Canada Vignettes: The Thirties

A woman reminisces about her childhood on a Prairie farm during the Depression. Her memory album is a collection of watercolours by artist/filmmaker Blake James that describe a family's struggle to survive despite drought and poverty. The film is a historical account of the land and the times, simply told through paintings that are alive with warmth and colour.

A montage of watercolour images of the work and occasional play of a farm family.

Kathleen Shannon describes the look and feel of her childhood to an artist friend, and uses his paintings and her visit to the ruins of the mining site where she grew up to reflect on her early life and how it influenced the adult she became.

A lesson in geography, which concludes that although the Great Lakes have had their ups and downs, nothing has been harder to take than what humans have done to them lately. In the film, a lone canoeist lives through the changes of geological history, through Ice Age and flood, only to find himself in the end trapped in a sea of scum.

An unconventional version of The Christmas Carol.

A man obsessed with his award-winning lawn goes to great lengths to keep it looking great when mushrooms suddenly start appearing all over the yard.

An eccentric history buff lives in a cabin in the woods but spends most of his time flying his biplane.

Bill Mason imparts his affection for the big northern timber wolves and the pure-white Arctic wolves. Filmed over three years in the Northwest Territories, British Columbia, the High Arctic and his home near the Gatineau Hills in Quebec, Mason sets out to dispel the myth of the bloodthirsty wolf. Going beyond the wolf's natural habitat, Mason relocated three young wolves to his own property and was able to film tribal customs, mating and birth - moments in wildlife never before seen on film.