The Big Snit, 1985
Canada Vignettes: Wop May, 1979
The ErlKing, 2002
Completely worthy of its exalted source. Goethe and Schubert? No problem. Perfect pacing: the king gradually insinuates himself, and by the end it’s shattering. The child’s fear! The father’s realization!
The Girl Who Hated Books, 2006
Tzaritsa, 2006
Uncle Bob's Hospital Visit, 2008
Educational:
Action: the October Crisis of 1970, 1973
Exemplary stuff. The structure is conventional, or maybe classical. There’s a bit of the main event, followed by a calm tracing of the various tributaries that led to it. These historical strands lead us back to the featured issue, the parts of which are now more fully set forth. This brings us to a kind of climax, accompanied by a proper, decorous lack of absolute closure. This is what’s really remarkable, because this isn’t really, exactly history. It’s a current event, and it’s not closed because that event is still being played out. Notwithstanding this partial aperture, this natural journalistic diffidence, we still get an account of practically magisterial clarity and gravity. The FLQ story isn’t quite over, but have they ever given us Quebec and Canada! This is typical Board stuff, of course, which means that it’s so modest and thorough and professional that you might not notice how amazing it is. That’s the mandate, art and craft, equally combined in the public service.
What a terrible story this is! What terrible and amazing things contained within. It’s distressing and edifying to participate in it. In addition to the relentlessly reserved and informative narration, what most stands out is the agonizing, amazing duration of some of the footage. We get the entire FLQ manifesto, without any B-roll distractions. We get the entire exchange between P.E. Trudeau and those reporters on Parliament Hill. Clip it and you get the wrong idea—“what have your friends been doing?”—run it and you’ve got a human, political, archetypal complexity and completeness. What an articulate, charismatic guy! And look at that access, in an era of assassination and in the very midst of this terrible danger. (The troops were an error, and a terrible circumvention of civil rights. At the same time, Canada!)
We get huge stretches of the sublime Tommy Douglas, a good part of that interview with the pinched and overwhelmed Robert Bourassa (“the young technocrat” they call him, a bit editorially), and most movingly, the profound prologue and the entire interview between Levesque and the English radio reporter. “You want sixty seconds? You’re going to have to get somebody else.” This is unspeakably stirring footage, because of the intelligence, the political resolve, the anger and sorrow and great decency that play across those features and come out in that voice. A great Canadian! Also there was never a better, clearer example of the sometimes necessity or morality of profane words. Clearly, in two languages, this masterful man can exactly and absolutely express himself. In the face of that bloody-minded, institutionally typical request, that was the correct word.
Hard stuff, then, and a film that doesn’t face in the flinch of it. What this means, what this is is the best kind of adult movie. For one thing this means that there are subjects we might consider attending to. More importantly, or universally—go ahead and opt out of the harsh material—there are durations and levels that mature people, no matter how un-R-rated they are, will consider. They don’t need distorting concision or empty slickness. Social (historical, political) reality have terror and tenderness and truth enough.
Children from Overseas, 1940
Days of Whisky Gap, 1961
Here's Hockey, 1953
The Voyageurs, 1964
Children from Overseas, 1940
Days of Whisky Gap, 1961
Here's Hockey, 1953
The Voyageurs, 1964
Historical:
Made before the attack on Pearl Harbour, eh? As has often been observed, the film is practically prophetic. Less obviously, it’s eye-opening to get a glimpse at a world before the huge traumatic event that changed everything. Legg-like, this is as much concerned with information as it with propagandistic motivation and uplift. So you’ve got music and reassurance and Lorne Greene, which works because of the unhysterical, detailed, fair-minded analysis that underpins it. The gallop through Japanese history is especially good. (Too bad they couldn’t dispense with that tired musical typage.) Much more than Capra’s war films—though all hail—this goes out of its way to say that the regime is an anomaly, that there’s a huge difference between the regime and the national character. “Japan, like Britain…”
Ideological:
Who ever thinks of Acadians, of French speakers in New Brunswick, let alone their obscure Chiac language? That’s the problem. What reproof! After this artless, subject-led little assembly, Acadians, in New Brunswick, struggling to figure out the place of their linguistic tradition, suddenly emerge as the most important people in the world. Brault brought the photographic artistry that made cinéma verité, but here you see Rouch returning the favour. Art is secondary, or maybe it doesn’t even matter. Go, listen, learn. The result is citizenly, ethical, religious. The teacher is our way in, but it’s the kids that are so amazing. What passion! What clarity of thought and feeling! So proud, so subtle, and so movingly articulate! Wow. They’re all archetypal, in that they so nicely represent this cultural type or that social pattern. But they’re completely individualized. At the end, when Brault has them look at the camera and tell us they’re names, it is like the writing on the wall. Of course Levesque…
This starts with yodeling, making it a clear anti-Royal Journey. Water is the first element! They start with Newfoundland, the ridiculous picturesqueness of which is seriously undercut by its staggeringly wind blasted desolation. You sense writer Donald Brittain behind Stanley Jackson’s superb narration. The text is tight and multi-leveled. It’s also commercial—it wants to please its audience. But not at the expense of its self-respect. The tone is piquant, ironic, always intelligent.
