Their modest lives aren’t society’s ideal, but they never stop fighting to make it work.

Because We Have Each Other tells a tender tale about seven people overcoming adversity by putting their unwavering love and support for one another above all else. Australian filmmaker Sari Braithwaite’s documentary paints an intimate portrait of working-class struggle. Braithwaite places an achingly revealing spotlight on the forces that strengthen and weaken family bonds. Because We Have Each Other delivers a heartfelt and inspiring tale about how unconditional love and acceptance help people find resilience in the face of life’s greatest challenges.

Screening with Short Film

Regard Silence | Santiago Zermeño | Mexico | Doc | 2022 | 29 minutes | Spanish with English subtitles with open captions

Regard Silence shows several deaf people participating in a poetry workshop. Their attempts to express themselves are alternated in the film with individual interviews about being a deaf person communicating in a hearing world. How does it affect one’s sense of self-worth to learn sign language after years of lip reading? – IDFA

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE), DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: BIPOLAR DISORDER | SCHIZOPHRENIA | MISSING PERSON | FAMILY | UNORTHODOX TREATMENT

Noella Luka’s riveting autobiographical documentary deftly explores the grief of dreams diverted by a bipolar diagnosis and the vulnerability of searching for the right support and community while navigating new and difficult life changes. Her plans to live and work in film abroad are cut short by her initial hospitalization, and she returns home to Kenya where mental health issues remain strictly taboo. Once there, she decides to document and dig into the how and why of her condition, running up against tradition, prejudice, and uncertainty, which makes even discussing the subject of illness uncomfortable for both family and friends. With a lack of references to guide them, those close to her are truly unsure of what this shift in circumstance really means. Undaunted, Luka looks for further understanding and a sense of community in a mental health support group, where she befriends newly diagnosed schizophrenic Nick–a man who recently returned home from Colombia after putting an end to his quest to become a Catholic priest. Through Nick, viewers are given a unique and disturbing opportunity to observe how certain mental illnesses are still viewed and treated, even in the 21st century. In exploring their unique situations, Luka gives voice to all those navigating the often uncharted waters of mental health–for those both with and without support systems in place–and offers a truly inspiring story of hope, change and possibility.

Screening with Short Film

Katanga Nation | Beza Hailu Lemma, Hiwot Admasu Getaneh | Ethiopia, South Africa | Doc | 2022 | 26 minutes | Amharic with English Subtitles 

Enkehone, naive but ambitious and from rural Ethiopia, lives in a hostel in the bustling neighborhood of Katanga. His host, Amele, lives in the back room of the dorms she rents out. As the path to his dreams unfold in uncertainty, Enkehone witnesses the raw, chaotic, and captivating life of his host family and their community in the last days of Katanga before it is engulfed by the monstrous construction of Addis Ababa.

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE), DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: TRAUMA | HEALING | ILLNESS | FAMILIES | MENTAL HEALTH

It’s never easy to talk about mortality with our loved ones. It’s even harder between a physician mother who excels at hiding her emotions under rationality and a daughter who spent her childhood solving math problems next to the morgue. They avoid conversation about mortality and related feelings at all costs – until the mother becomes a cancer patient and the daughter becomes her caregiver.

Screening with Short Film

Uproot | Queena Liu | Canada | Doc | 2023 | 11 minutes English and Cantonese with English subtitles 

“Ten years ago, my dad was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in his forties and spent two years in and out of a psychiatric hospital. This film documents my first time having an open and honest conversation with my family about his diagnosis that I never could as a child and explores how mental health care in immigrant communities is often complicated by a cultural and generational divide. Even as I gain a new perspective on my family’s silent struggles, putting together my interpretation of their stories, I still feel the need to hide myself behind the camera.”

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE) | DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: INDIGENOUS ISSUES | TRAUMA | FAMILY | HEALING

“I’m a descendent of a people who have more or less disappeared, all that’s left are a few indigenous and mixed-race people dotted around the world”. Having arrived in Europe at the age of 19 and lived in Brussels for many years, Colombian Sergio Guataquira Sarmiento carries a complex idea of his identity deep inside of him, because not only is he living in exile, he’s also an Indian, and “being an Indian person in Colombia is a burden, a source of shame, so we tend to lie low and westernise ourselves.” When the filmmaker learns that an epidemic of young indigenous people hanging themselves is raging through the jungle in his home country, he decides to visit the area in person, moved by a desire to investigate this phenomenon, but also to untangle his own confused feelings related to his roots” – ​​Fabien Lemercier (Cineuropa)

Screening with Short Film

Love and the Art of Despair | 2023 | Tara Grundmanis | Canada | 9 minutes | English with open captions

Love and the Art of Despair is a profile on Rebeccah Love; a Toronto based filmmaker who perseveres over mental and physical illness to create art.

