Asbestos

The Salton Sea: An inland ocean of massive fish kills, rotting resorts, and 120 degree nights located just minutes from urban Southern California. This film details the rise and fall of the Salton Sea, from its heyday as the "California Riviera" where boaters and Beach Boys mingled in paradise to its present state of decaying, forgotten ecological disaster.

Exploring the impact of human behavior on our environment from the perspective of one of South Florida's most beloved and fragile underwater creatures: the sea turtle. A critical look at the effects of global warming, water pollution, and our "throw-away" plastic lifestyle on this keystone species...and inevitably ourselves.

An examination of the extinction threat faced by frogs, which have hopped on Earth for some 250 million years and are a crucial cog in the ecosystem. Scientists believe they've pinpointed a cause for the loss of many of the amphibians: the chytrid fungus, which flourishes in high altitudes. Unfortunately, they don't know how to combat it. Included: an isolated forest in Panama that has yet to be touched by the fungus, thus enabling frogs to live and thrive as they have for eons.

Chemical engineer and inventor Maria Telkes worked for nearly 50 years to harness the power of the sun, designing and building the world's first successful solar-heated modern residence and identifying a new chemical that could store solar heat like a battery. Telkes was undercut and thwarted by her (male) boss and colleagues at MIT, but she persevered. Upon her death in 1995 Telkes held more than 20 patents, and now she is recognized as a visionary pioneer in the field of sustainable energy whose work continues to shape how we power our lives today.

The Rapanui community on Easter Island fights to prevent an environmental collapse due to overwhelming tourism and industrial progress, and and to preserve their cultural traditions.

An oil boom has drawn thousands to America’s Northern Plains in search of work. Against the backdrop of a cruel North Dakota winter, the stories of three children and an immigrant mother intertwine among themes of innocence, home, and the American Dream.

Directed by Ariane Louis-Seize, this tribute film was created as a gift for Lorraine Pintal, director of Montreal’s Théâtre du Nouveau Monde. Featuring some of the most memorable characters and performers of Pintal’s career, the film’s succession of surreal scenes from different dramatic worlds introduces viewers to the exceptional woman of theatre, stage director, and friend whom they consider to be the “ghost light” of Quebec theatre.

Man of the people, taxi driver, Jean Carignan is above all else one of the world's greatest violinists. In his hands reels become complex, intelligent creations, played with a virtuosity worthy of Paganni, and which continue the traditions of a genre passed on orally. A genre which has retained its popularity, and whose giants include Skinner, Coleman, Allard. Jean Carignan tackles their repertoire, as well as reaping the harvest of his exploration of Irish and Scottish musical traditions, which has made of him an internationally renowned specialist in Celtic music. This film is also a love story between an impoverished child and his violin, and provide a unique window into a remarkable era.

Through concerts and interviews, folk-progressive group Harmonium takes Quebec culture to California. This documentary full of colour and sound, filmed in California in 1978, recounts the ups and downs of the journey of the Quebec musical group Harmonium, who came to feel the pulse of Americans and see if culture, their culture, can succeed in crossing borders.

OUT OF DARKNESS: THE MINE WORKERS' STORY is a documentary by Academy Award-winning director Barbara Kopple (HARLAN COUNTY, USA). Historical film footage and photographs are integrated with first-hand accounts of UMWA history and of the Pittston strike of 1989-90.