Websites to help you find Canadian content
As streaming platforms take over, finding content made here often feels like navigating an obstacle course. Fortunately, online research tools are here to help.
I want to watch Universal Language, by Canadian director Matthew Rankin.
The film is described as a surrealist comedy that takes place somewhere between Tehran and Winnipeg. I’ve heard only good things, but I missed it when it was in theatres early last year. With all the awards it’s won, including Best Canadian Film from the Toronto Film Critics Association and Best Canadian Discovery at TIFF, finding it should be easy. And yet…
Five Tools to Help Find Canadian Films
When I want to watch a specific film, the first thing I do (after making popcorn) is visit Where2watch.ca, a Canadian website created in 2019 to help users find feature films of all nationalities and genres. Enter a title and the site immediately tells you where it’s playing in cinemas, on TV, streaming platforms or video-on-demand.
“We thought it would be nice to have a tool that allows us to find films across all modes of distribution,” says Martin Bilodeau, the general manager and editor-in-chief of Mediafilm, the independent non-profit behind Where2watch.ca.
Founded in 1955, Mediafilm is a French website that oversees a database containing info about more than 80,000 feature films. And yet Bilodeau compares the database to an iceberg. “There’s a whole segment of feature films that are invisible, and we wonder why no one’s watching them even though they’re available on various platforms or being shown on television. The idea is to promote these films, to stimulate people’s curiosity,” he says.
Mediafilm’s database feeds into other, more niche research tools.
There’s See It All, Telefilm Canada’s directory of more than 5,000 entries. See It All focuses on Canadian and Indigenous cinema, and gives Canadian films new life by directing fans to the streaming platforms, TV channels and movie theatres where they’re still playing.
The website was “born in 2020, in the midst of the pandemic,” says Virginie Pichet, Telefilm Canada’s External Communications Manager. “While the whole world was in lockdown, Telefilm created an aggregator to allow a wider audience to find and watch Canadian content.”
Aime ton cinéma — created by a group of Quebec’s independent film distributors — provides a similar service, but only for films from Quebec.
International sites are also helpful, like Just Watch, which is headquartered in Berlin and helps users find films and series from anywhere in the world on streaming services available in their country. However, you won’t find Canadian platforms like CBC Gem on the site.
According to these tools, Universal Language is, as I write, accessible on foreign streaming services Netflix, YouTube, Apple TV and Prime Video, as well as on Canadian services Tou.tv, illico+, Crave and TVA+. The platforms’ algorithms simply didn’t tell me…
Improving Discoverability
With the death of video stores and the influx of digital platforms, are these research sites our best hope for finding Canadian content? I asked Stéfany Boisvert, a media professor at the Université du Québec à Montréal.
According to Boisvert, sites like Where2watch.ca and See It All certainly help viewers discover content made here, especially since it can be hard to find Canadian films once they’ve left theatres.
However, these sites only solve part of the problem. “Discoverability is the capacity to easily find content,” she says, “but it’s also the ability to find content that we didn’t already know existed without looking for it.”
The Role of Foreign Businesses
To make Canadian productions more visible, Boisvert says additional initiatives have to be put in place. For one, foreign streaming services, specifically their algorithms, should do more to promote Canadian content.
“It’s a solution that is much more efficient than imposing a quota,” she says. “If we imposed a 30 percent quota, for example, a bit like what is done in several European countries, that doesn’t mean people would necessarily be connected with that content. Streaming services’ recommendations are always dependent on our viewing habits and so that’s what the algorithms are going to favour.”
In Canada, the CRTC decided not to touch the algorithms. Under Bill C-11, the regulatory body instead requires foreign platforms to pay a five percent licensing fee, which goes to support Canadian productions — although those foreign platforms are fighting the measure.
And the federal government’s policy doesn’t eliminate the provinces’ cultural authority. With Bill 109, adopted on December 11 by the National Assembly, Quebec can now impose minimum thresholds of francophone content on large platforms, like Netflix and Spotify. The bill will also require smart TV manufacturers to make it easier to access Canadian streaming platforms, as Australia did last year.
Promoting Canadian Platforms
Boisvert also wants to see better promotion of Canadian platforms, which are often overlooked. Many offer free content, such as TFO, Télé-Québec, TV5 Unis, CBC Gem and the NFB/ONF. The Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec’s (BAnQ) also has a site that offers a whole catalogue of free films to subscribers.
“We must find strategies for our platforms to become a larger part of the population’s cultural references,” says Boisvert. “The viability of our local film and television industry is at stake.”
Much of this visibility comes from the media, which, according to Boisvert, still gives too much coverage to foreign productions to the detriment of local content, and doesn’t sufficiently cover the laws and issues concerning the film and television industry.
As for Where2watch.ca, Bilodeau admits the site is still a “well-kept secret.”
“Every week I tell people about this platform,” he says. “We are a non-profit; we don’t have a private company’s resources to invest in advertising. Our launch in 2019 had an impact, but not as large as we would have hoped.” Still, 60,000 to 100,000 unique visitors use the site every month.
Working Toward Better Media Literacy
Discoverability also depends on the younger generations’ viewing habits. Many people think that to reach them we have to go where they are — social media.
Boisvert says, instead, we have to educate younger viewers about why social media isn’t the best place to watch Canadian content.
“We must explain the economic and cultural stakes these choices represent to them,” she says. “We can’t simply put our content on the platforms they use, because they’re foreign property. That means the vast majority of revenue from our culture is going elsewhere, as is currently the case. When they realize this, when they understand the political and economic ramifications, the conversation changes.”
Until we find other ways to improve the discoverability of Canadian productions, we have these online research tools.
On that note, I have a film to go watch. But where is it again?
