The holiday season is a season that invites long car journeys with family or alone, intense cooking or relaxing sessions: perfect conditions to discover audiovisual productions from all horizons. Please note that all of these productions are available on major digital audio platforms unless otherwise noted.
Heavyweight
After eight seasons, the future of the heavyweight division is in jeopardy. In December, Spotify announced that it was pulling the Jonathan Goldstein-led series from its schedule. In the meantime, we enjoy these stories in which the host gets to the bottom of a crucial or mysterious event in someone's life. Understanding the departure of your favorite babysitter, figuring out why a friend never called us back, or locating the true recipient of a box of family photos sent to the wrong address: Heavyweight will have brought to the fore the small events that define us .
Valerie Duhaime
The mysterious miracles
The show Les Mysterious Surprisings, a pioneer of podcasting, celebrates its 18th anniversary in January. Under the pleasant leadership of host Benoît Mercier, this weekly meeting offers a group of friendly friends – including illustrator Jeik Dion, bookseller Laurent Boutin, archivist Simon Chénier and publisher Gauthier Langevin – the opportunity to discuss news from popular culture. We approach comics, TV series and video games, and sometimes also theater and cinema, in a relaxed and warm tone. You don't need to know anything, they will guide you!
Marilyse Hamelin
Someone knows something
First there was the excellent Mississippi Cold Case (2007), Canadian director David Ridgen's multi-award-winning documentary that chronicles the unpunished 1964 murder of two young 19-year-old African Americans murdered by the Ku Klux Klan. Always driven by a desire to solve cold cases – if not advance them – the undisputed master of true crime had the bright idea of doing a podcast for Someone Knows Something, his own investigative series on CBC. The other good idea came from Radio-Canada when it was translated last year. Eight thrilling and repulsive episodes with a finale that restores faith in humanity.
Lisa Marie Gervais
Let the defendant enter
The cult television show in France is now available in podcast format. In his gripping narrative, presenter Dominique Rizet traces the largest criminal proceedings in France – from the moment the facts emerge to the course of the trial. Among these stories is that of Jean-Baptiste Rambla, a child witness to the kidnapping of his sister Marie-Dolorès, who was found dead in 1974. His life will forever be marked by the murder of his sister and the fate of the perpetrator. Named: Christian Ranucci (photo left), whose responsibility will, in doubt, reinvigorate the debate about the death penalty. Mark.
Clemence Pavic
Return to Normétal
Documentary filmmaker Nicolas Lachapelle once again delves into his family's traumas and happy memories in this unique sound work, whose aesthetics are reminiscent of direct cinema and which is characterized by its universal reach. We follow his loved ones' return to their roots during a fishing trip to the Normétal region, a boomtown village they knew to be promising and which they were forced to abandon when it became a shadow of its former self after the closure of its mine. This intimate, sometimes very moving story makes us want to explore our own family histories, which are shaped by the industrial and social history of this region.
Amélie Gaudreau