Hot Docs 2009

Sharon, pregnant with her first child, realizes she can't start a family of her own until she confronts and mends the dysfunctional family she left behind in Buffalo, New York. Mom is enraged about the most recent pregnancy of her other daughter, Karen, the black sheep of the family. Mom can't understand Karen's choices: Why have a third child, fathered by a drug dealer, on top of a terminally ill second child? The family unit is in crisis. No one shares the same values and cultures clash-Jew and gentile, black and white, middle class and welfare class. But mother and daughters are more alike than they realize. They may not like each other, but they do love one another. Scenes from everyday life-just surviving, nagging, coping, bills, and doctor's appointments-give the film true intimacy. Angie Driscoll.

Eva is a young, beautiful and smart overachiever with a loving family and a great sense of humour. She also shares a terrible bond with some very special friends. Eva (65_redroses) and her online friends, Spirit_of_Kina and megmucus, all have cystic fibrosis, a fatal genetic disease affecting the lungs and digestive system. On a waiting list for a lung transplant, Eva faces the stark reality that the transplant could either kill her or give her another shot at life. The only ones who truly know what she's facing are 22-year-old Kina, battling chronic rejection from her double lung transplant, and 19-year-old Meg, who tries to drink and medicate herself into denial. Unable to meet because of the deadly risk of passing superbugs to one another, the girls are each other's lifelines as they face some of the toughest decisions anyone could ever make when all they really want to do is breathe. Gisèle Gordon.

Since 1982, the Youth House on the outskirts of Copenhagen has provided a safe haven for punks, queers, freaks, and pretty much anyone else who doesn't fit into society. When local government votes to remove the outsiders, they refuse to go down without a fight. 69 provides incredible access to the activists whose situational pranks and media spin give way to violent protests and arrests. This is a battle royale between the establishment and the disenfranchised-youth facing off against police, squatters resisting condo developers, anarchists debating politicians. What's at stake? A sense of belonging and a place to call home. What happens to democracy when you don't have a say in it? Deny people their individuality and watch them explode! A suspenseful primer on what happens when both sides refuse to negotiate. Angie Driscoll.

As a baby, Gwen Bradshaw was horribly disfigured after being tossed into a campfire by her distraught mother, suffering from post-partum psychosis. Her father, unable to forgive her mother, took Gwen away and raised her on his own. She never saw her mother again. Now 24, Gwen, estranged from her father, is recovering in a mental hospital after a suicide attempt. About Face picks up Gwen's incredible story as she begins a five-year journey to find the answers she needs to forgive, heal, and move forward. Gwen's inspirational efforts to change her life are filled with ups and downs. She attends a conference for burn victims, finds romance and heartbreak, and connects with a half-sister. But her quest for self-acceptance culminates in the search for her mentally ill mother. Will meeting her mother give Gwen the sense of family and belonging she has longed for? Shannon Abel. Co-presented with Rendezvous with Madness Film Festival.

Anyone with an admiration for Asian action films knows that the genre's acrobatic stunt work is decidedly more realistic than the cushy, impressionistic green-screen stunts of Hollywood fare (workplace safety standards evidently aren't the same overseas). And no one knows this better than Jung Byung-Gil, a perpetual dreamer and movie junkie who is determined to become the next Stephen Chow. A delightfully sweet and self-deprecating look at one man's transition from film geek to stunt man, Action Boys follows Jung and several of his classmates as they audition for and attend the Seoul Action School. The grueling training program takes its toll (only seven of the 34 students who begin the program graduate) but the survivors earn spots in such cult Korean action pics as City of Violence and The Host. Action Boys is an endearing, tongue-in-cheek look at where your love for the movies can take you. Co-presented with Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival.

"I can't accept that it happened for a reason, nor can I really accept that there is no reason. The only way to carry on is to be humble, and a little bit in awe of these things you can't really understand," observes James O'Reilly, contemplating a lightning strike. Accidents, chance, fate, and the elusive quest for understanding underpin Jennifer Baichwal's elegant and captivating new work, an exploration of the metaphysical effects of being struck by lightning. For the writer Paul Auster, involved in a strike at age 14, it deeply affected his life and art. "It opened up a whole realm of speculation that I've continued to live with ever since," says Auster. The improvisational guitarist Fred Frith underscores how accidents spark "the beginning of something." Indeed, as a visually and aurally seductive reverie to storytelling, our attempt to make sense of things, Act of God may be Baichwal's cinematic ars poetica. Sean Farnel.

After 30 years of war and a ban on music and dancing under Taliban rule, pop culture is back in Afghanistan. Millions are watching Afghan Star, an American Idol-style vocal competition. You know the drill: thousands audition, a dozen make the finals, then viewers whittle down the roster of contestants until only one is left. But this is more than a glossy copycat show. Music holds special cultural import to Afghans, who have gone decades without art or public performance. So although Afghan Star is entertaining TV first and foremost, it also symbolizes freedom of expression and peace. Voting by cell phone is a novelty to many-their first encounter with the democratic process. When a female competitor dances on stage and drops her headscarf, there's talk of retribution and threats of an honour killing. In Afghanistan, you risk more than YouTube humiliation when you sing; you risk your life. Angie Driscoll. Co-presented with Toronto Human Rights Watch Film Festival.

For far too long, sex workers have been stigmatized and misunderstood. Aka Ana offers a profound yet transgressive and raw depiction of their world, leaving no safety net for the audience. Photographer and visual auteur Antoine d'Agata travels to the dark sexual underground of urban Japan, meeting with prostitutes, porn stars, and junkies. He broodingly yet sensually illustrates the women as they perform various explicit sex acts, sadomasochism, and drug injections. By cleverly layering their narrations, d'Agata reveals their intimate stories of pleasure, isolation, trauma, and desire. The women are the protagonists of the film, and their scenarios, coupled with their brutally sobering accounts, clearly unveil all the conflicting intricacies of feminine sexuality, from masturbation, to the power of orgasms, to violence. Aka Ana is a daring and provocatively intense subterranean experience. D'Agata's true achievement is his artful and multi-sensory approach to helping us understand these women and to expanding our own fearful boundaries. Karina Rotenstein. Co-presented with CONTACT Toronto Photography Festival.

In a lyrical and cinematic ode to memory, acclaimed Up the Yangtze director Yung Chang takes us on a dreamlike voyage to recreate a childhood experience as he remembers it. Spanning oceans and continents, Chang's film elegantly captures the breathtaking sunrise that exquisitely materializes from behind the peaks of Ali Shan, an historical mountain located in Taiwan. What emerges is a sensitive piece of visual poetry and a tribute to all who dare to dream. Michelle Latimer.