Junior, 2008
And how! The filmmakers stick to their observational guns with a vengeance. And once again the mode proves itself most adequate to the representation of processes and typicalities. And, if you choose your subject carefully, you can also be assured that a crisis or two will arise. Again, as is generally suggested, the recording and assembling of all of this really convinces you about both the richness and the ambiguity of the world. So much going on. What does it mean? Or what do we do with and about the many simultaneous, contradictory things that it means? (As with the Maysles’ Salesman, it’s hard to believe how much the camera disappears here. Hard because the rooms are small and things get silent, and all sorts of private and painful things happen. Do these lads think that this is what the spotlight means, or will require?)
A classic verité objection arises. Some of this footage, some of these interactions could have benefited from a bit of interrogation. More to the point, some of these kids might could have used some advocacy! Agents here, coaches there, doors closed and eyebrows raised all over the place. You can’t be sure, but there’s a sneaking feeling that when they’re not being exploited and manipulated, they’re being neglected. Not showing any hockey is a tremendous choice. The more we don’t see, the more the game increases in importance and magnitude. Concluding with the draft is dramatically obvious, and dramatically devastating. By keying on these kids as they key on the game we learn and feel how this is everything to them. At the end here, we essentially pull way back and learn that they’re all just Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. The agent tells the parent that being picked in the last round is no problem. We’ll make a player of him. You think?
This is so obsequious it’ll give you a concussion. Not all that much time has passed, and how have things changed! Part of that change is good of course—bloody colonial footprints and all. (Hierarchy generally, in fact, and every presumption of rank. How can you justify that posh privilege, and everyone else waiting in the cold? [Celebrity culture…]) But there is great loss too. Look at the sincerity, even the healthiness of some of that ridiculous pomp. Look at the faith in something bigger, a something that wasn’t all corrupt. (Especially if you’re Canada, or Australia, or a basically a member of the modern Commonwealth.) And look at how lovely she is, how dashing he. There’s tons of info, tons of substance beneath the boilerplate. What a strain it must be to be royal!
The episode idea is quite good, and the notion of individual voices reacting to the regional stop-offs. A little more authenticity, or literary artificiality would have been nice though. (The “Toronto teen-ager,” the Calgary Indian and the tough American newsman fare especially badly.) Anyway, there’s a great deal of historical and actual weight here. This was a big hit; Roman Holiday has to have been a basic plagiarization. And they both look good in the comparing. Best of all: that photography! Yes we like Technicolor, but these short and other institutional films tempt one to swear off big commerce forever. What colour! Everything was gathered in the press of newsreel practice. Hail to the newsreel cameramen, then, who capture so well, under such duress. Cutters too, for maintaining that graceful coherence, even as they had to make order out of doubtless and utter chaos. The cameras come off well, and the country even better. The tumult and the shouting dies; the captains and the kings depart… Nineveh and Tyre may fail, but the Newfoundland coast won’t!
Runaway, 2009
Is this why he takes so long between films? We can only be grateful for whatever he deigns to give us. Man! This reads as bailout fable, class critique, existential parable. (Naturalism too—could it be that they actually, intentionally distilled Zola’s La Bete Humaine for us?) It’s also a sentimentality buster, or an ideological primer—viz. its demolition of The Little Engine that Could. Or, it’s a textbook example of objective correlative. Or, it’s nine minutes of perfect comic construction. Great score. There’s his muse, Richard Condie. There’s a McLaren-like anger/savagery beneath the genial surface. (Did they just throw that baby in the boiler?) It’s actually very touching, though that might only be due to all of these moments of creative apotheosis. The ending is a Hal Roach topper—the captain! The dog!—with the grace and symmetry of a classical cadence.