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE), DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: AGING | DEMENTIA | GRIEF | FAMILY

German filmmaker Astrid Menzel makes her feature-length documentary debut with this incredibly personal and moving story of loss, love, and legacy. Following the death of her beloved grandfather E.O., the director and her brother embark on a 10-day canoe trip through the North of Germany with their widowed 86-year-old grandmother–a woman slowly succumbing to progressive dementia. Looking for some semblance of control at a time when grief seems insurmountable and change never-ending, a determined Menzel invites her grandmother to become a part of the planning and organization, looking for ways to connect with and involve her simultaneously. Eventually, the unlikely trio set out on a unique, emotional and unflinchingly honest journey that helps all three uncover different and changing perspectives on their existing relationships. With some distance and time come a little patience, unexpected joy and sorrow, and a brand new understanding of exactly what being there for someone you care about truly means.

Streams (online only) with Short Film:

White Noise | Tamara Scherbak | Canada | Drama | 2023 | 18 minutes | English with open captions

White Noise follows Ava, who suffers from misophonia – an extreme hyper-sensitivity to sound. When this reaches new terrifying heights, her doctor enrolls her in an experimental trial involving an anechoic chamber: the world’s quietest room.

PANEL

After the film enjoy a conversation with the film’s director Astrid Menzel; moderated by Jutta Brendemuehl from the Goethe Institut, Toronto.

Genre: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE), DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
Keywords: TRAUMA | TRANS RIGHTS | MURDER | SEX WORK

Kenya is an intimate portrait of a transgender female sex worker whose fate changes when faced with the transfeminicide of her sex worker partner. I came to this story with the intention of talking about the violence that trans women experience in Mexico, but the struggle in Kenya overcame violence and overcame all the systemic and structural limits that keep these women on the margins of society. Kenya is a film that brings us closer to a world full of darkness, which little by little is filled with light through the actions of the protagonist, her conviction to fight, and her humanity. Kenya is an intimate and powerful portrait that gains dimension and strength as this story progresses, which in its bowels reveals the violence experienced by trans women in Mexico, this being the country with the second most hate crimes due to transphobia in the world.

Screening with Short Film

Nicole | Chadi Bennani | Canada | 2023 | 23 minutes | French with English Subtitles and open captions

In this touching documentary, filmmaker Chadi Bennani accompanies his mother, Dominique, as she sets out to empty Nicole’s apartment, her mother who passed two years prior. Through their discoveries, Dominique and Chadi share their memories of Nicole, as well as their apprehensions of a future without her.

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE), DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: YOUTH | CLASS | INDIGENOUS

Co-directed by Nicolas van Hemelryck and Clare Weiskopf, Alis is a poignant documentary that delves into young womens’ stories of hope and despair. Set in a Columbian group home for teenage girls, the directors ask the young women to conjure an imaginary housemate named Alis. Alis is a blank canvas for the young women to paint vivid portraits of the darkest moments in their lives. 

By projecting their lived experiences onto Alis, they find ways to speak their truths without the burden of shame or stigma. Through a series of candid conversations, the camera captures profound moments of self-reflection in real-time. 

Alis profiles childhood trauma’s insidious influence on the trajectory of one’s life and speaks to the determination required to recover from major setbacks. These bright-eyed and increasingly world-weary young women share stories that will inspire laughter in one moment and tears in the next. Ultimately, Alis is a story about reckoning with the past in order to pave the way for a brighter tomorrow.

Screening with Short Film

Black Hole Legion | Jonathan Omer Mizrahi, Ariel Sereni Brown | Greenland, Germany | 2021 | 12 minutes | Inuktitut with English Subtitles and open captions

On the foothills of Uummannaq mountain, four cybergoth teens are fighting depression. Water contamination spreads throughout the village pipelines and one cybergoth finds herself laying on a hospital bed. The cybergoths show us a post-apocalypse future, that is to say, the apocalyptic qualities of the present; a fragile reality where national, communal, environmental, and mental stability is at risk.

GENRE: DOCUMENTARY (FEATURE), DOCUMENTARY (SHORT)
TYPE: FILM | IN-PERSON
KEYWORDS: IMMIGRATION | TRAUMA | MOBILITY | MUTUAL AID | HEALING

Should we leave our origins behind or can we give them new meaning? This is the question posed by The Dependents, in which the filmmaker combs through decades of diary entries written by her father, a retired immigration officer, interrogating him as he did countless applicants who appeared before his desk in Canadian embassies across the globe. This work is a reflection on the right to mobility for some and not others and the discourses that justify this inequality. Sofia Brockenshire’s film merges the past and present in a bold and sonically rich family portrait about home, displacement, and current forced and voluntary migration movements. — Jason Fox (RIDM, Montreal)

Screening with Short Film

Neighbour Abdi | Douwe Dijkstra | The Netherlands | Doc | 2022 | 29 minutes | Somali and Dutch with English subtitles 

How can you understand a violent past? Somali-born Abdi reenacts his life, marked by war and criminality, with the help of his neighbour and filmmaker Douwe. Through playful reconstructions in a special effects studio, they embark on a candid and investigative journey through a painful history, focusing on the creative process throughout.