Distribution:
FilmCAN is proud to be Canada’s only provider of digital downloadable
feature and short length media content.
We currently offer all files in mpeg4 (h.264; 640x480) format, which is
the highest quality iPod compatible format, and is also great for
most laptops and computer screens, as well as cell phones; it's
not really designed for big-screen (30”+) TV viewing. Check back in
the next few months, as DVD-equivalent quality is in the pipeline.
For a look at mpeg4 (h.264) in action, check out the short films in our FREE
VIDEO PODCAST, a collection of videos and interviews.
FilmCAN movies
and podcasts are best viewed using iTunes and
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and you may have to install both programs to play our files. Check out our DOWNLOAD FAQ if
you have more questions.
Feature films:
Short Films & other media:
Cowards Bend the Knee
Set in a shadow-suffused hockey arena and a Mabuse-like beauty salon-slash-abortion clinic lined with two-way mirrors, Cowards is twisted and poisoned wish-fulfillment: the mythomaniacal Maddin casts ’himself‘ (actually, Darcy Fehr) as a hockey sniper made lily-livered by mother and daughter femme fatales, and resurrects his father as the team? radio broadcaster and his own romantic antagonist. And it all takes place within a drop of sperm. Originally presented as an installation in ten peepholes at Toronto? Power Plant gallery and the 2003 Rotterdam Film Festival.
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$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Guy Maddin
2003, Canada
64 mins
DREAMTRIPS
Dreamtrips is a time-traveling, continents-traversing
journey about a young Hong Kong woman in Toronto who, sufferring from
insomnia and worried sick over a missing boyfriend, decides to take a
trip into the dream world through computer networking. Inevitably, she
ends up with more than she bargains for, but, in the end, all seems to
boil down to the simple pleasure of a cup of Hong Kong style "milk
tea".
related links:
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Kal Ng
1999, Canada
97 mins
Grass
Award-winning director Ron Mann (Comic Book Confidential, Twist) hooks up with actor/activist Woody Harrelson to deal you Grass, a highly spirited and innovative look into one of America’s most deeply rooted cultural myths: “the evils of marijuana.” Find out how a nice person like yourself became a dangerous criminal. Includes special bonus features.
related links:
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Ron Mann
1999, Canada
90 mins
Hard Core Logo
Bruce McDonald’s classic mock-rock-doc is
a by turns moving and piercing examination of friendship and betrayal,
success and self-hatred – everything that fuels punk rock. Lead
singer Joe Dick (Hugh Dillon) uses false pretenses to convince guitarist
Billy Tallent (Callum Keith Rennie) to reform Hard Core Logo for a reunion
tour across Canada. Tallent agrees, but only as a favour to Dick (and
because he expects to be joining a much more successful rock group very
shortly). As the reformed crew travel from town to town, their relationship
slowly unravels, as does the psyche of bass player John Oxenberger (John
Pyper-Ferguson). Serene moments of landscape-induced introspection contrast
beautifully with the inherently delinquent humour of a group on the run
from its past, toward a future that’s never been less assured.
related links:
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Bruce McDonald
1996, Canada
92 mins
Highway 61
Pokey Jones (screenwriter Don McKellar), a naive Canadian barber and aspiring jazz musician from Thunder Bay, meets Jackie Bangs (Valerie Buhagiar), a flamboyant roadie who needs someone to drive her and her "brother's" corpse to New Orleans. Jackie and Pokey set out along Ontario provincial highway 61, coffin strapped to the top of the car, following Bob Dylan's famous U.S. Highway 61 south through the heart of the country.
Chaos ensues thanks to the surreal characters encountered en route, the drugs secretly stashed within the body, and pursuit by the hirsute Mr. Skin
(Earl Pastko), who believes he's Satan and who wants to claim the corpse
for its soul, which he claims to have purchased sometime ago.
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Low Self-Esteem Girl
Featuring cameos and starring roles from a who?s who of the Vancouver independent music scene (including Destroyer?s Dan Bejar, Jason Zumpano and the New Pornographer?s Carl Newman), Blaine Thurier?s debut feature film follows a generous but gullible young woman (Corinna Hammond) who is sexually exploited by a pot dealer and his clients. At the same time, a demon-possessed virgin (Rob McBeth) falls in love with her, but his Christian youth group pastor (A.C. Newman) won't let him date her until she converts. While the potheads conspire, the Christians apply pressure -- will Lois be a saint or a sinner? Or will she learn there's really no difference?
Winner of best feature film at the SXSW film festival (2000).
