A world champion powerlifter’s transition from male to female is documented in Transformer. Matt “Kroc” Kroczaleski was a world record holding bodybuilder and marine veteran, who was outed as transgender by a 2015 YouTube video. The outing effectively ends Kroc’s powerlifting career, though she begins the process to transition into Janae Marie Kroczaleski. However, with Janae sporting…
A young cooking prodigy tries to prove himself in the culinary world in Chef Flynn. In 2008, Flynn McGarry opened a supper club at his home at the age of only ten years old. Flynn’s mother Megan is a filmmaker, who has been filming him since he was very young. As Flynn reaches his teenage years,…
The story of the movement that combined the punk and queer subcultures is told in Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution. Rejected by both the local punk and queer scenes, Toronto-based experimental filmmakers Bruce LaBruce and G.B. Jones invented a hybrid that they promoted through their zine “J.D.s.” The movement soon spread to other areas of…
The final year in the life of a young man with cystic fibrosis is depicted in Exit Music. Ethan Rice has been preparing for his death his entire life. Originally given only three months to live, Ethan and his family have had to cope with his cystic fibrosis, an incurable genetic illness that eventually leads to respiratory…
Elite athletes receive health benefits from plant-based diets in The Game Changers. James Wilks is and elite military trainer and winner of The Ultimate Fighter. After an injury, Wilks looks into diet options to help with his rehabilitation and comes across a study revealing that Roman Gladiators were predominantly vegetarians. This results in Wilks deciding…
The BDSM relationship between a famous Austrian composer and his kink educator wife are profiled in The Artist and the Pervert. Georg Friedrich Haas is one of the most performed living composers. In an article for the New York Times, it is made public that Georg has a master/slave relationship with his wife Mollena, who is an…
The growing community of people who believe the Earth is flat are profiled in Behind the Curve. Over the last number of years, there is a growing number of people who have become convinced that the Earth is truly flat and that we have been mislead by NASA. The movement is being lead by Mark Sargent,…
The history of the streetcar is told in the IMAX documentary The Trolley. First arriving towards the end of the 19th century, there was once a time when there were thousands of trolley companies around the world. However, with the arrival of the automobile and other forms of public transportation, the trolley started disappearing around…
Top female chefs are profiled in The Heat: A Kitchen (R)evolution. The restaurant industry has traditionally had men in the role of head chef. However, this is changing with more women taking charge at restaurants around the world. Seven female chefs, including “raddest vegetarian chef” Amanda Cohen, Toronto’s Charlotte Langley, and Gordon Ramsey protege Angela Hartnett, talk…
With it being the festival’s 25th anniversary, I thought that I would start my coverage this year by going back and reminiscing about the first screening I attended at the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary festival. I’m a bit of a late bloomer attending the festival, with me not deciding to attend a Hot Docs…
