Working toward your Winter of Reading prize? Stream a movie from Kanopy and fill in a square!
Stream classic films, indie cinema, award winning documentaries and The Great Courses. Plus movies and TV shows for kids. Kanopy access is limited to Denver residents.
Here are some staff favorites to get you started!
The Ait Atta tribe preserves their ancestral right of access to the agdal, a communal land management system that dates back hundreds of years in Morocco. The film follows Ben Youssef family's arduous journey from desert-like landscapes to green pastures along uneven terrain of steep climbs and descents of the High Atlas mountains. An ethnographic story, the film juxtaposes the hopes, constraints, obligations and sacrifices of a family torn between traditions and need to adapt to modern life.
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BaddDDD Sonia Sanchez offers unprecedented access to the life, work and mesmerizing performances of renowned poet and activist Sonia Sanchez who describes herself as "a woman with razor blades between my teeth." A leading figure in the Black Arts Movement and inspiration to today's hip hop spoken word artists, Sanchez for over 60 years has helped to redefine American culture and politics as an activist in the Black, women's and peace movements. Sanchez's contemporaries Ruby Dee, Amiri Baraka, John Bracey, Jr., Haki Madhubuti and Nikki Giovanni joined by such newer voices as Talib Kweli, Ayana Mathis, jessica Care moore, Bryonn Bain and Questlove present impassioned readings of and insightful commentary on her fearless verse, including her raw love poems.
From the creators of the comic satire 'Waiting for Guffman' comes a hilarious mock documentary exposing the wondrously diverse--and competitive--dog owners who travel from all over the United States to showcase their four-legged contenders at the prestigious Mayflower Dog Show.
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Academy Award winner Nicole Kidman stars as a delicate young widow who is on the verge of a new life when a solemn little boy appears, claiming to be the reincarnation of her dead husband. Could this child truly be Anna's husband, returned to her? Can she refuse the chance to again experience the love she felt for him?
In this imaginative origin story of two of the most beloved characters in literature, Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland, eight-year-old Alice, her mischievous brother Peter, and their brilliant older sibling David let their imaginations run wild one blissful summer in the English countryside, encouraged by their parents Jack and Rose.
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After the pharmacy in her small town is robbed, a girl who still lives at home with her parents takes matters into her own hands to solve the crime, while at the same time trying to get over her ex-boyfriend and become more of an adult.
Eileen is a peculiar young woman whose dreary life stretches on toward unending misery. In 1960s Boston, Eileen shuffles between her father's emotionally haunted home and the prison where she works. When an intoxicating woman joins the prison staff, Eileen is taken. Just as the possibility of friendship (or maybe more) takes hold, her newfound confidant entangles her in a shocking crime.
Also available on DVD
Frederick Wiseman's new film, Ex Libris: The New York Public Library, goes behind the scenes of one of the greatest knowledge institutions in the world and reveals it as a place of welcoming cultural exchange and learning. With 92 locations throughout Manhattan, the Bronx and Staten Island, the library is committed to being a resource for all the inhabitants of this multifaceted and cosmopolitan city, and beyond. The New York Public Library exemplifies the deeply rooted American belief in the individual's right to know and be informed. It is one of the most democratic institutions in America - everyone is welcome.
Hundreds of thousands of cats roam the metropolis of Istanbul freely. For thousands of years they've wandered in and out of people's lives, becoming an essential part of the communities that make the city so rich.
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David Bowie and Jennifer Connelly invite you into a magical universe where nothing is what it seems! Babysitting infant stepbrother Toby on a weekend night isn't young Sarah's (Connelly) idea of fun. Frustrated by his crying, she secretly imagines the Goblins from her favorite book, Labyrinth, carrying Toby away. When her fantasy comes true, a distraught Sarah must enter a maze of illusion to bring Toby back from a kingdom inhabited by mystical creatures and governed by the wicked Goblin King (Bowie).
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This offbeat heist comedy stars Rosanna Arquette as Lucy, a frustrated diner waitress and escape artist wannabe, who teams up with a smooth-talking British bartender, Monte (David Bowie), looking to escape his shady past. Their plan to rob the diner's safe quickly spirals into a chaotic mess involving handcuffs, straitjackets, and a lot of kitchenware. With a colorful cast of misfits and Bowie's magnetic charm, this wild caper is a delightful blend of absurdity and 90s indie spirit.
