Picking Locks

A review of little known and unusual facts collected from across Canada: New Brunswick's Magnetic Hill; a town in British Columbia with enough buildings for four thousand people yet inhabited by one man; and a religion which forbids its members to drive automobiles.

A canadian cameo production with Grey Owl produced by special arrangement with the national parks of canada.

This short documentary introduces us to a town where no one pays rent: Simoom Sound in central British Columbia, where loggers live on sturdy river craft. Every week there are visitors: the general storekeeper, the flying postman and most importantly, the forest ranger, who is ever alert to the threat of fire.

The story of the friendship between Grey Owl and a beaver. Sheltered and fed by Grey Owl through babyhood, the little beaver is reluctant to return to his own people. But when he does, Grey Owl (Archie Belaney) is adopted by the entire beaver tribe. The film shows Grey Owl playing with his beaver friends and re-enacting the finding of the baby beaver.

King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (later Queen Mother) in the royal carriage.

Rhapsody in Two Languages is a city symphony film reminiscent of the work of Walter Ruttmann and Dziga Vertov, a paean to '30s Montreal that contrasts old and new: horse-drawn carts, flashy new automobiles, busy streets, jaywalking monks, and wild nightlife, with overlaps and spinning images that suggest just how out of control things could get when the sun went down.

A group of workers decide to join the army in the Great War. The indulge themselves in the side benefits to being soldiers, and one of them marries a French waitress.

A 1938 NFB short. Part of a series called 'Canada Cameos' that traces the history of buffalo in Alberta, it's threat of extinction and the efforts to protect it as an endangered species. Narrated by Lorne Greene. (black and white)

Documentary about curling in Canada. It shows: slow motion shot of sweepers clearing the path of the rock; Ken Watson, head of a Canadian championship curling team, demonstrating curling shots; taking care of the curling rink; scenes from Scotland, where granite is made into curling stones); women curling; rules of the game; overhead shot of children curling with homemade cement stones in the jam tin league in Regina (named for the jam tins filled with cement to make stones); high school curling leagues in Western Canada; highlights of a game between two teams skipped by Ken Watson and Jimmy Welsh; outdoor march by curlers and kilted marching band; and scenes of Canadian Curlers.

This documentary is a compilation of unusual facts about Canada. It includes trains which travel in air, eels which swim to the market, and a ship that keeps afloat with its bottom and sides full of holes. Narrator Corey Thomson gives explanations in this educational short.

What Hockey player do on their time off.

The fourth and final game in the 1933 playoffs for the Stanley Cup played at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto. The match, between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the New York Rangers, is described by the well-known sports commentator Foster Hewitt. Hewitt also interviews the players and coaches of both teams in their respective dressing rooms. Scoreless at the end of regulation time, the game goes into overtime: now the first goal scored will decide the game. The Rangers score to take the Cup.

Documentary about skiing in the Rockies. It shows: skiers coming out of a lodge; attaching seal fur skins to skis to give traction for climbing; protecting eyes with sunglasses and skin with face cream; skiers with their guide; two skiers risking their safety by skiing without a guide; the guide racing to stop the two skiers from skiing over a precipice; the two skiers joining the group; and the skiers arriving at a cabin for a rest.

Old Dobbin talks about his flashy relatives, race horses, jumpers, fire horses, cavalry mounts.