40 years ago, William Friedkin’s The Exorcist redefined screen terror with its slow but atmospheric build up mounting to a sustained crescendo of graphic, visceral horror. Audiences had never seen special effects like these before, and reacted with panic and revulsion - as if Satan himself was at loose in this film.

"A credible portrait of the modern, urban world ripped apart by an obscene, ancient evil… the graphic desecration of everything considered wholesome and good about the fading American Dream - the home, the family, the church, and, most shockingly, the child." Mark Kermode

When superstar Canadian director Robert Lepage is invited to stage Wagner’s the Ring Cycle at New York’s Metropolitan Opera it was never going to be a routine production. Susan Froemke follows the backstage progress of a controversial but visually astounding show that tested everyone involved to their limits.

"Simply the best documentary about the Met ever made." Film Journal

"Destined to be one of the classic documentaries about opera." Philadelphia Inquirer

"A rousing portrait of creative renewal and, specifically, the way in which – by attempting something daring and new in the face of an opera culture deeply invested in tradition – Lepage proves that classic art can survive and flourish in a marriage with modern technology and imagination." – The Village Voice

In 2008, Canadian music icon Bruce Cockburn set out on tour to make a live solo album, “Slice ‘o’ Life”. Cameras followed the man whose legacy includes songs like Wondering Where the Lions Are, If I Had a Rocket Launcher, and If A Tree Falls, as he performed to sold-out crowds in benefit concerts across North America. The filmmakers also followed Bruce to his home for candid conversations about his views on topics from religion to new parenthood. Featuring Romeo Dallaire, Sarah Harmer, and Michael Ondaatje.

Peter Greenaway’s shocking but oh-so-elegant allegory for consumer culture run rampant features extraordinary performances from Helen Mirren and Michael Gambon and costumes by Jean-Paul Gaultier. Presented by renowned architect Bruno Freschi.

In the early 70’s, legendary rock photographer Bob Gruen and his wife Nadya toured with Ike & Tina Turner and filmed them performing, on the road, and behind the scenes. Now for the first time ever this footage is unveiled. This is a look inside a hardworking band as well as an iconic couple.

Note: shot on early video equipment in black and white, the film looks like what it is, an archival record. What it lacks in gloss it makes up for in intimacy.

Tracks include: River Deep, Mountain High; Shake A Tail Feather; Heard It Through the Grapevine; Proud Mary; I Want to Take You Higher.

"The band reminds you why it’s called "funk" with almost every note they play. Even considering the poor quality of some of the footage, there’s no disguising the fact their music wasn’t the safe anti-septic stuff being churned out by Motown for mass consumption. They were playing down and dirty funk and R&B, which makes even most of today’s rappers look tame in comparison…The music created by Ike and Tina Turner was some of the most amazing R&B/soul/funk produced in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Any opportunity to see them perform shouldn’t be missed." Richard Marcus

In the early 70’s, legendary rock photographer Bob Gruen and his wife Nadya toured with Ike & Tina Turner and filmed them performing, on the road, and behind the scenes. Now for the first time ever this footage is unveiled. This is a look inside a hardworking band as well as an iconic couple.

Note: shot on early video equipment in black and white, the film looks like what it is, an archival record. What it lacks in gloss it makes up for in intimacy.

Tracks include: River Deep, Mountain High; Shake A Tail Feather; Heard It Through the Grapevine; Proud Mary; I Want to Take You Higher.

"The band reminds you why it’s called "funk" with almost every note they play. Even considering the poor quality of some of the footage, there’s no disguising the fact their music wasn’t the safe anti-septic stuff being churned out by Motown for mass consumption. They were playing down and dirty funk and R&B, which makes even most of today’s rappers look tame in comparison…The music created by Ike and Tina Turner was some of the most amazing R&B/soul/funk produced in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Any opportunity to see them perform shouldn’t be missed." Richard Marcus

8 players with 703 years between them compete in the World over 80s Table Tennis Championships in Inner Mongolia. Terry (81) having been given a week to live, gets in sight of winning gold. Inge (89) has used table tennis to train her way out of the dementia ward she committed herself to. Australian legend Dorothy deLow is 100, and finds herself a mega celebrity in this rarefied world and Texan Lisa Modlich, a new-comer at 85 years old, is determined to do whatever it takes to win her first gold.

"It is about ageing, mortality, friendship, ambition and love. The stories stay with you for hours, weeks, after the credits have rolled. But perhaps its most powerful achievement is to leave us with a more humane conception of sport, and of life itself."

Matthew Syed - The Times

"What a heart-warmer… ’Inspirational’ barely covers it." Anthony Quinn, The Independent

"An unabashed crowdpleaser bouncing between sweetly satirical and sincerely moving." Total Film

8 players with 703 years between them compete in the World over 80s Table Tennis Championships in Inner Mongolia. Terry (81) having been given a week to live, gets in sight of winning gold. Inge (89) has used table tennis to train her way out of the dementia ward she committed herself to. Australian legend Dorothy deLow is 100, and finds herself a mega celebrity in this rarefied world and Texan Lisa Modlich, a new-comer at 85 years old, is determined to do whatever it takes to win her first gold.

"It is about ageing, mortality, friendship, ambition and love. The stories stay with you for hours, weeks, after the credits have rolled. But perhaps its most powerful achievement is to leave us with a more humane conception of sport, and of life itself."

