Practical & Applied Arts

This episode on 'attention' is shot in the attention-demanding city of Las Vegas. Our guide for this episode's journey into the brain will be master magician David Copperfield, whose stock and trade is manipulating an audience's attention to produce amazing illusions. Magicians like David unde...

Watch an early experiment using computers to animate film. The result is a dazzling vibration of geometric forms in vivid colour, an effect achieved by varying the speed at which alternate colours change, so producing optical illusions. In between these screen pyrotechnics there appears a simple ...

In her first feature-length documentary, released in 1977, Alanis Obomsawin honours the central place of women and mothers within Indigenous cultures. An album of Indigenous womanhood, the film portrays proud matriarchal cultures that for centuries have been pressured to adopt the standards and c...

This short documentary examines an innovative educational program developed by John and Gerti Murdoch to teach Cree children their language via Cree folklore, photographs, artifacts, and books that were written and printed in the community. Made as part of the NFB’s groundbreaking Challenge for C...

Woodland tribes like the Yankton Sioux, Menominee and Objibwe share their perspectives on why cultural diversity and biodiversity are interconnected. You will experience how, through years of dedication and listening to their elders, the Menominee have created one of the most outstanding examples...

A clip in the Science Please! collection, The Moon Changes uses archival footage, animated illustrations and amusing narration to explain what causes the different phases of the moon.

This second of two new Canada: A People's History episodes begins as 9/11 shakes the world. Canada fights terrorism in Afghanistan and pays a heavy price; the Muslim community is under suspicion; Indigenous women are Idle No More; Canadian athletes own the podium at the Olympi...

Ukrainian communities of the Canadian prairies still follow the Julian calendar and celebrate Christmas on the seventh of January. Traditional foods are prepared for the holy Christmas Eve supper, eaten when the first star of the evening appears. Then traditional carols and light-hearted dances i...

This short documentary depicts a discussion at Duck Lake, Saskatchewan, in which social issues are presented before a gathering of Indigenous and non-Indigenous community members. Essentials such as schooling and the lack of opportunities for Indigenous youth are on the agenda.

In Season 10’s Student Special, a university student thinks he can spin a deal in the Den; a kinesiology student hopes to school the Dragons with the help of two upstanding guests; and business partners hope the Dragons’ skepticism won’t leave them in the dark. Plus, a young pair of siblings t...

An offbeat, irreverent documentary that tells the story of a group of Jewish songwriters, including Irving Berlin, Mel Tormé, Jay Livingston, Ray Evans, Gloria Shayne Baker and Johnny Marks, who wrote the soundtrack to the world’s most musical holiday. It’s an amazing look at the 20th century ...

This short documentary explores the legacy of residential schools through the eyes of two extraordinary women who not only lived it, but who, as adults, made the surprising decision to return to the school that had affected their lives so profoundly. This intimate and moving film affirms their st...

In this animated environmental parable, we find a people living in harmony with nature, until carelessness leads to the ravens' revenge. We follow a boy's courageous journey to the spirit world to find the only one who can save his village from the resulting darkness--the Lord of the sky. An arti...

This animated short by Alethea Arnaquq-Baril tells 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...

This introspective short animation takes place In the village of Carcross, in the Tagish First Nation. Neighbourhood pillar Grandma Kay tell the local children the tale of how Crow brought fire to people. As the story unfolds, we also meet 12-year-old Tish, an introspective, talented girl who fee...