We're sorry, but our site requires Javascript to be enabled. If you would like instructions on how to enable Javascript, please click here.
How does it work?
VUCAVU works on a video-on-demand (VOD) basis. To rent a film or video, browse the catalogue, view details for individual films and videos, and click RENT when you find something to watch.
What is MY LIST?
You can create a customized list of films and videos to watch later. To add to your list, browse the catalogue and select the +MY LIST button.
Fanny meets her high school friends for the annual Switch & Bitch Party.
A young songwriter seeks out her folk idol in a sleepy lakeside village, only to become enmeshed in a secretive society whose rituals safeguard the threshold between worlds.
This is video compilation is part of the educational guide produced as part of Archive/Counter-Archive’s (A/CA) Case Study, Through Feminist Lenses: Video Works at Groupe Intervention Vidéo with Groupe Intervention Vidéo.
A look at the community response to the murder of Nirmal Singh Gill, a caretaker at the Guru Nanak Gurudwara in Surrey BC by 5 white supremacist skinheads in 1998.
A shortened version of the synopsis that must be less than 500 characters in length. This teaser appears in a pop up when a user hovers their cursor on a title image in our search or other pages.
VHS video documentation of The images, such as they are, do have an effect on us: PORN Dossier. The envelope and folders are opened and the contents examined.
Chilean refugee Daniela (Carmen Aguirre) wants to travel back to Chile to learn more about her family as her father is reluctant to talk about his past. But she is about find out much more than she expected.
A presentation for filmmakers and artists with VUCAVU.com’s Digital Programming Intern, Stephanie Poruchnyk-Butler.
While narrating letters written to her ex, a woman attempts to cast away the lingering shadows of the relationship and overcome feelings of rejection and failure.
VHS video documentation of The images, such as they are, do have an effect on us: CENSORSHIP dossier. The envelope and folders are opened and the contents examined.
Filmed sporadically and intuitively during the summer months of 2020 and 2021, Homunculi is a recontextualization of a personal archive of hand processed 16mm “home movies” and various cinematographic experiments.
"C'est à qui, cette ville?" is a response to the 1984 film, “Ville, Quelle Ville?” This original super 8 film documented various places in Toronto’s east end and reflected upon a young woman’s life in the city.
Digital video documentation of The images, such as they are, do have an effect on us: PORN Dossier. The envelope and folders are opened and the contents examined.
Clash of cultures, care of the elderly and four women trying to make sense of their unravelling family, this is Mum Singh.
A young loner struggles to make connection at a haunted summer camp.
Two sisters attempt to find common understanding amidst bickering.
Spirit Bear's friends teach him about residential schools and how he can help with reconciliation!
Did you know that many First Nations schools get less money than provincial schools? Shannen Koostachin, a young leader from Attawapiskat First Nation, knew this was wrong, and so does Spirit Bear.
As he is making a didgeridoo, Bernard Bosa tells us what vibration is for him, what it has done in his life.
We're delighted to launch A/CA's Educational Guide series; a project and research network dedicated to the activation and preservation of audiovisual archives created by Aboriginal peoples (First Nations, Métis, Inuit), Black communities and people of color, women, LGBT2Q+ and immigrant communities.
Since the launch of the VUCAVU platform in 2016, we have collaborated with artists, educators, and arts organizations across the country to present a wide variety of independent Canadian films and video art online. Artists are always compensated for the dissemination of their works, and the artworks can often be rented individually for VOD viewing after the programming free period has expired. Programs are always accompanied by bilingual curatorial texts exploring the themes addressed in the selection, and many of them also include recordings of roundtable discussions and conversations with the artists!
The Goddess of Humanity is an imaginary deity safeguarding human rights.
A woman transforms into Louis Riel in an exploration of Métis identity.
Funambule moves between the open expanses of the grasslands to the dark shadows of a cedar grove where a traveler and a hunter beckon us to the heart of the forest.
Memories are bridges.
The life of photographer-writer Serge Emmanuel Jongué, told using his own talismans, images and texts.
Inspired by the 8mm app, Garland's Quiet Steps is an instrumental music video of the artist's experience of living in Vancouver.
In an Algeria divided between tradition and modernity, two young adults named Karim and Hadjer could not love each other free.
A couple of uber-goths ride the public transit to the mall to buy more lipstick, but the subtext! Pain, suffering and eternal damnation wrapped in velvety angst. It’s sunny outside, but dark in their souls!
