Film Screenings / Programs / Series
QUEBEC-CORE
April 5 – April 19
April 5-19, 2024
“I had to come back to Montreal. I have total disrespect for Hollywood, it still makes my hair stand on end. Yukk. They’re all creepos.” –Micheline Lanctôt, 1984
Lanctôt, who has directed thirteen features and starred in countless more, is one of the filmmakers showcased in our spring film series, “Quebec-Core”, which represents a dazzling dive into the “French Canadian New Wave”, a vital cinematic movement that’s virtually unknown in the U.S. even as it’s distinctly NORTH American.
The series calls attention to several extraordinary filmmakers who are likely to be more or less unfamiliar to most audiences south of the border, including Mireille Dansereau, Francis Mankiewicz, Pierre Falardeau, Julien Poulin, and Micheline Lanctôt, and includes mini-spotlights on Robert Morin and André Forcier, two extraordinary filmmakers who have operated at a furious pace right up to the present day. All the directors selected emerged from vastly different backgrounds but are united by their shared need to probe the depths of Quebecois identity.
The role of the outsider takes supreme, constant, and hypnotic importance in this ragtag assembly. The ghostly bond of two lonely souls living out their final days in a car outside a Montreal bowling alley; a heart wrenching countryside tragedy caused by a daughter’s brutal desperation for her mother’s affection; vitriolic alienation pulsing through the walls of an apartment of desperate junkies; a disabled adult at last breaking free from the diminished expectations of his suffocating suburban parents. Through all of them runs a constant howl, the whispers of strangers and interlopers and those who feel discarded both socially and existentially. The kind of thing you hear in an alley, muffled voices on the street corner or a scrawled treatise on a roadside bathroom wall. A cry for understanding and compassion, and a call to be seen. We bring you, the “French Canadian New Wave”.
Guest-programmed by Luke Rathborne & Sean Price Williams.
André Forcier and his writing and producing partner Linda Pinet will be here in person from Tuesday-Thursday, April 9-11, and Robert Morin will be here in person on Thursday & Friday, April 18 & 19!
There will be a reception in honor of André Forcier and Linda Pinet on Tuesday, April 9, following the 6:45 screening of BAR SALON. And on Thursday, April 18, there will be another reception, in honor of Robert Morin, following the 7:15 screening of SCALE MODEL SADNESS. Both receptions are made possible thanks to the Québec Government Office in New York.
Presented with invaluable support from the Délégation générale du Québec à New York / Québec Government Office in New York, and from the Conseil des arts de Longueuil. Special thanks to Jean-Pierre Dion, Director Cultural Services, Québec Government Office in New York.
Special thanks as well to André Forcier; Robert Morin; Keith Bennie (Toronto International Film Festival); Sarah-Nicole Bolduc (Christal Films Productions); Marc Daigle (ACPAV); Dominique Dugas & Pascal Laplante (Éléphant: mémoire du cinéma québécois); Mathilde Fauteux & Joseph Rozenkopf (Vidéographe); Isabelle Gingras (Films Seville); Melissa Haughton (National Film Board of Canada); Guillaume Lafleur & Jean-Philippe Tremblay (Cinémathèque québécoise); Anne-Julie Lalande (Filmoption International); David Lavoie (MELS Studios); Léa Marinova (Coop Vidéo de Montréal); David Marriott (Canadian International Pictures); and Linda Pinet (Les Films du Paria).
Denys Arcand
DIRTY MONEY / LA MAUDITE GALETTE
1972, 100 min, 35mm-to-DCP. In French with English subtitles.
Roland and Berthe are a struggling working-class Montreal couple who receive a visit from Roland’s estranged and wealthy Uncle Arthur. After a $500 gift is ill-received, Berthe hatches a plan to take what she feels entitled to. She and Roland make a trip to Arthur’s remote country house to steal the rest of his fortune, but soon find that their lodger Ernest has trailed them and has plans for the money himself, causing what should have been a simple heist to spiral towards a cascade of shocking violence. Arcand’s first feature is a wily ride into Canuxploitation and established him as a force to be reckoned with. His protagonists, while conniving, commit their acts with none of the resourcefulness of the typical screen criminal. They seem guilty of only two things: desperation and the momentary lapse of judgment that comes along with it.
