Still from 2016 Hot Docs Audience Award winning film, Angry Inuk

Season 1 Episode 6: Hot Docs

Toronto has two major festival seasons: the spring for non-fiction at Hot Docs and the fall for (mainly) fiction at the Toronto International Film Festival. Given the imminent beginning of Hot Docs and the contemporary atmosphere of protest, revolution and revolt in our city with Black Lives Matter, Idle No More and other international movements, we asked ourselves How do you produce and direct effective social justice documentaries? What makes a social justice documentary successful on the festival circuit? How does this success translate into actual social change?

Many questions and two excellent guests with politically conscious films playing at this year’s Hot Docs to discuss them with us: Director and producer of the short film “Kettle” Lucius Dechausay and producer of feature doc “Migrant Dreams” Lisa Valencia-Svensson.

In the final part of the episode, we discuss this year’s Hot Docs Outstanding Achievement recipient Steve James and his landmark documentary “Hoop Dreams.”

To dig deeper, check out these links:

• “Reel to Real: Can Documentaries Change the World?”
• Stanford Social Innovation Review: Reel Impact”
• “Hoop Dreams, the real thing”
• “Hoop Dreams, Serious Game”