Documentary

Films

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An orphan escapes Ethiopia and heads to England, where she grows up and works to help fellow immigrants reunite with their families.

Drama | 111 min

Sweetness in the Belly

JOHN LEWIS: GOOD TROUBLE chronicles Lewis’ 60-plus years of social activism and legislative action on civil rights, voting rights, gun control, health-care reform and immigration.

Biography | 98 min

John Lewis: Good Trouble

Abdulkader fled the war in Syria and crossed the Mediterranean. Now he’s pursuing his lifelong dream of becoming a ‘nez:’ a master perfumer.

Documentary | 29 min

L’essence des Souvenirs: Itinéraire d’un Apprenti Parfumeur

ISLANDS follows Joshua, a shy middle-aged Filipino immigrant who has lived in the comfort of his parents' Scarborough home his entire life. When their health declines, he begins to long for a partner.

Drama | 94 min

Islands

Tommy (a.k.a. 張麟發, Jason, Timmy, Tammy, Tim Tam, Lan Phat and T Truong)  reveals the story of his many names.

Biography | 11 min

My Name is 張麟發 Tommy Lan Phat Truong

Black Canadian immigrants share the joys and obstacles on their paths to Black excellence. From their first steps in Canada to the moments that shaped their lives. These are their journeys here.

Documentary | 1 episode

Being Black in Canada: My Journey Here

KIM'S CONVENIENCE is the funny, heartfelt story of The Kims, a Korean-Canadian family, running a convenience store in downtown Toronto.

Comedy | 5 seasons

Kim's Convenience

KIM'S CONVENIENCE is the funny, heartfelt story of The Kims, a Korean-Canadian family, running a convenience store in downtown Toronto (Korean subtitled version).

Kim's Convenience (Korean Subtitles)

Every new Canadian has a story. “Becoming Canadian” travels to citizenship ceremonies right across the country to capture some of those stories.

Documentary | 1 season

Becoming Canadian

The six-hour miniseries tells the story of Grace Marks, a young, poor Irish immigrant and domestic servant in Upper Canada who finds herself accused and convicted of murder.

Crime and Police | 1 season

Alias Grace

A young Romanian woman moves to the United States with her son after she marries an American man she hardly knows.

Drama | 88 min

Lemonade

Filmmaker Anne Koizumi explores the childhood shame she felt about her Japanese immigrant father, who worked as a janitor at her school.

Documentary | 8 min

In the Shadow of the Pines

The beautifully normal absurd story of a man who did everything right, perhaps not quite at the right time. Fine arts student, immigrant, husband, father of two, and owner of his own condom business.

Documentary | 24 min

The Condom King of Newfoundland

With the help of his recent recruit, a gang leader takes on an established crime lord in a battle for control over Vancouver's arms and drug trade.

Drama | 104 min

Beeba Boys

An Irish immigrant lands in 1950s Brooklyn, where she quickly falls into a romance with a local. When her past catches up with her, however, she must choose between two countries and the lives that exist within.

Romance | 112 min

Brooklyn

One Sunday a month, Nancy Falaise closes the doors of her Montreal hair salon to lead an intimate workshop for young Black girls struggling with their curly hair.

Documentary | 20 min

Nancy's Workshop

Chand (Preity Zinta) is a young woman who travels from India to Canada to marry Rocky (Vansh Bhardwaj), a man she has never met. Her dream of a new life morphs into a nightmare as marriage to Rocky and his family becomes a numbing spiral of confusion and pain. Chand finds hope in her friendship with Rosa (Yanna McIntosh), a street-smart woman from Jamaica who works with Chand at a laundry factory. Rosa gives Chand a magical root and promises that it will make Rocky fall deeply in love with her. The experiment ends in a surreal parallel life that mirrors an Indian fable involving a King Cobra.

Drama | 105 min

Heaven on Earth

Vika - a seventeen year-old Ukrainian orphan with fiery red hair, bright blue eyes and an everlasting laugh - is setting out into the world for the very first time, all alone. Vika is the story of her final year at a rural boarding school in Eastern Ukraine. It’s also the story of the bond she fights to maintain with her 10 year-old sister, Arina. Arina was adopted by a family in Toronto four years ago, during the Ukrainian revolution. Arina has a blissful childhood, with a family in Toronto offering her guidance, unconditional love and the types of opportunities Vika never had. Vika, meanwhile, is stepping out into the world as an adult for the first time, moving to another city  and leaving behind the only support she's ever known. Vika hasn't seen Arina since she left Ukraine, but her ultimate goal is to one day reunite with her sister - the only family she has left - and start a life in Canada. Reuniting the girls has always been the plan for Arina’s adoptive mother Alena, herself a Ukrainian immigrant to Canada. When she and her husband Slava made the decision to adopt, the sisters were already separated: Vika was put in a boarding school while her mother was alive; Arina was put in foster care after their mother’s death. Alena and Slava only met Vika later; they wanted to bring her to Toronto, but as a family of limited means, supporting both girls was impossible. Before Vika can move to Canada, she’ll need to navigate the troublesome waters of life on her own, in a country where orphans are disproportionately abused, neglected and brutally stigmatised by society. As few as five percent of Ukrainian orphans make a successful transition to adult life. The majority fall victim to poverty, drugs, alcohol, crime, trafficking and suicide. Vika has a real chance to break the mold, but it’s up to her to do it all alone.

Biography | 26 min

Vika

Marvin is sixty-five. He hates to get his hair cut. With a modest (but expanding) grey afro on his head, Marvin's hair isn't what you might expect on a senior executive who lives in suburbia. Marvin immigrated from Jamaica to Ottawa in the 1950s, when Black immigrants were rare and often unwelcome. With no Black barbers in the city, Marvin suffered through many painful haircuts. The trauma from this period still lingers with him today. The Haircut is a funny and refreshing take on the classic Canadian immigrant story - but it's also an exploration of assimilation and resistance through the portrait of one man's refusal to cut his hair.

Documentary | 10 min

The Haircut

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All "Immigration" content