Three-time Oscar nominee Christopher Nolan (Interstellar, Inception) directs this critically acclaimed mystery. Leonard (Guy Pearce) is tracking down the man who murdered his wife. The difficulty, however, of locating his wife's killer is compounded by the fact that he suffers from a rare, untreatable form of memory loss. Although he can recall details of life before his accident, Leonard cannot remember what happened fifteen minutes ago, where he's going, or why.
This avant-garde classic, made in collaboration with husband Alexander Hammid, is an important piece of feminist filmmaking. Of the film, with its subjective camera movement, jump cuts, and visual repetition, Deren wrote, "[it] is concerned with the inner realities of the individual and the way in which the subconscious will develop, interpret and elaborate an apparently simple and causal occurrence into a critical emotional experience." Here in its original version, it is presented intentionally silent.
When the filmmaker Simon Chambers receives a call from his elderly gay uncle - "I think I may be dying!" - he takes it as a summons. For five years, he cares for eccentric Uncle David, a retired actor living alone in a cluttered, mouse-infested London house - through all his performative exuberance (constantly acting out passages of King Lear) and anarchic charisma (swinging from boisterous humor to short temper), as various people (including a sexy young hustler) possibly take advantage of him.
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Hirayama is content with his simple life cleaning toilets in Tokyo. Outside of his structured routine he cherishes music on cassette tapes, books, and taking photos of trees. Unexpected encounters reveal more of his story in a deeply moving and poetic reflection on finding beauty in the world around us.
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Marianne is hired to paint the wedding portrait of Héloïse. As the women orbit each other, intimacy and attraction grow as they share Héloïse's first moments of freedom.
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This revelatory documentary brings to light the profound and overlooked influence of Indigenous people on popular music in North America. Focusing on music icons like Link Wray, Jimi Hendrix, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Taboo (The Black Eyed Peas), Charley Patton, Mildred Bailey, Jesse Ed Davis, Robbie Robertson, and Randy Castillo, Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World shows how these pioneering Native American musicians helped shape the soundtracks of our lives.
Also available on DVD
This documentary profiles the controversial world-renown violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenburg. An enormously funny, fearless and irreverent individual, Nadja has played on every major stage and with every major orchestra in the world. Her unorthodox, passionate delivery, her swagger and unconventional attire earned her the nickname "the bad girl of the violin" Described as "possessed," "frightening" and "brilliant," her unique interpretations of timeless classics have both enraged and enraptured critics and audiences all over the world.
Squaring the Circle: The Story of Hipgnosis tells the story of Storm Thorgerson and Aubrey "Po" Powell, the creative geniuses behind the iconic album art design studio, Hipgnosis, responsible for some of the most recognizable album covers of all time, including "The Dark Side of the Moon" and "Band on the Run." They formed Hipgnosis in Cambridge during the ferment of the sixties and became rock royalty during the boom time of the seventies. They conjured into existence sights that no one had previously thought possible, produced visuals which popularized music that had previously been considered fringe, and were at the white-hot center of the maddest, funniest and most creative era in the history of popular music.
The manager of a pancake stall finds himself confronted with an odd but sympathetic elderly woman looking for work. A taste of her homemade bean jelly convinces him to hire her, which starts a relationship that is about much more than just street food.
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When a group of friends discover how to conjure spirits using an embalmed hand, they become hooked on the new thrill, until one of them goes too far and opens the door to the spirit world forcing them to choose who to trust: the dead or the living.
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Harold is an ordinary man who has passed through life, living on the side lines, until he goes to post a letter one day and keeps walking.
Explores every facet of Yankovic's life, from his meteoric rise to fame with early hits like 'Eat It' and 'Like a Surgeon' to his torrid celebrity love affairs and famously depraved lifestyle.
Also available on DVD
A hotel owner and landlord in a remote Turkish village deals with conflicts within his family and a tenant behind on his rent.
Also available on DVD