Le Chat Dans Le Sac Written and Directed by Gilles Grouix Canada, 1964 A movie that is difficult to find but well worth the effort, Le Chat Dans Le Sac captivates moviegoers through its hand held camera usage, John Coltrane soundtrack, twenty-something characters struggling with the world around them. You don’t have to be familiar …
Canadian cinema seems endlessly intertwined with the fringe appeal of horror genre. The first boom of horror happened in the 1970s when Canada’s tax policy allowed producers to take a fee of production costs before the film earned back its production costs (which is not allowed in the States), driving many low quality projects into theatres. Horror was always a safe bet because it was particularly cheap to make, and if they happened to land on a success the return on the investment would generally be a lot higher than for more “prestige” pictures. As that tax-shelter eventually closed up, there still remained a rather strong legacy of horror in Canadian cinema and to this day Canadian horror leans towards the adventurous and the innovative.
The dark unforgiving waters of the Atlantic Ocean and the mouth of the St. Lawrence river provide the backdrop to Les Loups, a beautifully crafted melodrama. Set in a small island Quebec town during the spring thaw, a stranger arrives during the height of the controversial seal hunts. Vibrant and mysterious, many suspect that Elie, the young woman from Montreal, is not who she says and is likely a reporter or an activist bent on portraying the townsfolk in a bad light.
Miraculum Written by Gabriel Sabourin Directed by Daniel Grou Canada, 2014 Daniel Grou (affectionately known as Podz by the Quebec public) got his start in television, directing a number of very successful shows for Radio-Canada, the national channel. In 2010 he made his cinematic debut with two films and has since been working exclusively for …
The first character of the cinema was the mass: In La sortie des usines Lumière, credited as the first ever film, a crowd of factory workers leave a factory. While on repeated viewings you could begin to pick out the quirks and personalities of certain subjects, the real character was the group, the mass, the …
While Festival du Nouveau Cinema is not known for showcasing a large number of world premieres, the Focus section is always the exception. Taking a look at Quebec and Canadian features, films large and small are allowed space to find an audience. The section consistently features a large number of adventurous first time filmmakers, making …
Montreal actor, writer and director Xavier Dolan’s fifth film Mommy is without a doubt one of the best of the year. Although thematically similar to his 2009 debut J’ai tué ma mère (I Killed My Mother), which won three separate awards at Cannes that year, Mommy follows the mother’s perspective of the relationship instead of that of the son’s. It is interesting, despite their many parallels, how very different the two films actually are. With Mommy, Dolan not only seems more assured of himself as a filmmaker but appears to have developed into quite an auteur as well. Creating a film so close in theme to his first can be seen as somewhat of a gamble, for many individuals might fear the film to be repetitious, a carbon copy, yet here is where Dolan demonstrates his disturbingly instinctual talent. Because he revisits the mother-son leitmotif in his works, he is strengthening both his storytelling as well as his understanding of the unique relationship. In the five years since his introductory film, he has grown from adolescent to adult, resulting in a shift from youthful intuition to a certain maturity on the subject. The result is downright brilliant.
Kevin Smith’s early work, guerilla-style films about disenfranchised geeks and losers, helped gain him a strong and dedicated audience. While many of his most dedicated fans seem to find the best in even his weakest films, Smith has never found the same success in critical circles. The negative critiques of his films has only been exasperated by Smith himself, who seems to struggle with dissenting takes on his work, leading him to withdraw into podcasting. Though this was not a strategic choice on Smith’s part, it seemed to pay off as his audience only grew and he is now among the most influential people in the ‘Twittersphere’. This allowed Smith to distribute his 2011 film Red State himself. He described the entire process as “Indie Film 2.0.”; it was no longer about just making the film yourself but distributing it as well.
Tu dors Nicole is the newest feature film from Quebec filmmakers Stephane Lafleur. The film premiered at the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes, a section specifically focused on emerging auteurs of the screen. Nicole (Julianne Cote) is 22 years old and is house sitting while her parents are on vacation. She spends most of her days wandering aimlessly with her friend Veronique. The atmosphere of ennui though is loudly interrupted when her brother and his band arrive, setting up shop in the family living room. The film explores the aimless summers of youth and the seemingly directionless future that awaits the young Nicole. She is withdrawn and sullen, but through a quiet surrealism Lafleur peels back the layers, evoking a sense of phantasmagoria, where reality and dream exist simultaneously.
Pouvoir intime, or Blind Trust if you’re of the Anglo persuasion, is a film that has more or less fallen through the cracks of time. It was issued on home video once upon a time, in the long-past age known as the VHS era, and hasn’t been seen in a newer format since. Luckily, some enterprising folks at the Fantasia International Film Festival got together with the Cinémathèque québécoise and got them to dust off their 35mm print of the film. Showing these kinds of movies serves a very specific purpose: they add depth and texture to a film culture that was still figuring itself out even in the mid-80s.
The 42nd Edition of Montreal’s Festival du Nouveau Cinema is just days away and the weight of an incredibly diverse and exciting program can intimidate even the most weathered cineaste. Combining the very best of big name and upcoming filmmakers, the festival has built its reputation on giving attention to groundbreaking and avant-garde cinema. Though sometimes …
Bruno Dumont is joining the ranks of acclaimed filmmakers trading in the big screen for the home screen. Set to develop a police drama for French network ARTE, this will be his first foray into television. Dumont’s work, which includes L’humanité (1999) and Hors Satan (2011), has long been controversial and his filmmaking practises have …
Breathtaking Dir. Kathleen Mullen (2010, Canada, 43 mins.) On the surface, Breathtaking is an uncomfortable question: if asbestos is not used in Canada, why does Canada still export asbestos? At root, however, it is a memoir and cautionary tale featuring the director’s father, Richard Mullen, now deceased from disease as a result of asbestos exposure. …