Places Not Our Own

Created in 1939, the National Film Board of Canada has produced and distributed literally thousands of films by and about Canadians, including hundreds of animated shorts. But despite the fact that these innovative cartoons received several Oscar wins and nominations, most were little-seen by Canada's neighbors to the south.

Morag Gunn, a writer who is having trouble with her teenage daughter, examines her own relationship history, which includes a period of turbulence with Jules. While she and Jules have known each other since childhood, he is no rock of stability. In addition, he is white, while she is part Native American, so the teenage Morag experienced racism he can only imagine. Even after they have a daughter, she struggles against the emptiness within her.

A man smuggles in an exotic animal, but discovers too late that it's infested with some rather nasty insects.

An archaeological expedition journeys to Manitoba, Canada, in search of a legendary crucifix supposedly buried in an ancient Viking grave.

HEART LAND takes viewers from a raging white-water kayaking ride and the thundering heat of a chuckwagon race, to swooping over a field of magnificent sunflowers and the magic of a solar eclipse. There are landscapes of unparalleled beauty, the exquisite grace of Evelyn Hart and Andre Lewis dancing Norbert Vesak's award winning pas-de-deux, "Belong", a hilarious animated sequence by Richard Condie, and touching images, past and present, of the people who have dared to carve out a new life against a vast, and sometimes unforgiving landscape.

Jesse Threebears is a troubled Native-American teen who has been tossed from one foster home to the next since his mother died when he was an infant. Finally, he is taken in by his grandfather who, after a ten year stint in prison, is living on the reservation. With the help of his grandfather and several others who live on the reservation, Jesse begins to learn about his heritage and how to come to terms with his troubled life.

A train runs into a cow on the tracks; with the captain nowhere to be found, the fireman is forced to desperately improvise in order to keep the train going.

A young dog struggles to learn how to find a job.

This animated short tells the story of Qalupalik, a part-human sea monster that lives deep in the Arctic Ocean and preys on children who do not listen to their parents or elders. That is the fate of Angutii, a young boy who refuses to help out in his family’s camp and who plays by the shoreline... until one day Qalupalik seizes him and drags him away. Angutii's father, a great hunter, must then embark on a lengthy kayak journey to try and bring his son home.

A 13-year-old girl and her older brother live on a farm where paleontologists search for fossils.

This animated short is a tragic and twisted story about the dangers of revenge. A cruel mother mistreats her son, feeding him dog meat and forcing him to sleep in the cold. A loon, who tells the boy that his mother blinded him, helps the child regain his eyesight. Then the boy seeks revenge, releasing his mother’s lifeline as she harpoons a whale and watching her drown. Based on a portion of the epic Inuit legend “The Blind Boy and the Loon.”

Set in a blazing land where the sun ceaselessly shines, this dramatic fantasy examines love’s darker aspects.

The story of two very different boys in the Canadian wilderness. They must learn to depend on each other in order to survive.

In this animated short, a self-important colonial explorer emerges from a sailing ship and plants a flag on the Arctic ice, as a bemused Inuit hunter looks on. Then the explorer plants another, and another, and another, while the hunter, clearly not impressed that his land has been “discovered,” quietly goes about his business. In this charming and humorous re-imagining of first contact between Inuit and European, Jonathan Wright brings us the story of a savvy hunter and the ill-equipped explorer he outwits.

A group of seemingly humanistic trucks takeover a truck stop and starts killing everything in sight. The remaining townsfolk must band together and come up with a way to murder the inanimate objects, a seemingly difficult task considering the abnormal circumstances.

A traveling cellist gets involved with two disturbed sisters on their way to Seattle to tell their mom that their dad has just passed away. On the way, the two kill a judge and a few others unknown to the cellist. Eventually he gets pinned for the crimes and is forced to defend himself.