Matthew Syed - The Times

"What a heart-warmer… ’Inspirational’ barely covers it." Anthony Quinn, The Independent

"An unabashed crowdpleaser bouncing between sweetly satirical and sincerely moving." Total Film

"For the fans left bereft by his 2012 death, it’s impossible to imagine a more exquisite, honest, and beautifully detailed documentary about the life of Levon Helm than Jacob Hatley’s Ain’t in It for My Health. This film seems as much man as it does movie, capturing the many sides of The Band’s former drummer: his modesty, his humor, his anger about how his group fell apart. And, without getting all gooey, the doc shows how Helm handled the cancer that hovered over his final decade. Finally, this unassuming little flick makes a sham out of drugs-a-go-go melodramatic crap like Walk the Line—maybe because Hatley never forgets he’s making a movie about a goddamn musician. This is one of the most fully rounded, unsentimental portraits of an artist you’ll ever see on film." Peter Gesternzang, Village Voice

In this hit documentary, Italian journalists/filmmakers Ragazzi and Hofer wonder if those roads leading to Rome don’t also look like escape routes. There is an opportunity to move to Berlin - where rents are a third of the price, there’s less unemployment, and less homophobia too. Also Berlusconi doesn’t live there. Even so, Luca is loathe to leave. So they hop into a vintage FIAT 500 and set off to take stock of "the real Italy", with a pilgrimage to visit George Clooney’s Lake Como villa on the side.

"Effervescent." John Anderson, Variety

*** (3 stars out of 4) Rick Groen, Globe & Mail

Both a tribute to one of the twentieth century’s most extravagant and influential personalities, and simultaneously a chronicle of the impact of fashion in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, this portrait of the irrepressible editor of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar is an eye-opener, just like its subject.

"Makes a compelling case for the late Diana Vreeland as the 20th century’s pre-eminent tastemaker, not to mention one of its most extravagant personalities." Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal

"4 out of 5… Captivating… Insightful." Carolyne Zinko, San Francisco Chronicle

For over forty years, America’s "War on Drugs" has accounted for 45 million arrests, made America the world’s largest jailer, and damaged poor communities at home and abroad. Yet for all that, drugs in America are cheaper, purer, and more available today than ever before. Perhaps it’s time to call a ceasefire?

"Searing… One of the most important pieces of non-fiction to hit the screen in years." LA Times

"Fearless… A model of the ambitious, vitalizing activist work that exists to stir the sleeping to wake." New York Times

Jean Pierre Jeunet, the wizard who gave us Amelie and Delicatessen conjures another buoyant medley of slapstick, whimsy and satire in this infinitely inventive contemporary fantasy. Dany Boon is the Chaplinesque hero with a bullet in his brain who falls in with a band of urban outsiders and takes revenge on the weapons manufacturers who put it there.

"A fun-house of mirrors that is lovely to get lost in." Betsy Sharkey, LA Times

"Micmacs is like a Buster Keaton or Harold Lloyd movie where everybody is Buster or Harold, yet they all work in harmony." Peter Howell, Toronto Star

The latest in our irregular series of archival shows throws a well-earned spotlight on the late Phil Keatley, whose long career at the CBC ranged from the 1950s to the 70s. Keatley is probably best known for his work as a producer on The Beachcombers, but here we look back further, to three black and white dramas he produced in BC between 1958 and 1967.

Two women from opposite sides of Hitler’s Third Reich meet in Toronto, years after the Second World War–Mania, orphaned by the regime, and Johanna, possibly the Nazi guard who protected her. Weaving together their stories, this powerful documentary intimately explores their war experiences and witnesses their reunion more than half a century later.

He won Grammys and an Academy Award; wrote many #1 songs; starred in a Brian DePalma movie; put out his own hit records and albums; was a guest on The Tonight Show fifty times; and is the president of ASCAP…and you might not have heard of him. In the 1970’s, Paul Williams was the singer / actor / songwriter that emotional, alienated teenage boys all over the world wanted to be, a sex symbol before MTV, when sex symbols could be 5"2 and sing songs about loneliness with the Muppets. A wistful musical journey that will re-introduce a new generation to Williams’ soulful classics, Paul Williams: Still Alive is the charmingly self-narrated story of Stephen Kessler’s lifelong obsession with the former superstar-and what happens when the nostalgic filmmaker finally catches up with him.

"The oft-hilarious push-and-pull between director and subject—Williams wryly notes that the film is turning into “the Steve and Paulie Show”—effectively hacks away at the celebrity-enthusiast divide. By the end of this perceptive dual portrait, both men are content to merely be human." **** Keith Uhlich, Time Out New York

The Golden Lion winner at last year’s Venice Film Festival, this is a controversial and intense drama about a tough, brutal loan shark redeemed by the unqualified love of a woman claiming to be his long-lost mother. Violent and provocative, Pieta is nothing if not extreme, a movie reveling in almost absurdist dichotomies of good and evil. But if you can stomach the challenging first hour, the pay off tells us something unexpectedly poetic and moving about the relative value of money and compassion in today’s capitalist society.

"A master provocateur playing out his own neuroses and obsessions on the big screen…Like Lars Von Trier, his films don’t always work. But when they do … well, when they do Kim is capable of creating work that disturbs and troubles and finds beauty in unexpected places. This is one of those films." Todd Brown, Twitch

"The worst major festival winner since the Palme d’Or for Amour." Christoph Huber, Cinema Scope

The latest from master director Abbas Kiarostami (Certified Copy; Close Up; A Taste of Cherry) is a strange, seductive and beguiling love story set in modern Tokyo. Akiko is a beautiful student who moonlights as a prostitute, unbeknownst to her boyfriend. A liaison with an elderly academic brings all manner of complication to all their lives…

"Every shot — everything you see, and everything you don’t — imparts a disturbing and thrilling sense of discovery." AO Scott, New York Times

"A sly, teasing riff on the heart’s irrational stirrings… You emerge elated and slightly dazed…. But the movie’s sense of immutable desire resonates well after the lights have come up." Scott Foundas, Village Voice