A Common Experience

Heritage Minutes, also known officially as Historica Minutes: History by the Minute, are a series of sixty-second short films, each illustrating an important moment in Canadian history. They appear frequently on Canadian television and in cinemas before movies and are now also sold on DVD. The Minutes were first introduced on March 31, 1991 as part of a one-off heavily-promoted history quiz show hosted by Rex Murphy. The thirteen original short films were broken up and run between shows on CBC Television and CTV Network. The continued broadcast of the Minutes and the production of new ones was pioneered by Charles Bronfman's CRB Foundation, Canada Post Power Broadcasting, and the National Film Board. They were devised, developed and largely narrated by noted Canadian broadcaster Patrick Watson, while the producer of the series was Robert Guy Scully. In 2009 Historica merged with The Dominion Institute to become The Historica-Dominion Institute. While the foundations have not paid networks to air Minutes, they have made them freely available, and in the early years paid to have them run in cinemas across the country. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission has ruled that Heritage Minutes are an "on-going dramatic series" thus each minute counts as ninety-seconds of a station's Canadian content requirements.

Bilal Irving, a professional basketball player returns to his small, Northern Ontario town of Dumont. He re-connects with his former coach, and conflict ensues as they both struggle to put their egos and complicated pasts aside to mentor the town’s only basketball team.

After feeling he has nothing left to live for on earth, a lonely geologist tries to qualify for a one-way mission to Mars with the help of an offbeat musician who is just as lost as he is.

Despite it lasting 90 days in 1974, there is only eight minutes of footage about an Indigenous youth-led armed occupation in Kenora, Ontario. The documentary Ni-Naadamaadiz: Red Power Rising tells that story of Indigenous resilience and power.

This short documentary offers a portrait of a group of women who led their community, the largest reserve in Canada, Six Nations of the Grand River Reserve, in an historic blockade to protect their land.

The story of Chanie "Charlie" Wenjack, whose death sparked the first inquest into the treatment of Indigenous children in Canadian residential schools.

Far from home and struggling to reconcile their Native identities with non-Native culture, Ray and Jolene negotiate a growing attraction as they're drawn together, in this reflective exploration of urban Aboriginal identity.

The making of Treaty 9 from the perspective of historical witness George Spence, an 18-year-old Cree hunter from Albany, James Bay.

Sensationalized in the media as a high profile catfishing case involving an NBA superstar and an aspiring model, Shelly Chartier was portrayed as a master manipulator who used social media as her weapon. Through the sensitive and intelligent lens of Indigenous directors Lisa Jackson and Shane Belcourt, the sensationalism is swept aside to reveal something much more compelling and complex - the story of a young woman caught in historical circumstances beyond her control and how she struggles to rebuild her life after incarceration.

In this short film, a young woman of mixed ancestry struggles with an Equal Opportunity Form that requires her to respond to the dilemma: Ethnicity - Choose One.

Growing up in a blue-collar Hamilton neighbourhood filled with factory workers and nuclear families, Tom Wilson knew he was different. His dad George was a blind war veteran—stoic and reserved—and his mother Bunny a very private and protective housewife. Tom learned to express himself through music, successfully getting a record deal and achieving fame and its trappings with his 90s band Junkhouse and later Blackie and the Rodeo Kings. Through all his achievements, his parents kept a secret from their son, one he would not uncover until they both died. After years of hard living, revelations about his family led him on a path to connect with his true identity. Based on his memoir, Beautiful Scars shares Tom's remarkable gifts as an artist and storyteller as he learns about his Mohawk heritage and embarks on a healing journey that reflects on his past and present self.