By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) With this year’s edition of Hot Docs cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, a selection of festival films are being given broadcast premieres every Thursday night from April 16th to May 28th on CBC, documentary Channel, and the CBC Gem streaming app, as part of the Hot Docs… Read More Hot Docs At Home Review: 9/11 Kids
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) The Hot Docs Film Festival in Toronto has come to be one of the biggest showcases of documentary cinema in the world, and it’s an event that, on a personal note, I look forward to attending every spring, as I have done since 2011. But this year, the… Read More Hot Docs At Home Review: Made You Look: A True Story About Fake Art
By John Corrado The 17th annual Human Rights Watch Film Festival kicks off tonight in Toronto, showcasing a total of six timely and relevant films over the next six nights, most of which played at other Toronto festivals over the past year. All of the screenings will be taking place at the Hot Docs Ted… Read More Previewing the 2020 Toronto Human Rights Watch Film Festival
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) Whether you agreed with her or not, there’s simply no denying that Pauline Kael was one of the most influential film critics of the 20th century, a writer whose often controversial opinions were sometimes hurtful and sometimes helpful, but always uniquely hers. Even when her contrarian views put… Read More Review: What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael
By John Corrado The calendars have already turned over to 2020, but 2019 would not be complete without my annual countdowns of the best movies and documentaries of the previous year. Per tradition, I have once again broken up these lists, because I want to pay tribute to as many of these films as possible.… Read More The Best Documentaries of 2019
By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) Bruce Springsteen’s latest album, Western Stars, which was released earlier this year, is an introspective, often bittersweet concept album of sorts that tells the story of a fading Western movie star, and finds the iconic American rocker branching out to country music and performing with a thirty piece… Read More Review: Western Stars
By John Corrado ★★★½ (out of 4) Marianne Ihlen and Leonard Cohen died within three months of each other in 2016. The two never got married or had children together, but they shared a deep bond, with her directly inspiring at least two of Cohen’s classic songs (“So Long, Marianne” and “Bird on a Wire”).… Read More DVD Review: Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The possibilities of human genome editing through the discovery of CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats), a specific family of DNA sequences, are explored in director Adam Bolt’s documentary Human Nature, which looks at the possibilities of a future where diseases or even certain traits could be cut… Read More Review: Human Nature
By John Corrado One of the highest grossing documentaries of the year so far, and a film that has found a way of connecting with audiences since it played at TIFF last year, The Biggest Little Farm is now available on DVD. The film follows a couple, director John Chester and his wife Molly, who gave… Read More DVD Review: The Biggest Little Farm
By John Corrado It’s been a long time coming, but after finally arriving in theatres earlier this year over forty years after it was originally shot, the Aretha Franklin concert film Amazing Grace is now available on DVD. The film documents the production of Franklin’s classic 1972 gospel album of the same name, which was… Read More DVD Review: Amazing Grace
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Directed by Phyllis Ellis, who takes an investigative approach to the material, the documentary Toxic Beauty explores how harmful ingredients like phthalates, parabens and even formaldihyde are lurking in a lot of the soaps, deodorants, creams and shampoos that many women use on their bodies every single day.… Read More Review: Toxic Beauty
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Directed by Toronto’s own Daniel Roher, Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band is an engaging and emotional look at Robertson’s own life and career as lead guitarist and main songwriter for The Band, as well as the rise and fall of the group itself. The film… Read More Review: Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) Started as an eco-friendly alternative to the fuel-burning of Formula 1, Formula E is a racing series that has been going strong since 2014, in which the drivers compete against each other in battery operated cars, offering a carbon neutral alternative to the high emissions of traditional motorsports.… Read More #TIFF19 Review: And We Go Green (TIFF Docs)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Directed by Toronto’s own Daniel Roher, and carrying the distinction of being the first ever Canadian documentary to open the festival, Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band is an engaging and emotional look at Robertson’s own life and career as the lead guitarist and main songwriter… Read More #TIFF19 Review: Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson and The Band (Gala Presentations)
By John Corrado ★★★★ (out of 4) The latest from Alan Zweig, Coppers finds the Canadian documentary filmmaker interviewing former police officers in Ontario, who have either left the force due to retirement or for other reasons. Speaking directly to the camera, the officers open up about experiencing PTSD, tough decisions they had to make… Read More #TIFF19 Review: Coppers (TIFF Docs)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Since moving to England from Algeria in 2001, Fahed has been living in the working class town of Grimsby. While he is settled in the UK, working late hours at a restaurant in order to support himself, he still feels the pull of his home country, and dreams… Read More #TIFF19 Review: My English Cousin (TIFF Docs)
By John Corrado ★★½ (out of 4) Directed by Pat Collins, Henry Glassie: Field Work is a documentary portrait of the renowned scholar and American folklorist Henry Glassie, who has spent over fifty years travelling around the world to study the work that other artists create, from religious statues to clay pots. For much of the… Read More #TIFF19 Review: Henry Glassie: Field Work (Contemporary World Cinema)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) In this era of fake news, independent journalist Robert Fisk stands tall as a champion of finding the truth and standing up for those who are oppressed, even if it means going against the official narratives and holding those who hold power to account. With a long, storied… Read More #TIFF19 Review: This is Not a Movie (TIFF Docs)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) The 53rd film from Alanis Obomsawin, Jordan River Anderson, The Messenger continues the Canadian filmmaker’s long history of documenting the injustices faced by Indigenous people in Canada and the fight for equal treatment under the law. This film focuses on the case of Jordan River Anderson, a baby… Read More #TIFF19 Review: Jordan River Anderson, The Messenger (Masters)
By John Corrado ★★★ (out of 4) Back in 1969, after local religious authorities ordered that all of the totem poles be cut down as part of Canada’s widespread erasure of Indigenous culture, the celebrated Haida artist Robert Davidson became responsible for carving the first new totem pole to be put up in nearly a century in his village… Read More #TIFF19 Review: Now is the Time (Short Cuts)
The Joy of Movies 