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Male Fantasy
Divorced from his wife and reality, deluded eccentric
Andrew (Robert Dayton) applies a magical philosophy to
his romantic life in order to rise from his obsessions, become a successful
lady's man, and achieve godhood. With the superhuman persistence of a
door-to-door salesman, he tangles with obstacles thrown up by a resentful
friend (Steve Wood), his lingering feelings for his wife (Cindy Wolfe),
and the refusal of reality to co-operate with his plan. His determination
brings him closer to his goals but fatal landmines are often hidden in
fulfilled wishes. Featuring original music by A.C. Newman and
The Sun City Girls.
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Blaine
Thurier
2004, Canada
78 mins
Outrageous!
It sounds like a joke: a bashful drag queen and
a young schizophrenic bring out the best in each other.
Robin (Craig Russell) is a hairdresser who hasn't quite
gathered the courage to get on stage and do drag. But when
an old school friend named Liza (Hollis McLaren) appears at his door in
a robe and nightgown, having just run away from a mental hospital where
she was voluntarily committed, her manic energy gives him the strength
to act on his desires. He in turn gives her a stable, loving home – until
he goes to New York to audition for a drag show and his spot-on impressions
of Bette, Barbra, Carol Channing, and Mae West make a splash. Just as
Robin's star rises, though, a pregnant Liza spirals into misery and madness.
Outrageous may sound melodramatic, but in fact it achieves a rare realism – there's
no Hollywood gloss on any aspect of the characters’ crazy but skillfully-rendered
lives.
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Richard
Benner
1977, Canada
100 mins
RollerCOASTER
There are the damned, the doom generation. Stealing the group home station wagon, a quintet of jaded juveniles invade a closed down amusement park called Wonder World which for one day and night threatens to become Teenage WasteLand. Lovers Chloe and Darrin are there for more than fun and games: after a positive pregnancy test, she wants to end their lives with a spectacular double suicide. Uncouth pals Stick and Sanj are around to see if the pair will really go through with it, and Darrin’s little brother Justin, an unnervingly quiet sketcher, is using the trip as a jumping-off point to run away to Spokane. How much of this is mere Gen-Why poseur boastfulness, and how much of it is really going to happen?
related links:
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Scott Smith
1999, Canada
87 mins
Roadkill
Ramona (Valerie Buhagiar), who can’t drive,
is sent to recover an errant band who are in danger of missing the final
date of their tour. Hiring a taxi to drive her the hundreds of kilometers
to get the job done, she meets a variety of characters along the way:
a trainee serial killer (screenwriter Don McKellar’s brilliant breakout
role) who's finding it hard to get his career off the ground; a film crew
desperate for some live action gore; and a silent young man who refuses
to speak since “he has nothing left to say any more.” Infused
with the true independent spirit of low budget filmmaking, the conclusion
wraps up the seemingly isolated plot lines in a
thumping final scene.
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Bruce McDonald
1989, Canada
80 mins
Trains of Winnipeg
Clive Holden's collection of 14 film poems is an epic ride through a uniquely early 21st century landscape. Featuring music by Christine Fellows and Jason Tait and John K. Sampson (The Weakerthans), Trains of Winnipeg presents suburban and urban dystopias, explores the politics of form and the form of personal politics, and celebrates the raw joy of moving pictures, sound, colour and light.
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$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Clive Holden
2005, Canada
89 mins
Dream Tower / Echoes Without Saying
A feature length bundle of two of director Ron Mann's counter cultural studies. Dream Tower is an incisive look into Toronto’s notorious Rochdale College, an eighteen storey high rise completed in 1968, and intended as a free college; instead Rochdale quickly turned into an experimental living environment peopled by artists, draft dodgers and hippies. Echoes Without Saying (28mins) looks at CoachHouse Press, an innovative Toronto-based publishing and printing house.
related links:
$8.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Ron Mann
1994 / 1983, Canada
47 mins / 28 mins
Sissy Boy Slap Party / The Workbooks
Sissy Boy Slap Party
Originally commissioned as a four-minute short in support of the Saddest Music in the World, this longer version is an exercise in grafting the Three Stooges onto a Kenneth Anger lilac bush. Now contains 50% more slapping.
The Workbooks
A collection of rarely seen Maddin shorts! Includes: Fuse Boy (4:00); Rooster (3:54); Zookeeper (3:53); Chimney (3:52); Audition 01 (5:04); Audition 02 (2:33).
related links:
$5.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Guy Maddin
Various Dates, Canada
30 mins
The Dead Father / Sombra Dolorosa
Dead Father, The
A grey comedy about a boy who keeps forgetting, and a man who cheats on his wife by dying.
Sombra Dolorosa
In this Maxi-Mexi-Melancolour short, the widow Paramo attempts
to prevent further familial tragedy and her daughter Dolores
wants to join her father, the recently deceased Don Paramo,
in death and by
taking on El Muerto, Death himself, in the wrestling ring.
$5.99 CAN
credits:
Director – Guy Maddin
1985 / 2004, Canada
23 mins / 7 mins