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Hospitals and medical clinics (12)
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Citizens' MedicineBonnie Sherr Klein 1970 30 minIn Montréal, the St. Jacques Citizens' Committee set up a community health clinic, aided by volunteer doctors, nurses, dentists and medical students. This film shows discussion, planning, and the clinic in operation, and presents its problems and advantages as seen both by medical workers and by local residents. Members of the Citizens' Committee participated in the making of the film, from original planning through filming, selecting and editing. -
CaterpillarplastyDavid Barlow-Krelina 2018 5 minA prescient, grotesque sci-fi satire that lifts plastic surgery to another level. Set in a state-of-the-art clinic, in a world where advanced technologies have given rise to new standards of beauty and prestige, Caterpillarplasty offers its sardonic take on a social obsession with beauty that’s spiralled out of control.
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Doctors Without ResidencyTetchena Bellange 2010 9 minThis short documentary highlights how the mechanism of discrimination prevents foreign-trained doctors from practicing in Canada – even after they've received their Canadian qualifications. Every year, scores of these doctors are turned down for the residencies they need in order to practice – and many of those residencies stay vacant. Through interviews with medical professionals and human rights advocates it becomes clear that systemic racism is to blame. Strikingly, several doctors interviewed for this film would not speak on camera, fearing repercussions from the medical establishment. What is the real problem: the incompetence of foreign-trained doctors or the injustice of the system?
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Emergency WardWilliam Greaves 1959 30 minThis 1959 documentary short is a frank portrait of the daily operations inside the Montreal General Hospital’s emergency ward.
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Emergency! A Critical SituationTahani Rached 1999 52 minShot at the Pierre Boucher Hospital in Montreal, this film takes us into the emergency room to see how our healthcare system is holding up. What it reveals is a powerful indictment of management that sees only the bottom line while human lives are at stake.
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Hospital CityRosemary House 2004 47 minShot at the Health Sciences Centre in St. John's, Newfoundland, this documentary reveals the workings of a contemporary health-care facility. Accompanied by hospital staff, we travel through labs, pharmacies, supply rooms, operating theatres and patient rooms from the maternity ward to the morgue. As debate in Canada and the world rages over health care, Hospital City offers a moving, human portrait of the people whom the issues touch most closely.
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A Hospital CrucifiedRenée Blanchar 2007 1 h 1 minOn March 2, 2004, Bernard Lord's Conservative government announces that the hospital in Caraquet, New Brunswick, will be converted to a community health centre. Considering the government's decision unfair, the people of the region rally to save the health care services to which they feel entitled. Despite their year-and-a-half-long struggle, the Hôpital de l'Enfant-Jésus is closed. In recording the chronology of the events, Renée Blanchar plunges into the heart of the action with an urgent need to speak out against injustice. The result is a very human film about solidarity. In French with English subtitles.
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Memento MoriNiobe Thompson 2016 1 h 29 minWith remarkable access to Canada’s busiest organ-transplant hospital, this documentary brings viewers face-to-face with stories of life and death, and the impossible decisions that tragedy demands. From the very beginning to the final frame, filmmaker Niobe Thompson grips viewers in a relentless, emotional embrace and propels them from moments of unexpected joy to unbearable heartbreak.
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Rural HealthErnest Reid 1946 18 minThis 1946 short film takes a look at the groundbreaking Health Units that were set up throughout the province of Manitoba to improve sanitary conditions and provide adequate medical services. The film illustrates how the first of these clinics, the Dauphin Health Unit, was organized, and shows members of its staff at work in the community.
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SessionsDanic Champoux 2012 1 h 24 minCan we fight or even overcome cancer in an atmosphere of peace and tranquility? Filmmaker Danic Champoux believes so and in his documentary, Sessions, he dispels many of the clichés associated with the disease, using empathy and humour to reveal the extraordinary resilience of human beings.
Shot over the course of a year in the common room of an oncology centre, where patients regularly meet when undergoing chemotherapy, the film invites viewers to look at cancer from a new perspective. Sessions chronicles the patients’ intensely emotional encounters, deftly capturing the love and joie de vivre that brighten their often stressful days. Never denying the distress of cancer patients, and that of their families and friends as well, Sessions is, above all, a work of deep humanity and a sensitive portrait of life’s mysteries. -
Vital BondsNiobe Thompson 2016 52 minCanada's organ donation rate is the lowest in the industrialized world – and every organ lost is also a life. For the first time ever on-screens, Vital Bonds gives viewers unprecedented access to the powerful real-life human stories of organ donation in Canada. Following a traumatic brain injury, the family of 28-year old athlete Matthew makes the decision to donate his organs. A two-week old baby girl named Harlow receives a donor heart from the far side of the continent. These are just some of the life and death stories covered with unflinching authenticity to show the lasting impact and major importance of organ donation in Canada.
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White FortressLeslie McFarlane & Ronald Weyman 1949 10 minThis short 1949 documentary studies the impact Canada's National Health Program has had on people who might otherwise not had been able to obtain medical help.