Fri, April 5 at 6:45, Thurs, April 11 at 9:15, and Sat, April 13 at 3:30.
Mireille Dansereau
DREAM LIFE / LA VIE RÊVÉE
1972, 90 min, 35mm-to-DCP. In French with English subtitles.
Considered the first publicly financed film by a female director in Quebec, DREAM LIFE tracks the romantic desires of two young Montreal women as they discuss their dreams, desires, and interior lives. Directed with a deep love of life and experimental curiosity, Dansereau’s film moves seamlessly from the young girls’ romantic fantasies to the deflating reality they’re forced to confront in the harsh light of day. A trip to the countryside leaves them contemplating the nature of love itself. A distinctive coming-of-age film, told with beauty and austerity, it is also a film that is prone to bouts of visual experimentation. The two women, lost in alienation, build an almost impossible closeness as they approach the anxiety of having to settle down. Maybe men are a disappointment, but with dreams this good what does it matter?
Fri, April 5 at 9:15, Sun, April 14 at 7:15, and Wed, April 17 at 6:45.
André Forcier
BAR SALON
1974, 84 min, 35mm. In French with English subtitles. Archival print courtesy of the Cinémathèque québécoise.
Charles Méthot is hopeless. His seedy bar has run out of patrons. His marriage is in ruins. Even the bartenders seem sick to death of the clientele, at one point exclaiming, “All men without women, get out!” In desperation, he turns to his pal Larry, who offers him a job as the night manager of the local cabaret, an equally seedy joint that at least has customers. He tries to settle down with a dancer at his new job, but she soon steals his car. Booze, hopelessness, and despair loom around every corner. 25-year-old André Forcier captures it all with respect, tenderness, and flair in his second feature, never turning his back on his characters even when they seem at risk of turning in on themselves.
Sat, April 6 at 4:00 and Tues, April 9 at 6:45. André Forcier and his writing and producing partner Linda Pinet will be here for a Q&A on Tues, April 9!
André Forcier
A PACEMAKER AND A SIDECAR / L’EAU CHAUDE, L’EAU FRETTE
1976, 94 min, 35mm-to-DCP. In French with English subtitles. Restored DCP courtesy of Éléphant / Collection Cinémathèque québécoise.
A provocateur whose work was as feverish as Scorsese’s and as grotesque as Fellini’s (minus the maestro’s oppressive presence), André Forcier was the province’s reigning enfant terrible, and an even more influential social critic at the time. Unlike Denys Arcand, Forcier was devoted to the working class, failed artists, and those on the extreme fringes. A PACEMAKER AND A SIDECAR is perhaps his most cohesive, liveliest piece, concentrating on the inhabitants of a run-down tenement in Montréal. The community is effectively run by a ruthless loan shark named Polo, who’s planning a birthday celebration for himself. Unfortunately for him, his enemies aren’t as cowed by him as he believes.
Preceded by:
Claude Jutra THE DEVIL’S TOY / ROULI-ROULANT 1966, 15 min, 35mm-to-digital
“Skateboarding is not a crime” – long before it was scrawled on the alleyway walls of the United States and the world, skateboarding was all the rage in Montreal, Quebec, until it was briefly banned. This short documentary explores that period of time, and provides a mesmerizing portrait of teenage life and rebellion in the suburbs of Montreal.
Total running time: ca. 115 min.
Sat, April 6 at 6:15, Tues, April 9 at 9:00, and Wed, April 10 at 6:30. André Forcier and his writing and producing partner Linda Pinet will be in person on Tues & Wed, April 9 & 10!
Francis Mankiewicz
GOOD RIDDANCE / LES BONS DÉBARRAS
1980, 114 min, 35mm. In French with English subtitles. Archival print courtesy of the Cinémathèque québécoise.