Individuals:
21-87, 1964
Blake, 1969
These are just so skillfully, beautifully shot and assembled. All this film craft quietly but powerfully supports the film’s ideas. Life today is a rat race, but if we’ll just Thoreau it, if we’ll just simplify and be ourselves, it’ll be alright. It’s all very attractive, transcendental/non-conformist. True too, and really interesting/important as a bit of vivid 1969. This is no mere hippy manifesto. Mind you, there’s a bit of baloney here too, or at least a level of unacknowledged contrivance that has to be dealt with. For instance, they’re hypnotizing us. Off-screen voices bear witness to Blake’s perfections; rhetoric and staying in the middle of the frame and they’ve carried the day. Not the same as earning the win. Here’s a thing that worked perfectly for “paddle” and the Great Lakes film, but which becomes more of a Bill Mason problem. The film claims to be a documentary about this unaffected guy and his natural, harmonious life. But can these shots be any more planned and designed? To make a documentary film is kind of like doing your alms in public. Designed, and gloriously too—this is as much of a documentary as Fires Were Started. Which in the end isn’t so bad, is it?
Foster Child, 1987
Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard Cohen, 1965
Synchromy, 1971
Ted Baryluk's Grocery, 1982
Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard Cohen, 1965
Synchromy, 1971
Ted Baryluk's Grocery, 1982
Community:
Made a decade after those observational documentary innovations, so what was innovative now seems almost classical. This is practically a Nova Scotia Les Raquetteurs. It seems that during this classic period, and well into the 70’s, there’s not a crew at the Board that doesn’t shoot and assemble down-to-earth, authentic, very beautiful stuff. A slightly facetious tone actually makes it slightly silly, but the titanic tug-of-war, or the horseshoe details, the lady with the camera, or the ones with the curlers, make that disappear. Flaherty? Seems current and unthreatened (clothes, hands, teeth).
The Board pitches in to do a promotional piece for this beleaguered, plucky town. Here’s why the Griersonian documentary (EMB, GPO) can’t just be dismissed. Shilling for the powers is the tip of the iceberg; below the surface are all those regular people who depend on the powers for their support and sustenance. Since this is the case, soft propaganda might just help the whole community. Look at that nice deputy mayor, for instance. Yes she’s at a trade show, and she might be straining a bit. Michael Moore would chew her up and spit her out. But here, by resisting the urge to be sarcastic, the filmmakers give us a brave and decent person trying to do her best, for herself and for her community. What’s to mock? Same with the mining engineer/ex-mayor/realtor. Terrific folks. At the end, even knowing some of the economic history, we wouldn’t mind moving there ourselves. I like the quick and friendly portraits of some of the new arrivals and old residents.
Village of Idiots, 1999
A practical anthology of animation techniques, utilized as much to interrupt illusion and identification as to tell the story. That part is wonderfully done. Then the story ends up being equal to the wealth of visuals. The balance is terrific. This is a Chelm tale, a shaggy folk tale without apparent pretentions. An ideal folk tale that it is; however, it’s local/ethnic particularity that rises to universality. The inciting gag that leaves our protagonist so existentially confused is excellent. It’s very well developed, and in the development goes from comedy to philosophy. Providence, or meaninglessness? The foolish human subject is pretty well always going to be inadequate to that question. The film isn’t, though. The village is full of petulant, marginally unattractive knuckleheads. But they’re drawn tenderly, worthy of sympathy, even heirs of a kind of Jewish grace.
A practical anthology of animation techniques, utilized as much to interrupt illusion and identification as to tell the story. That part is wonderfully done. Then the story ends up being equal to the wealth of visuals. The balance is terrific. This is a Chelm tale, a shaggy folk tale without apparent pretentions. An ideal folk tale that it is; however, it’s local/ethnic particularity that rises to universality. The inciting gag that leaves our protagonist so existentially confused is excellent. It’s very well developed, and in the development goes from comedy to philosophy. Providence, or meaninglessness? The foolish human subject is pretty well always going to be inadequate to that question. The film isn’t, though. The village is full of petulant, marginally unattractive knuckleheads. But they’re drawn tenderly, worthy of sympathy, even heirs of a kind of Jewish grace.
Key thing: Hollywood is justly considered to be a repository of the world’s back stories and processed aspirations. It applies lots of moonshine, sometimes unto nonsense. The roots are effaced, the fingerprints filed down, the clean-up sometimes equivalent to emasculation or even evisceration. Still, how universal, how something-for-everyone. Then there’s the Board, which after all these years appears to have actually done Hollywood one or two better. With all of this chronology and geography, with all these accents, these vivid tiles in the mosaic, this repository is full of the real, unvarnished thing. It’s no longer just representing Canada to Canadians. It’s an immigrant nation, chronicled by this subsidized, commerce-protected institution, speaking to and for the entire world. Enormity…
Moral naturalism. Some things can’t be fixed, and what can you do? Upholding the law, and their dignity at the same time. He’s some character, and everyone else is too.
