Making Movie History: Jacques Giraldeau

Art lover and cinephile Jacques Giraldeau established Quebec's first film club in 1948, the year of the Refus Global, an anti-establishment manifesto championed by his art-world peers. He got early film training at the NFB alongside comrade-in-arms Michel Brault and then cut loose for a few years to experiment with the 16mm Bolex, the new lightweight alternative to heavy 35mm cameras. He and Brault collaborated on Petites médisances (1953-1954), a series of 39 shorts that foreshadowed Direct Cinema. Returning to the NFB in 1960, he thrived in the creative atmosphere that soon gave birth to French Program. In 1963, Giraldeau co-founded the Cinémathèque québécoise. In a career spanning over 50 years, from La neige a neigé (1951) to L'ombre fragile des choses (2007), he has created an extraordinary body of work, bearing witness to the evolution of Quebec culture.