Manon, a precocious but obsessive young woman, clings to her mother Michelle’s every breath in the Laurentian Mountains of Quebec. Her desperate need for affection takes a dark turn when Michelle reveals that she’s pregnant. Plagued by incessant poverty and the burden of caring for her mentally disabled brother Guy, Michelle is faced with a fever pitch of cataclysmic change that will sunder their family unit forever. Beautifully shot by renowned cinematographer Michel Brault, GOOD RIDDANCE adopts a palette of dark, shadowy hues, giving way to a patchwork of desolate early winter landscapes. With a screenplay by acclaimed but reclusive novelist Réjean Ducharme, the film is elevated by a searing lead performance by child actor Charlotte Laurier.
Sat, April 6 at 9:00 and Mon, April 15 at 7:30.
André Forcier
AU CLAIR DE LA LUNE
1983, 92 min, 35mm-to-DCP. In French with English subtitles. Courtesy of Éléphant / Collection Cinémathèque québécoise.
In the chill of an impossibly cold winter night, a washed-up bowler, Bert, lives in the back of a 71’ Sedan outside Montreal’s Moonshine Bowling Alley. He awakens one night to find an albino stranger, François, nearly frozen to death in the snow. Bert revives him and they develop a friendship built upon shared insight and years of social neglect. François purports to be from the mythical land of Albinie, and summons Bert to revive his courage and his long-lost bowling dreams. The two bowl by day, and concoct schemes and well-meaning plans in the back of Bert’s car by night, forming a tender bond that breaks the monotonous desolation of their lives.
Sun, April 7 at 4:15, Wed, April 10 at 9:15, and Thurs, April 11 at 6:45. André Forcier and his writing and producing partner Linda Pinet will be in person on Wed & Thurs, April 10 & 11!
Pierre Falardeau & Julien Poulin
ELVIS GRATTON: THE KING OF KINGS / ELVIS GRATTON: LE KING DES KINGS
1985, 100 min, 16mm-to-DCP. In French with English subtitles. Courtesy of Éléphant / Collection Cinémathèque québécoise.
This 1985 feature film packages together the three short films that introduced Quebec audiences to the character of Elvis (Bob) Gratton, who would become an inescapable part of Quebecois pop culture in the 1980s and 90s. Bob Gratton wants nothing more in life than to be a famous Elvis impersonator. When he learns of a local TV talent show contest whose prize is a cruise to the island of “Santa Banana”, he jumps at the opportunity. During the second film, an overweight Bob is summoned back to the spotlight by a talent agent, only to find that he has “outgrown” his Elvis suit in his middle age. In the third and final act, Bob has become the head of a media organization, manipulating and designing the news, and altering the public’s perspective and consumption at will. The film was made as a critique of the perceived political failure of the Quebec Federalists and their refusal to vote for independence. It satirized them as U.S.-loving, unsophisticated, and as dim-witted as Gratton himself.
Sun, April 7 at 6:30.
Micheline Lanctôt
SONATINE
1984, 91 min, 35mm-to-DCP. In French with English subtitles. Courtesy of Éléphant / Collection Cinémathèque québécoise.
Structured as a triptych, Lancôt’s second feature follows two disillusioned teenagers who exist in a world of isolation and loneliness, ignored by their parents and the gentrifying city around them. In the first two chapters, they each make tentative advances towards genuine connection with two older men from the margins of Quebecois society. Soon, however, their good-natured plans sour under the weight of unseen forces (political and otherwise), and they are left vulnerable and unable to cope with the urban chaos surrounding them. The final third of the triptych concerns their star-crossed bond, and a pact that will lead them to their doom.
Sun, April 7 at 9:00, Sun, April 14 at 5:00, and Wed, April 17 at 9:00.
