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Portraits (37)
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Alden Nowlan: An IntroductionJon Pedersen 1984 28 minThis short documentary introduces us to Alden Nowlan, winner of Canada’s 1967 Governor General’s Award for poetry. His empathy for ordinary people was evident in his work as a poet, journalist, short-story writer, novelist and playwright. Nowlan’s writing is admired far beyond his native Maritimes, but he never forgot his roots, which he drew on for inspiration. This film, shot just before his death in 1983, records him reminiscing and reading from his work. -
The Author of These Words: Harold HorwoodWilliam D. MacGillivray 1982 29 minNewfoundland writer Harold Horwood has been called many things, but his own opinion of himself is undiminished. A former union organizer, politician in the Smallwood government, muckraking journalist, and founder of a counterculture "free school" in the 1960s, he is also an award-winning author whose regional base has not lessened his national stature.
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Antonine Maillet - The Possibilities Are EndlessGinette Pellerin 2009 52 minMade famous in 1971 by the success of La Sagouine and achieving international celebrity after winning the Prix Goncourt for Pélagie-la-Charrette in 1979, Antonine Maillet has been the mouthpiece of the Acadian people throughout the world for fifty years. This documentary takes us from Bouctouche to Montreal by way of Moncton to discover a great writer who has rarely spoken of herself with such candour and generosity. An unforgettable autobiographical document.
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Alias Will JamesJacques Godbout 1988 1 h 23 minThis feature-length documentary tells the incredible story of Ernest Dufault, a.k.a. Will James, a French-Canadian man who became one of the most legendary cowboys of the American West. For over 30 years, as he went from cattle rustler to ex-convict, he managed to keep his secret. And when he took up the pen, he became a Hollywood legend. Watch this compelling exploration of the powerful attraction the West still holds for young adventurers.
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The Black SquirrelFadel Saleh 1999 57 minThis feature film is a different portrait of Ottawa, as transfigured by the loving but provocative gaze of well-known Francophone writer Daniel Poliquin. In his novels, the national capital metamorphoses, like the dreaded rat that supposedly changed into the city's ubiquitous black squirrel in a bid to win our affection. Alternating reality and fiction, the film reveals another Ottawa through the dreams and desires of his novels' characters - all portrayed by Poliquin himself.
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Backyard Theatre1973 27 minBackyard Theatre is a documentary about playwright Michel Tremblay and director André Brassard’s flavourful brand of Quebec theatre, which captured the earthy wit and joual (slang) of Montreal's East End working-class neighbourhood. The film features impromptu improvisation by the cast of Les belles-soeurs and Demain matin, Montréal m'attend, two genre-defining plays.
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CordéliaJean Beaudin 1979 1 h 55 minGuilty of loving life! A dramatization of an actual court case in turn-of-the-century Québec. A lively, outgoing woman is accused of murdering her husband in collaboration with the hired hand. The townspeople do not appreciate her robust personality and the proceedings in court degenerate to a judgment of her character. Filled with stunning visual imagery, this feature film captures the spirit of the time and place. Particularly useful for those interested in history, law or women's issues. With English subtitles.
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The Cabinet of Doctor FerronJean-Daniel Lafond 2003 1 h 21 minThis feature-length documentary focuses on acclaimed novelist, playwright, essayist, political gadfly, and practicing doctor, Jacques Ferron. Using a combination of fiction and biography, the filmmaker takes viewers on a pilgrimage into the life and fictional world of the prolific author. The film reveals a complex and appealing man who was a Quebec nationalist, an ironic polemicist, and an anguished humanist devoted to social and political justice.
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Darts in the Dark: An Introduction to W.O. MitchellRobert Duncan 1980 18 minCanadian author, humorist and storyteller W.O. Mitchell talks about his career as a writer and performer. Known for his witty radio and television appearances, Mitchell shows a more serious side as he reveals his personal views on writing and on the meaning of life and death. Passages from Who Has Seen the Wind and the Jake and the Kid stories reflect the many facets of this self-proclaimed "folksy foothills philosopher" from the Prairies.
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David Fennario's Banana BootsAlec MacLeod 1998 48 minThis documentary invites you to join acclaimed playwright David Fennario for a performance of his funny and touching one-man play Banana Boots.
