Meet Me In The Bathroom and Drop The Needle Among CUFF.Docs 2022 Favourites
Celebrating 10 years underground, Calgary’s premiere documentary film festival is still stranger than non-fiction.
by Christine Leonard
- Published on
Rubbing shoulders with movie-goers and spilling popcorn on theatre carpets for nearly two decades, the Calgary Underground Film Festival has proven to be a documentary spectacle. A non-fiction offshoot of the main festival, their annual celebration of provocative, evocative, and hard-to-find films has become a much-anticipated winter boredom buster for those looking to break out of the streaming service algorithms.
Celebrate the 10th anniversary of CUFF.Docs with more than 15 full-length international and independent documentaries. Mixing in a healthy roster of shorts and surprises for their audiences, the festival’s expertly curated selection of genres, subjects, and styles will leave you sounding a lot smarter around the holiday table this year. And all you have to do is figure out what size of fountain drink you can reasonably handle.
The CUFF.Docs 2022 line-up is packed solid with cinematic gold. We suggest taking in these RANGE recommendations that genuinely rock:
MEET ME IN THE BATHROOM (United States, 2022)
The post-9/11 fever dream of co-directors Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace, MMITB stumbles through the streets of New York City searching for a new identity and finding it in the discordant disillusionment of bands like The Strokes, TV on the Radio, LCD Soundsystem, and Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Longing for the iconic days of yore, they stir up memories and tensions with footage of live performances circa 1999-2000 that provided a fearsome catharsis to all who bore witness to them.
Screening at Globe Cinema – 9:15 pm on Thursday, November 24 | TICKETS
DROP THE NEEDLE (Canada, 2022)
Director Rob Freeman will be dropping by the cinema in-person to discuss the making of this film about the influential Toronto record store Play De Record and its magnanimous owner Eugene Tam. A coming-of-age story set in the mid-nineties, Drop the Needle loops viewers into the history of a family-run joint that became a hub for DJs and producers of all stripes while feeding the community’s insatiable appetite for fresh tunes. Fans of hip-hop, house, reggae, and electronica and more will feel right at home at the 411 Spadina nook where music-lovers have spent 25 years digging through those crates.
Screening at Globe Cinema – 6:30 pm on Friday, November 25 | TICKETS
*Followed by Q&A with Director Rob Freeman
The 10th annual CUFF Docs runs November 23 to 27 at Globe Cinema | MORE INFO
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