Kick back this Labor Day weekend with Kanopy’s curated collection of films and shows—featuring everything from crowd favorites to thought-provoking documentaries, available free through your library at kanopy.com/category/53883.
H IS FOR HAWK follows Helen (Claire Foy), who, after the sudden death of her father (Brendan Gleeson), loses herself in the memories of their time birding and exploring the natural world together and turns to the ancient art of falconry—rooted in European tradition—by training a wild goshawk named Mabel to navigate her profound loss. As she teaches Mabel to hunt and fly free, Helen discovers how deeply she has neglected her own emotions and life. What begins as an act of endurance transforms into an intimate journey of resilience and healing. Based on the award winning memoir by naturalist Helen MacDonald.
This nostalgic Canadian dramedy follows Lawrence Kweller (Isaiah Lehtinen), an awkward, film-obsessed teen. Armed with a head full of movie trivia and a serious superiority complex, Lawrence lands a job at the local video store, where he butts heads with his sharp-tongued, no-nonsense manager Alana (Romina D’Ugo). Between clashing with customers, dodging his worried mom, and fumbling his way through first crushes, Lawrence’s cinematic dreams start colliding with real life in hilariously awkward ways.
An aspiring stand-up comedian and au pair struggling with PTSD decides whether or not to join the search for Brooke, a missing teenage girl she used to nanny. The story exists between the present, where Sam tries to recover from her trauma and get back on stage, and the past, where memories of Brooke make it harder and harder to ignore the petulant teen’s sudden disappearance.
Zoya Lowe (Mary Louise-Parker) has been diagnosed with a black hole growing in her chest and given a week to live. But what the doctors and her family do not know is that she has already lived this week before because she’s been stuck in an endless time loop. That all changes the day she meets Paula (Ayo Edebiri) and together they team up to save her life and solve time travel.
Nine-year-old Sophia (Emily Matthews) spends the summers at her family’s seasonal home on a tranquil isle in the Gulf of Finland, but this will be the first summer without her mother. Her father (Anders Danielsen Lie) remains numbed by grief, while her grandmother (Glenn Close) guides her on a giddy, winding path towards young adulthood. With a sense of infinite possibility and a tender regard for the wonders of the natural world, Sophia and her grandmother explore the terrain, celebrate midsommar, and test the limits of faith in the face of life’s many storms. Adapted from Tove Jansson’s beloved novel, THE SUMMER BOOK is a delicate account of growing up and growing old, beautifully filmed on 16mm in majestic natural light.