The film recounts Fennario’s memories of Montreal’s Verdun and Point Saint-Charles districts, follows him on a journey to Belfast for the Irish premiere of his hit play Balconville, and details his move from major theatrical performances to community theatre, where he sought to "create theatre that can be used to fight back." -
Dreams Come True: A Sheldon Cohen RetrospectiveSheldon Cohen 2005 15 minAuthor Roch Carrier hosts this documentary retrospective of the work of animation director Sheldon Cohen. Carrier offers anecdotes and insight about Cohen's movies, created over the past 30 years at the National Film Board of Canada. Lively animation sequences created by Greg Houston as well as Cohen's illustrations offer lively visual counterpoint. There is emphasis on the art of making animation from children's books as Cohen's films are based on the works of celebrated authors from across Canada including: Roch Carrier's The Sweater; Wilma Riley's Pies; Dayal Kaur Khalsa's Snow Cat (adapted by author Tim Wynne-Jones) and Khalsa's I Want a Dog. Excerpts of these films are included in the documentary.
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EnigmaticoDavid Mortin & Patricia Fogliato 1995 51 minInterweaving poetry, painting, photography, music and sculpture, this feature documentary is an innovative look at the lives and work of Canadian men and women artists of Italian origin. Broaching issues of identity and culture, the film explores the relationship between the immigrant experience and the creative process.
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F.R. Scott: Rhyme and ReasonDonald Winkler 1982 57 minThis feature documentary looks at the multi-faceted career of F.R. Scott (1899-1985), a Canadian poet, thinker and constitutional expert whose work and vision of social justice spanned and influenced an entire era. The film looks at Scott's role in the founding of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation Party in the 1930s, his years as a teacher of constitutional law, as a modernist poet, and as a champion of civil liberties. Highlights include Scott's courtroom challenges of the Duplessis regime in the 1950s, his controversial support of the War Measures Act during the 1970 October Crisis in Québec, and readings from his poetry.
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Finding FarleyLeanne Allison 2009 1 h 2 minIn this feature documentary, husband-and-wife team Karsten Heuer and Leanne Allison (Being Caribou), along with their 2-year-old son and dog, retrace the literary footsteps of Canadian writer Farley Mowat. They canoe east from Calgary towards the Prairies (the geography of Farley's Born Naked and Owls in the Family) and then traverse the same paths that Mowat took more than 60 years earlier in Never Cry Wolf and People of the Deer. Their epic 5,000 km journey—trekking, sailing, portaging and paddling—ends in the Maritimes, at Mowat's Nova Scotia summer home.
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Firewords: Louky Bersianik, Jovette Marchessault, Nicole BrossardDorothy Todd Henaut 1986 1 h 24 minThis feature documentary offers an intimate glimpse of three respected yet controversial Quebec writers. Now recognized at home and abroad, Louky Bersianik, Jovette Marchessault and Nicole Brossard have contributed greatly to the creation of a distinctive women’s literature. Confirming that fresh approaches to literature are still possible, they have helped to heighten awareness of the politics of language. Excerpts from their works vividly convey each woman’s style, concerns and rhythms. They examine personal and global issues from a feminist perspective: human relationships, work, justice, poverty, loneliness, women’s spirituality, and the future.
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Hugh MacLennan: Portrait of a WriterRobert Duncan 1982 57 minA portrait of and tribute to the author who, with the publication of Barometer Rising in 1941, set a precedent in Canadian literature by writing about Canadian topics and places and, in so doing, paved the way for a thriving national literary movement. Through the use of still photographs, archival footage and interviews, this documentary traces seven decades of MacLennan's public and private life--as a young boy in Nova Scotia, brought up in a strict Presbyterian family of Scottish descent, as a Rhodes scholar at Oxford, as a professor at McGill University, and as the author of seven novels and numerous essays. Also featured in the film are several readings from MacLennan's work.
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Harry in WonderlandBarbara Willis-Sweete 1990 28 minThis portrait of Canadian composer Harry Freedman shows his creative imagination at work and how he puts it into practical application in the composition and production of a major new work--Fragments of Alice--a musical adaptation of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland.
