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Reality, Lifestyle & Documentary

Wild Bear Rescue returns for Season 2, premiering June 22 on Animal Planet

From a media release:

Northern Lights Wildlife Society in Smithers, B.C. is bursting with rambunctious cubs for Season 2 of Animal Planet’s original Canadian series WILD BEAR RESCUE. Featuring 44 black bear cubs and a strong-willed grizzly prowling inside the rehab pens, Season 2 of the series premieres June 22, and airs Fridays at 10 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. PT on Animal Planet. Bristling with drama, humour, and irresistible cuteness, the 12-part series follows Angelika and Peter Langen and their family-run operation that rescues, raises, and rehabilitates the cubs for their safe return back into the wild.

In Season 2, Angelika and Peter Langen return with their daughter Tanja, son Michael, son-in-law Shawn, and an array of dedicated volunteers who work to provide medical care, housing, and food for wounded and orphaned animals across the region. Throughout the season, the Langen team offers essential treatment to bear cubs, as well as lynx, fawns, birds, moose, cougars, and other wildlife. With a record number of animals in need, and faced with an unforeseen housing crisis, the Langen family must pull together and work harder than ever to provide these animals with the rehabilitation and care they need in order to survive.

WILD BEAR RESCUE is produced by Omnifilm Entertainment in association with Animal Planet. Executive Producers are Gabriela Schonbach and Michael Chechik. Series producers are David Gullason and Brad Quenville.

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Preview: CBC’s Back in Time for Dinner is an education in living in Canada decades ago

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I grew up the 1970s, the era of strange casseroles and questionable ingredients suspended in Jello salads. Mine was a childhood filled with Cheez Whiz smeared on celery, macaroni loaf sandwiches and copious amounts of Cool Whip on things. I look back on all of that fondly, but I wouldn’t want any of it if offered to me today.

That’s not the case for the Campus family, who signed on to Back in Time for Dinner, CBC’s newest documentary series that transports one family back in time to eat, dress and live like Canadians of yesterday. Hosted by TV veteran and all-around nice guy Carlo Rota, Back in Time for Dinner is a social experiment that takes the Campuses—a middle-class suburban family of five from Mississauga, Ont.—and strips away their modern diets and lifestyle to go back in time.

Starting in the 1940s and landing in the 1990s, their home becomes a time machine as it’s stripped to the studs and transformed into a new decade each week. I’m a sucker for series like this—check out the excellent British series Victorian Farm, Edwardian Farm and Wartime Farm on YouTube if you haven’t already—so I was jazzed to see how the Campus family would adapt to old-timey living and the bumps in the road along the way.

Thursday’s first of six episodes at 8 p.m. on CBC begins in the 1940s with the five-person family arriving to see the interior of their house has been totally transformed to reflect that time period. Gone, of course, are modern trappings like big-screen TVs, central heat and—GASP!—the Internet in favour of a fridge-sized radio, an electric stove, icebox and laundry done by hand.

It was the time of the Second World War, and Canadians were enlisting to fight overseas. This country was also a major supplier of food to the Allied countries and that meant food rations at home. It was also a different time in snacking. No chips, cookies and gummy things for teens Valerie, Jessica and Robert. Instead, sardines and other canned meats are the rules of the day. So too were the societal guidelines. Mom Tristan and her daughters are in charge of keeping the house ship-shape inside and purchasing from a grocery list hemmed in by ration coupons. Rather than her usual overflowing grocery carts, Tristan is given a small basket containing her essentials.

As if being a teen wasn’t tough enough, the Campus kids have to attend school in their period-perfect clothing and eat 1940s lunches. Needless to say, Robert is not a fan of his yeast-based bread and “sauce.”

Back in Time for Dinner is certainly fun to watch, but it’s a fantastic history lesson too, thanks to Rota. In between Campus family footage, he narrates what life in Canada is like during those days, from footwear and clothing and hairstyles. As for Night One’s dinner? Pan-fried kidneys with celery sauce on toast and boiled potatoes. (“Every once in awhile you get a whiff of … urine,” Tristan observes as she pan-fries the morsels.)

The first instalment of Back in Time for Dinner is surprising and informative and made me appreciate everything I have today. I can’t wait to see more.

Back in Time for Dinner airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on CBC.

Image courtesy of CBC.

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Preview: APTN’s Queen of the Oil Patch is the story of triumph and acceptance

Until a screener landed in my inbox, I wasn’t sure what Queen of the Oil Patch was going to be about. According to the press release, the documentary series, debuting Tuesday at 10:30 p.m. ET on APTN, tells the tale of Fort McKay resident Massey Whiteknife and his alter ego, Iceis Rain. Whiteknife’s business empire was shattered when oil prices took a tumble followed by fire sweeping through nearby Fort MacMurray. Cameras capture Whiteknife as he attempts to get back on his economic feet.

But Queen of the Oil Patch is so much more than that.

When we catch up with Whiteknife, he shows off his two businesses in Fort Mac, Tatonka North Contracting, a construction company and Iceis Safety, a full-service occupational health and safety consulting business. But at night, Whiteknife becomes someone else … Iceis Rain. Iceis is a critically-acclaimed recording artist, booking dates across the country, and was nominated at the 2014 Aboriginal People’s Choice Music Awards, where she also performed. She’s also an anti-bullying advocate, speaks to suicide prevention and has a wicked wiggle.