A Johannesburg neighourhood unites five people’s ambitions, desires, and struggles to survive over the course of a Friday.
Ties that bind beyond the last light.
A manuscript, written in 1954 to aid missionaries working among the Cree speaking natives of northern Saskatchewan, Canada, is the basis for this reflective narrative.
The artist ponders the possibilities of reconciliation.
Alice is in a race against time to get basic human rights for her son Kevin, who has Cerebral Palsy.
Two ersatz “Indian warriors” chase a beautiful Indian maiden through the streets of Winnipeg but she loves Chief Big Bear. Who is the hunter, and who the hunted in this tableaux?
Filmmaker Coleen Rajotte returns to Pikangikum First Nation in northwestern Ontario, a community with an unusually high suicide rate.
"Buried Traces" is an 8 minute experimental documentary exploring questions of Métis identity, cultural loss and renewal.
NIN E TEPUEIAN - MY CRY is a documentary tracks the journey of Innu poet, actress and activist, Natasha Kanapé Fontaine, at a pivotal time in her career as a committed artist.
The film captures the diversity of the neighbourhood at that time.
Everyone sees. No one tells.
A film crew journeys to resurrect a lost film, taking it to the communities where the film was originally shot. Images come to life; people recognize faces, landscapes, and lost traditions.
A split-screen video of the Trans-Canada Highway and the single Access Road on our Reserve, the Lac des Mille Lacs First Nation / Nezaatiikang, located north-west of Thunder Bay. Before the completion of the Access road in the late 2000's, the Reserve was only accessible by water. The roads work as metaphor of Colonization by revealing disparity between Canada and Indigenous Nations.
A place called home, a North End poem.
The Weaver's Circle is a short documentary film portrait of an environmental artist working in the downtown eastside of Vancouver.
The bold new girl at school inspires three classmates to follow her down a blissful path of self-realization, where they stumble upon a dark truth that forever galvanizes their friendship.
In the beginning were the Sex Pistols. All the ikons of the Punk Movement and more. Anarchistic anti-art calculated to offend. "It's violent... it scared the shit out of me a couple of times." - Freddy Pompeii, The Viletones
This is a video about drawing. It gives view of processes, not of completed drawings.
In October of 1984, the highly acclaimed New York artist, Jack Smith, came to Toronto for a week long performance/Halloween ritual at the Funnel Experimental Film Theatre. This performance, true to Smithesque form, went by three different titles: “Dance of the Sacred Foundation Application,” “Brassieres of Uranus,” and “Impacted Croissants From Outer Space.” Accompanied by the music of Yma Sumac, this short piece remains the last film documentation of this historic event.
"This video is available in French only. Use the Search or Explore site tools to select non-dialogue or English-language films and videos." Once again Sisler examines the physical and psychological realms of being a woman through the use of gesture as narrative. Here we are introduced to a woman demoralized from her unsuccessful job search. Sisler looks at the cultural imperative of Òpoise and our public presentation as women.
From the near silence and invisibility of late motherhood, a resolute woman attempts to help a young stranger who also finds herself at the edge of existence.
From celebration to squabbles, food serves as a microcosm for the push/pull of family dynamics. Coming from a passionate French-Canadian restaurant family, Kirouac’s experiences of familal relations have been continually filtered through the ubiquitous, yet intimate, act of cooking. In Don’t Go Away, Kirouac combines these histories and emotions into a mediated conversation with her deceased father “Fernie”. From 1976-78, Fernand (Fernie) Kirouac co-hosted (with George Knight) “Charcoal Chiefs”
Wontons is a video that has dialogue centred on being mistaken for a different race. The non-translated dialogue, spoken in Cantonese, may be mysterious to viewers.
Time is measured in increments of what falls on the kitchen floor.
The Common Handbag: it contains the only survival equipment carried by many women. Is it a useless burden, or a vital accessory? This short story plunges into the woman’s “tool box”.
This video poster for “Idle No More” was inspired by the young students at the Native Education College, that are engaged, often for the first time, in having their voices heard by Canadian society and the Canadian government.
Sydnie Baynes is a Toronto-based multimedia artist and animator currently studying at OCAD University. She holds a BFA in Film Animation and creates work that explores Black history, identity, and self-love through storytelling and digital media. Her artistic practice bridges the worlds of education and independent media, with a focus on accessibility, empowerment, and cultural preservation. Welcome to the team Sydnie!