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In Love and Anger: Milton Acorn - PoetKent Martin 1984 52 minThis feature documentary profiles poet Milton Acorn, who left his home in Prince Edward Island in the late 1940s to earn his living as an itinerant carpenter, and wound up in Toronto as one of Canada's most highly regarded poets and one of its most outrageous literary figures. Dubbed "The People's Poet" by fellow poets, he won the Governor General's Literary Award in 1975. Burned out by personal crises, Acorn moved back to Charlottetown in 1981. This film, directed by a P.E.I. filmmaker, brings out Acorn's wit, love of nature, unorthodox political views, and sometimes infuriating personal contradictions.
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Jack Hodgins' IslandRobert Duncan 1981 56 minOne of Canada's most exciting new literary talents, West Coast author Jack Hodgins talks about his world and his work. Using passages from his short stories and novels, the film enters the world of logging camps and saloons, of people and events on Vancouver Island. At times serious, sometimes hilarious, other times introspective, it is a reflection of a storyteller who writes about what goes on around him.
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Jack Kerouac's Road - A Franco-American OdysseyHerménégilde Chiasson 1989 54 minPart documentary, part drama, this film presents the life and work of Jack Kerouac, an American writer with Québec roots who became one of the most important spokesmen for his generation. Intercut with archival footage, photographs and interviews, this film takes apart the heroic myth and even returns to the childhood of the author whose life and work contributed greatly to the cultural, sexual and social revolution of the 1960s.
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Listening for Something... Adrienne Rich and Dionne Brand in ConversationDionne Brand 1996 55 minThe nation, the country, where do we belong in it? In this film through conversation and poetry two poets meet for the telling and the listening. Adrienne Rich is a distinguished American feminist poet, and author of numerous books of prose, poetry, essays and speeches. Dionne Brand is a Trinidadian-Canadian femininst poet, writer and filmmaker. Incisive and inquisitive, the two women meet to discuss the world as they each see it. Claiming any subject, they talk about events as they see them, analytic, contemplative, honest and open ended. Topics include political issues, feminism, racism and lesbianism, among others. The viewer is invited into the exchange by the familiar images of two women talking intimately around a kitchen table, in corridors, or casually outdoors in the United States, Tobago and Canada. Shot in black and white and in colour, the conversation takes us over the territories of their poetry.
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Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard CohenDonald Brittain & Don Owen 1965 44 minThis informal black-and-white portrait of Leonard Cohen shows him at age 30 on a visit to his hometown of Montreal, where the poet, novelist and songwriter comes "to renew his neurotic affiliations." He reads his poetry to an enthusiastic crowd, strolls the streets of the city, relaxes in this three-dollar-a-night hotel room and even takes a bath.
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Margaret Atwood: Once in AugustMichael Rubbo 1984 57 minIn Margaret Atwood: Once in August, filmmaker Michael Rubbo attempts to discover what shapes the celebrated writer's fiction and what motivates her characters. As one of Canada's most distinguished poets and novelists, Atwood is also one of this country's most elusive literary figures.
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Mordecai Richler: The Writer and His Roots1983 57 minThis feature documentary explores Mordecai Richler's cultural and geographic roots as well as his personal reasons for writing. The film includes excerpts from several of his books and movies as well as readings by the author.
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Margaret Laurence, First Lady of ManawakaRobert Duncan 1978 52 minThis feature documentary is a portrait of one of Canada's most celebrated authors, Margaret Laurence. Born in a small Prairie town in Manitoba, Laurence remained haunted by the images of this small Presbyterian home town. This film traces her life from the early days and introduces us to her characters, whom we meet through readings from her work by Canadian actress Jayne Eastwood. The film blends fact with fiction to give its audience a strong impression of who this very private person really was.
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The Mystery of Mazo de la RocheMaya Gallus 2011 52 minThis feature documentary tells the mysterious story of Canadian author Mazo de la Roche, author of the Jalna novels. Using both dramatic and documentary techniques, the film explores this compelling woman’s uncommon family life and reveals the secrets behind the extraordinary partnership that allowed the Jalna saga to grow into the phenomenon it is today.
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Mr. Symbol ManBruce Moir & Bob Kingsbury 1974 49 min"Blissymbols" are giving children without speech a joyous new means of communication. This film tells the story of a remarkable man, Australian Charles K. Bliss, who invented a symbol language (pictographs) originally as a means of overcoming the barrier of differing languages, and then found that it has an even greater, more rewarding application when used with speech-handicapped children. This is witnessed in Toronto and Montréal, where the Blissymbols are being used.
