While the events portrayed in Michèle Stephenson’s incisive documentary may technically be several decades in the past, TRUE NORTH’s lessons about racism in Canada can feel uncomfortably timely. In 1969, Black students at Concordia University in Montreal staged an occupation of a computer lab to protest the mishandling of racism allegations against a professor. Widely covered by the media and violently suppressed by the police, the episode exposed deeper-seated issues when it came to Canada’s history of bigotry and contemporary responses and attitudes toward the global movement for Black liberation. Through its bracing and compelling blend of new interviews and archival footage, Stephenson’s film erases any gulf between then and now, inviting a new understanding of a moment that badly bruised Canada’s self-image as a proud model of multiculturalism.

Director: Michèle Stephenson

Language: English, French with English subtitles

Runtime: 96 minutes

Content warning: racial violence, strong racial language