ROBERT MORIN
“An unclassifiable filmmaker, Robert Morin influenced a whole generation of artists with his lucid vision of society and an approach guided by pure creative impulse. Since the 1970s, he has continued to multiply projects, to impose not only his style and his vision of the world, but a way of making cinema and video as an artist who does not accept any compromise. The imagination of this filmmaker fiercely committed to the heart of everyday life is inseparable from the critical view he casts on society. Morin is also known for having founded, with friends, the Montreal Videoscopic Production Cooperative (the Coop Video) in 1977, at a time when access to film production was almost impossible and financial support from the government was difficult to obtain.” –CINEMA QUEBECOIS
Robert Morin
SCALE MODEL SADNESS / TRISTESSE MODÈLE RÉDUIT
1987, 83 min, digital. In French with English subtitles.
Jeannot, a young adult with Down’s Syndrome, lives a gentle, placid suburban life. His parents control his schedule with clockwork precision, and his only escape to the outside world is through his model car collection or by observing the frogs that end up in his swimming pool. His world is turned upside down by the arrival of a young caretaker, Pauline, who challenges his parents’ conviction that Jeannot cannot fend for himself. Riding the wave of freedom brought on by this break in his routine, Jeannot begins to assemble a plan and to build the courage to transcend the diminished expectations of his suffocating home life.
Preceded by:
Robert Morin & Lorraine Dufour THE MYSTERIOUS PAUL / LE MYSTÉRIEUX PAUL 1983, 26.5 min, digital
A desperate circus performer, Paul, seeks to continue his dangerous sword swallowing even after his doctors and his family warn him he’s closing in on death. Paul is an enigma, his need to perform seems to defy every convention, even his own death is a price easily paid to live out his soul’s one ambition. A performer at heart, his family struggles to keep him satisfied within a domestic existence, while the danger and thrill of the circus life beckons him from every dark hall.
Total running time: ca. 115 min.
Mon, April 8 at 6:30, Fri, April 12 at 7:15, and Thurs, April 18 at 7:15. Robert Morin will be here in person for a Q&A on Thurs, April 18!
Robert Morin
WHOEVER DIES, DIES IN PAIN / QUICONQUE MEURT, MEURT À DOULEUR
1998, 90 min, digital. In French with English subtitles.
Vitriolic alienation and dismay course through the walls of an apartment full of desperate junkies in Morin’s unforgettable film. Making their last stand against the Montreal police, the denizens of the apartment have shot one police officer and are holding another hostage. Meanwhile, the crew of a reality TV show has become trapped alongside the junkies, and captures their final testaments and philosophical ramblings. For his bold experiment in meta-narrative, Morin mixes gonzo documentary and the struggle of real-life addicts to chilling and visceral effect.
“I didn’t want to make a film about dope as such, I wanted to make a political film. That is, how people who are into drugs see society. We put them on the margins, and from the margins, they have a very particular vision of society. That’s what interested me.” –Robert Morin
Mon, April 8 at 9:15, Sat, April 13 at 6:00, and Fri, April 19 at 6:45. Robert Morin will be here in person for a Q&A on Fri, April 19!
Robert Morin
MAY GOD BLESS AMERICA / QUE DIEU BÉNISSE L’AMÉRIQUE
2006, 110 min, digital. In French with English subtitles.
The day is September 11, 2001. Maurice Ménard, a police inspector in Laval, Quebec has been tasked with finding a brutal killer of sex offenders who is still on the loose. The offenders have been posted on notices scattered through street corners and businesses of the residential neighborhood. Details emerge that the killer has been feeding his victims meals before ending their lives, but who is he and where will he strike next? A classic whodunnit begins to engulf the psychology of the town’s inhabitants but things are not what they seem. As far off images of September 11 play out on television screens throughout the film’s various locations – a pawn shop, an all you can eat buffet, etc. – the inhabitants of the town are strangely oblivious. Who is the real killer? Will he be discovered before time runs out? Morin probes the psychology of small-town life while critiquing the lack of empathy of his closest neighbors in the U.S. What is the result when individuality has gone mad?
Sat, April 13 at 8:30, Tues, April 16 at 7:30, and Fri, April 19 at 9:00. Robert Morin will be here in person on Fri, April 19!
