High Wire

On April 4, 1957, Herbert Norman, the Canadian ambassador to Egypt, leapt to his death from a Cairo rooftop. During his remarkable life, Norman helped set the course of post-war Japan and played a key role during the Suez crisis. But with all of his talents and achievements, there was something haunting Herbert Norman and following him to every corner of the globe: the accusation that he was a Soviet spy. Director John Kramer's chilling and revealing documentary The Man Who Might Have Been: An Inquiry into the Life and Death of Herbert Norman takes us back to a time when the Cold War was heating up and when the mere accusation of communist sympathies could destroy a man's career. Using declassified documents, interviews with key players and dramatizations filmed around the world, Kramer reconstructs the ordeal that Norman endured for seven long years, as a US Senate subcommittee relentlessly probed his past beliefs and current loyalties. During his meteoric rise and fall, Norman crossed paths with some of the greatest personalities of his time: Nobel-prize winning Canadian diplomat and politician Lester B. Pearson; FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, whose organization had an 800-page security file on Norman; General Douglas MacArthur, to whom Norman was a trusted aide; and charismatic Egyptian leader Gamel Abdul Nasser.

In 1999, a life-altering journey to Baghdad changed the focus of Canadian artist Deryk Houston's work. His canvas would be the Earth. His inspiration would be peace. Unable to remain an outside observer of the crisis in Iraq, Deryk travelled to witness first-hand the impact of international sanctions on the Iraqi people. Deprived of basic medicine, adequate food and clean water, UNICEF has estimated that a half-million children under the age of five have died as a result of war and the economic sanctions imposed by the United Nations in 1991. Compelled to speak out, the artist embarked upon a unique nature art project designed to call attention to the situation of the children of Iraq. Using rocks, gravel and hay, Deryk began to create large-scale art installations in the image of a mother and child against diverse landscapes around the world. With footage from Deryk's travels to Baghdad and Scotland, this documentary follows the artist as he works with his young son Sam to compose the largest and most challenging of his works: a permanent mother-and-child sanctuary located in the Peace River country of northeastern British Columbia.

Sur la corde raide revient sur les raisons du refus canadien d'intervenir en Irak en 2003 aux côtés des États-Unis. Le film met en lumière le bras de fer politique qui s'est alors joué en coulisse avec un voisin du Sud qui a toujours fait preuve d'interventionnisme sur la scène internationale pour servir ses intérêts économiques et géostratégiques. Cette décision historique aurait pu être lourde de conséquences pour le Canada, et plusieurs acteurs de l'époque et analystes montrent le terrible prix à payer lorsque la diplomatie échoue à régler les conflits à travers le monde.