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Poet: Irving Layton ObservedDonald Winkler 1986 52 minThis feature documentary is a portrait of the life and work of Canadian poet Irving Layton. Here, the artist who long masked himself in controversy, unexpectedly agrees to be unmasked in front of the camera. The 1981 Nobel nominee not only reads and explicates his own writings, but also speaks incisively about Canadian literature itself, defining it metaphorically as a "double hook" that combines "beauty and terror."
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A Song for QuebecDorothy Todd Henaut 1988 55 minProduced in 1988, this feature documentary presents a living history of Quebec's last 40 years as seen through the eyes of one couple. Pauline Julien and Gérald Godin, two Quebec artists, share their perspectives on the events that have marked Quebec's evolution. Julien, a singer, and Godin, a poet, express their love and passion for the province (and each other) while providing a unique take on the Quebec nationalist movement.
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Ten Million Books: An Introduction to Farley MowatAndy Thomson 1981 25 minFarley Mowat has sold more books than any other Canadian writer – 10 million copies in 22 languages in 50 countries. In this short film, Mowat recalls some of his experiences that have found their way into his work.
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Two Episodes from the Life of Hubert AquinJacques Godbout 1979 56 minThis feature documentary by Jacques Godbout retraces the life of Hubert Aquin, one of Quebec's most brilliant writers. The film revolves around 2 episodes in Aquin's life: the dramatic events leading up to the publication of his first novel, and the anguish of the months preceding his suicide. (Aquin ended his life in 1977.) An unusual montage technique intercuts excerpts from a feature film in which he was the lead actor with the recollections of people who knew him well.
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Tomson Highway: kipimâtisinaw tapâhpeyahkBarry Bilinsky 2022 5 minAn intimate glimpse into the life of Cree author, musician, playwright, and storyteller Tomson Highway, who is the 2022 recipient of the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement. Through his warmth and Cree humour Tomson invites us into his home in Gatineau, Quebec, where he shares stories about his parents, reasons for living, and the power of music as a language in and of itself.
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The Ungrateful Land: Roch Carrier Remembers Ste-JustineCynthia Scott 1972 27 minHere is the village of Ste-Justine as one gifted man, novelist and playwright Roch Carrier, remembers it. In this small corner of Québec there is space in the landscape and in the vast spread of forest, but the fringe of rocks around every field speaks of the backbreaking hardship that was the lot of Carrier's father and of his grandfather before him. This is a nostalgic view of rural Québec.
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Volcano: An Inquiry into the Life and Death of Malcolm LowryDonald Brittain & John Kramer 1976 1 h 39 minThis feature-length documentary focuses on Malcolm Lowry, author of one of the major novels of the 20th century, Under the Volcano. But while Lowry fought a winning battle with words, he lost his battle with alcohol. Shot on location in four countries, the film combines photographs, readings by Richard Burton from the novel and interviews with the people who loved and hated Lowry, to create a vivid portrait of the man.
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Wood Mountain PoemsHarvey Spak 1978 28 minIn this short documentary, Canadian poet Andrew Suknaski introduces us to Wood Mountain, the south central Saskatchewan village he calls home. In between musings on his poetry, which is tinged with nostalgia and the vast loneliness of the plains, the poet discusses the area’s multicultural background and Native heritage, as well as the customs and stories of these various ethnic groups.
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W.O. Mitchell: Novelist in HidingRobert Duncan 1980 57 minThis feature documentary turns the lens on Canadian playwright and novelist W.O. Mitchell. Throughout the film we see him in his many different roles – writer, teacher, family man, entertainer – as he talks candidly about himself, his work and the effect the Prairies have had on him, both personally and professionally.
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A Writer in the Nuclear Age: A Conversation with Margaret LaurenceTerre Nash 1985 9 minIn this short film, internationally acclaimed author Margaret Laurence passionately addresses several issues related to peace: the social responsibility of the writer; language usage and reality; jargon and "newspeak"; imagination, meaning and understanding; the nuclear threat; world leadership; the role of empathy in communication; the distinctions between fiction and didactic writing; and the power of "ordinary" people to influence events. The film's scope makes this an excellent discussion starter in diverse subject areas.