Whiteknife’s plan? To spend a year transitioning fully into Iceis Rain. How will that go over in Fort Mac? Will being a woman ruin his day-to-day business? Whiteknife is willing to take that chance to be who he is.

Kah-Kitowak Films, a Vancouver-based production company that works in partnership with Great Pacific Media, has captured something really special in Queen of the Oil Patch. Métis producer-director Neil Grahn and producers Kelly McClughan and Mark Miller have gained the trust of their subject. The result is an intimate, honest portrait of a person who is passionate about what they do and wants to help their fellow First Nations people find full-time jobs while becoming who they truly want to be.

It’s inspiring, meaningful and riveting stuff. Don’t miss it.

Queen of the Oil Patch airs Tuesdays at 10:30 p.m. ET on APTN.

Image courtesy of Great Pacific Media.

 

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Preview: History’s doc series Bud Empire rolls up on pot sales as Canada heads toward legalization

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I don’t—and have never—smoked marijuana. Growing up, I didn’t know anyone who did and when it was offered I declined. As a result, I don’t have any skin in the game as Canada inches closer to the legalization—voting on Bill C-45 is scheduled for June —of recreational marijuana in this country. But tuning in to History’s latest original series, Bud Empire certainly educated me in the drug and what being able to sell it as an entrepreneur.

Debuting Tuesday at 10 p.m. ET/PT on the specialty network, the seven-part Bud Empire—narrated by Will Sasso—introduces viewers to Bob Kay, the owner of Be Kind, the Okanagan’s original Compassion Club. Episode 1, with its guitar-driven soundtrack, introduces Kay as he reveals B.C.’s Okanagan Valley is dotted with pot grow-ops mixed in with other crops. It’s a $5 billion industry and Kay aims to be “the King of Weed.” That title comes with challenges in the form of robbery, extortion, violence and Kay potentially being arrested for selling.

But Bud Empire isn’t about the furtive exchange of money for pot in a shadowy alley or groups of stoners lounging in a room filled with smoke; the program explores not only Kay’s family life (including his creatively-named kids) but how he’s running and, hopefully, expanding his business. This could be a series about any entrepreneur wanting to sell a product; the hook is that Kay sells marijuana. Kay welcomes salespeople into Be Kind, analyzing and sampling their weed and deeming if it’s up to his high standards and worthy of being in his store. Watching bunches of twenties exchange hands over bags of pot is certainly something to see.

Kay works a grey area of the law but he believes what he and others are doing is really helping; medical marijuana helps alleviate chronic pain and other ailments. Still, rules in Kelowna, B.C., could put him out of business and in jail.

Produced by Screen Siren Pictures Inc. and HLP + Partners, Trish Dolman (Canada in a Day)—Bud Empire‘s executive producer and director—offers a wonderful, educational and heartfelt peek into the life of man eking out a business in a rapidly-changing landscape.

Bud Empire airs back-to-back episodes on Tuesdays at 10 p.m. ET/PT on History.

Image courtesy of Corus Entertainment.

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Preview: Bonacini’s Italy brings the tastes of 15 food regions to Gusto

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Did you catch Michael Bonacini’s Gusto special, Christmas at the Farm? If not, you missed a fantastic hour packed with tasty recipes and Bonacini’s charm.

Luckily, the folks at Bell Media were smart enough to sign on the restaurateur and resident MasterChef Canada judge for a whole new series of 15 instalments. This one, Bonacini’s Italy—debuting Monday at 8:30 p.m. ET/5:30 p.m. PT on Gusto, which is in a free preview until June 26—picks up with Bonacini as he cooks his way through 15 Italian regions, exploring the flavours and textures that make each unique through an entire meal, from antipasto, soup, or salad, to primo, secondo and dolce.

On Monday, Bonacini transports viewers to Tuscany for a menu jam-packed with peasant food. Gone is the sprawling, snowy farm from this holiday special, swapped out for the clean lines of a what looks like a condo kitchen complete with a sun-coloured bike hanging askew on the wall. Simplicity and freshness are the rules of the day in Tuscan cooking according to Bonacini, as he roughly dices perfect heirloom tomatoes, preps crusty bread, cores and chops cucumber, slices red onion, tears basil and pours out red wine vinegar and olive oil to create a bread salad. Gnudi with ricotta and spinach are equally tantalizing, followed by a Tuscan beef stew with just seven ingredients and a shockingly simple baked fish and potatoes.

Aside from the charm I mentioned when previewing Bonacini’s holiday special, he brings an air of supreme calm to Italy. Bonacini delivers his lines softly and succinctly, exuding the same confidence and surety that has made him a successful restaurateur and MasterChef Canada judge and coach. By the end of Episode 1 of Bonacini’s Italy, not only was I hungry but I had the confidence to try out the recipes for myself.

Bonacini’s Italy airs Mondays at 8:30 p.m. ET/5:30 p.m. PT on Gusto. Gusto is in a free preview until June 26.

Image courtesy of Bell Media.

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