POV Magazine

WHEN MICHAEL J. FOX ADMITS that he’s hurting during the final moments of the documentary Still, director Davis Guggenheim, seated offscreen, responds with audible concern. “Really? Why didn’t you say anything?” he asks. “ I’m in pain all the time,” s

“WHAT IS THE MACHINE ASKING ME TO DO NOW?” It was the early ’90s. As the first documentary film editor in Canada to embrace digital tools, I was able to augment my junior editor wages by training senior film cutters on this mysterious new machine the

THERE’S NEVER BEEN a more robust public conversation around artificial intelligence and ethics than since late summer 2022, when a small handful of tech companies released the first proprietary text-to-image AI art generators to the general public. F

IRECENTLY RETIRED from the National Film Board of Canada (NFB), having worked there for 37 and a half years. For the last 15 of those years, I was the English collection curator, a post where I was responsible for selecting the films to be added and

The most photographed man of the 19th century was not Edison, or Emerson, or Einstein. It wasn’t Jefferson, and it wasn’t Lincoln. In fact, the most photographed man of the 19th century was not, per the letter of the law, even a “man” at all, but an

THERE ARE A HANDFUL OF TEXTS that stay with you, that you mull over, return to, and consistently reference. Words that provide much-awaited answers to the questions floating in your head. In my case, as I have been pondering how photography, which de

A country? The world? Several brave souls share their lives openly in Hot Docs’ international spotlight The Changing Face of Europe. The programme, assembled in partnership with European Film Promotion, favours intimate windows to the world this year

THE DOCUMENTARY FORM has in recent years spurred rigorous discussions about the ethics of those who have practiced it and their engagement with those in front of the camera. The observation of the centennial of Robert Flaherty’s Nanook of the North i

IN MAY 2021, members of the Toronto Film Critics Association (TFCA) received an invitation from the organizers of the Kyiv Critics Week for a cultural exchange: We would provide a list of Canadian films from which they would pick three, and we in tur

ELIZABETH KLINCK has a confession to make. “I always wanted to be a private detective,” the iconic visual researcher admits. “It’s rewarding to find the right piece of film or the right person…and find homes for things.” Klinck’s work will receive lo

ON A CONCRETE ROOFTOP overlooking Saigon and overflowing with green plant life, Dahn and Ngoc discuss love. Dahn recalls a whirlwind love affair, “We first met in Da Lat, at 7 AM,” she says. “It was the first time I met a man without telling him I’m

THE IDEA OF HISTORY repeating itself becomes more and more a truism as history rolls on. Improvements to overall health and standards of living can be seen from generation to generation, but at our core, human beings still are prone to fears and prej

PART OF THE APPEAL OF TRUE-CRIME DOCUMENTARIES is their ability to turn viewers into armchair sleuths and jury members. One minute you’re donning your deerstalker hat and embracing your inner Sherlock Holmes, dissecting the who and how of a crime, an

THE LUSH, GREEN SERENITY of the forest envelops Silvicola, a new documentary about people who spend their working lives amongst the trees. The film, at once stunning and sobering, taps into the paradox of being both a forest worker and a forest lover

WHEN YOU THINK OF BURGERS, it’s not likely that you think of Lebanon. Unless, of course, you’re Omar Mouallem, the director of The Lebanese Burger Mafia. First made as a short film for CBC Gem, Mouallem’s feature-length, crowdfunded documentary premi

THE COACHELLA VALLEY is a land of contradictions, replete with mystery, toxicity, folk tales, and terrifying beauty. Set in the California desert, the valley is famous for its date-palm tree farms amid a growing network of golfing communities and res

JOHN KASTNER WOULD BE LAUGHING if he saw the title of this modest tribute to him. “So now you think I’m Dostoyevsky,” I can imagine hearing him say, “Well, better late than never.” Actually, John never thought he was Canada’s filmic Dostoyevsky. It w