Like most 15-year-olds, the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival is growing again. With two added venues this year, eight theaters will unspool 173 documentaries from 36 countries from April 17-27.

‘This festival flirts with the mainstream but embraces the margins,’ says Sean Farnel, director of programming, regarding the festival’s increasing appeal. He says it’s the ‘exploration of the margins…[in the eight official festival programs that] are brimming with films that broaden our sense of understanding of the world and the richness of human capacity.’

Planning for a spike in attendance, organizers added the prestigious Winter Garden Theatre (992 seats) for the fest’s American opener Anvil! The Story of Anvil, the directorial debut of Sacha Gervasi, a one-time roadie who followed the Canadian heavy-metal band around the world, looking at the hopes and dreams of its 50-something members Steve Kudlow and Robb Reiner.

The Canadian opener (which unspools directly after Anvil) marks the world premiere of Air India 182, written and directed by Sturla Gunnarsson, who was nominated for an Oscar for his 1982 doc After the Axe. The director reveals what he considers to be a conspiracy behind the 1985 terrorist airplane attack and ‘hopes to provoke outrage.’

Arguably Hot Docs’ most-anticipated Canadian premiere is Errol Morris’ Standard Operating Procedure, with its daunting tagline: ‘The War on Terror will be photographed.’ The confrontational director of The Thin Blue Line and Fog of War, Morris examines the incidents of abuse and torture of suspected terrorists at the hands of U.S. forces at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The buzz film won the Silver Berlin Bear in Europe earlier this year.

New themes this year include Next, a program that surveys the minds – and sometimes madness – of artists and their passionate pursuits and expression. Films in the Next program are either about artists or have been created by directors who work in other visual art mediums. Topics include a thriving Icelandic indie-art community (Steypa, by Markus Andresson and Ragnheidur Gestsdottir); and art and activism and London in the swingin’ sixties (Tonite Let’s All Make Love in London, by Peter Whitehead).

Opener of Next is the U.S. doc Beautiful Losers by Aaron Rose and Joshua Leonard, an exploration of the creative spirit of a loose movement of young American artists that emerged in the early 1990s, whose work was rooted in the do-it-yourself subcultures of skateboarding, graffiti, punk and hip hop.

Another new category is Make Me a Believer, offering films that examine practices of faith but don’t necessarily promote spirituality. This program will unspool films about the earnest, offbeat and sometimes scary ways that people seek, understand and practice their faith.

Top-liner film is the Austria/U.K./U.S. copro Anatomy of Failure, in which filmmaker Minou Norouzi takes a desert road trip to investigate the deaths of five women in New Age architect Carlos Castaneda’s ‘harem,’ and is seduced by this infamous writer’s mysterious persona.

The Spotlight on Iran sidebar explores that country’s complex cultural and religious landscape in docs such as Mahnaz Afzali’s The Red Card, about how an Iranian soccer hero’s life became tabloid material when his mistress murdered his wife and a complicated love triangle emerged (which the filmmakers compare to the O.J. trial) through courtroom drama and unprecedented behind-the-scenes footage.

Several Iranian filmmakers will be in Toronto to discuss their projects (and the conditions for making documentaries in their homeland) during an Innis Town Hall meeting on April 24 (4 p.m.).

Another film about Iran is Be Like Others – a Canada/U.K./U.S./Iran coventure that will unspool in the World Category and shed some light on transsexuals in Iran. The picture’s financing structure is also telling of how filmmakers are increasingly gathering coin around the globe to get a doc made (in this case with no Telefilm or SODEC money).

Necessary Illusions’ Peter Wintonick – its Canadian coproducer – tells Playback that Be Like Others is not easy to categorize as a Canadian doc and that he ‘brought the ITVS International money into the picture.’

‘The film has such an international provenance that it’s hard to label, which these days is the way all docs are going,’ explains Wintonick. ‘As the traditional Canadian slots get more limited and condensed, we have to find money outside the country, too.’

Focus on Jennifer Baichwal will feature five of the Canuck filmmaker’s films, including Genie and Toronto International Film Festival award winner Manufactured Landscapes. There will also be a retrospective for outstanding achievement award winner Richard Leacock, the Brit director and cinematographer whose career dates back more than 50 years.

Made in Mexico’s social, political and cultural landscape is featured in director Alejandra Islas’ The Demons of Eden, which reveals journalist Lydia Cacho’s plight to expose Mexican politicians and business leaders supporting a child pornography/pedophile ring in Cancun and the U.S.

Hot Docs’ ninth annual Toronto Documentary Forum market event is expanding this year with the increased need for filmmakers to find foreign broadcasters to back their projects. Five hundred delegates are expected to come to hear 35 project pitches from a record 231 submissions (see story, p. 19).

With delegates on the rise, the Doc Shop will be offering a year-round online market service through a digital on-demand library of all titles. ‘We’re excited to cultivate new audiences and expand opportunities for filmmakers,’ says Brett Hendrie, managing director of Hot Docs (see story, p. 21).

This year’s International Spectrum competition will feature 28 titles, including the world premiere Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived, looking at the U.S. president’s foreign policies.

There is also International Co-production Day on April 21 (9 a.m. to 5 p.m.) at the Rogers Industry Center, where Canadian and international producers will have networking opportunities and special presentations. Delegations from Brazil, Catalan, Italy, South Korea and various Nordic countries are expected to attend.

– with files from Suzan Ayscough

HOT DOCS PROGRAMS 2008
• Special Presentations
• Canadian Spectrum
• Focus on Jennifer Baichwal
• International Spectrum
• Made in Mexico
• Next
• Make Me A Believer
• Outstanding Achievement Award Retrospective Honouring
• Richard Leacock
• Spotlight on Iran
• World Showcase