30 City of Gold, Corral and Universe for Tom Daly's Unit the Cinema
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Vki 1: I a • ' f it . 41,44' • 4‘. -/ _ • 4 * Tat • al • designed to distance itself from the political heat of Ottawa, the NFB opened its new headquarters in suburban Montreal in 1956, building the largest sound studios and most complete production facilities outside of Hollywood. FILM The NFB hit its stride during the late 1950s and 1960s, producing important and stylistically revolutionary documentaries, shorts, animation and feature films Animator Norman McLaren led the way with the Oscar-winning Neighbours, and his proteges, Colin Low, Wolf Koenig, Roman BOARD Kroitor and others, combined to produce innovative and award-winning documentaries like City of Gold, Corral and Universe for Tom Daly's Unit B. The new headquarters provided a focal point for a new generation of talented quebecois filmmakers—Pierre Perrault, Michel Brault, Gilles Groulx, Bernard Gosselin, Claude Jutra, Denys OF Arcand—who created many of their early works , in the cinema verite style. Jutra's Mon oncle Antoine, JOHN GRIERSON ON THE RIGHT produced by the Board in 1971, is still considered the finest feature ever shot in this country. The creation of the National Film Board in 1939 is the central event in Expo 67 provided an opportunity for the Board to become involved the history of Canadian cinema. Set in multi-screen productions and The projection of ultra-wide films up by Mackenzie King's Liberal which led directly to the creation of the IMAX format by two NFB government in the months just prior alumni, Roman Kroitor and Graeme Ferguson. The 1970s saw the to the start of WWII, the Board flowering of two remarkable producers: Kathleen Shannon, who almost immediately became an was chosen to head the Board's first unit for women filmmakers, important tool in mobilizing the Studio D, and Derek Lamb who was brought back to head the nation for the war effort. Canada's animation department. These units excelled and brought more glory first Film Commissioner, John to the Board with films like Terre Nash's If You Love this Planet, Grierson, a self-styled propagandist Beverly Shaffer's I'll who had spearheaded the Find a Way,Weldon documentary movement in Britain, and Macaulay's directed his filmmaking team to Special Delivery and show Canada to Canadians while stirring them .into action to Eugene Fedorenko's support British efforts to end the Nazi threat in Europe. Grierson Every Child—Oscar established partnerships with Famous Players theatres in Canada winners all. and March of Time in the U.S., to distribute the Board's films, a strategy that paid immediate dividends when the Board won its first Many of the Board's of 10 Oscars for Stuart Legg's Churchill's Island in 1941. CORRAL most successful films of the past few The post-war period proved to be a years have been co-productions with the private sector, or in time of grave uncertainty as conjunction with CBC-TV—The Boys of St. Vincent, The Valour and Grierson left the Board to set up the the Horror, Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media. film unit for the United Nations and Recent cuts in staff and the closing of the Montreal lab have put was subsequently implicated in the the Board on notice that it cannot continue to rely on the level of Gouzenko spy scandal. Although the public support it has enjoyed in the past. Despite its central role in charges were unfounded, the the creation of a film culture in Canada, the NFB is having to rely scandal left the Board with a "pink" increasingly on creating challenging and distinctly Canadian work hue during the Cold War epoch and for the global television market in the "500-channel" universe. when it came time to create ■ Marc Glassman Canada's first TV network in 1952, the task was given to CBC Radio and not the NFB. In a move 30 SUMMER 18135 Above, Jean Pierre Lefebvre's Les flours sausages. Middle, Colin Low. Below, Carole Loire in La moil tun bacheren. at Expo 67; and, now in the alienated teen-age girls, was the short, Piwi; his debut feature, Un 1990s, he is working on 3D first Canadian feature to win the zoo, la nuit; and the surreal Leolo, IMAX films. A veteran of the Golden Lion Award at the which screened in competition at NFB, Kroitor was one the Venice Film Festival. Cannes in 1992. Lauzon's legend leading members of the direct is that of a troubled dropout who cinema movement, contributing transformed himself into an to the Candid Eye series and Robert Lantos artist able to express down and directing Lonely Boy with Wolf Producer and distributor. Born, dirty semi-autobiographical Koenig. A co-founder of IMAX, Budapest, Hungary, 1949. Lantos themes with elegant craftsman- Kroitor directed Tiger Child with became involved in film at ship. Despite his success, Lauzon Donald Brittain, the first film McGill University and formed his frequently expresses doubts shot in this revolutionary first company, Vivafilm, in 1972. about his profession, claiming process. He quickly moved into pro- that hunting and flying bush duction during the "tax shelter" planes are more satisfying to him years with Gilles Carle's L'ange et than moviemaking. Derek Lamb la femme, George Kaczender's In Producer and animator. Born, Praise of Older Women and Ted London, U.K., 1936. Lamb Kotcheff's Joshua Then and Now. developed his animation skills at In 1985, he formed Alliance Jean Pierre Lefebvre the NFB in the late 1950s, and Entertainment with Stephen Director and writer. Born, scored a major success with I Roth, Denis Heroux and John Montreal, 1941. While other Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed Kemeny. Since then Alliance has filmmakers of his generation a Fly in 1964. From 1966 become Canada's largest attempted to access the main- through 1971, he taught production/ distribution com- stream, Lefebvre, once a movie animation at Harvard, then pany with a succession of hit TV critic, has never turned away returned to the Board in 1976 as shows—Night Heat, E.N.G., Due from ultra-low-budget personal head of the Animation Unit. South. Lantos continues to cinema. Film historian Peter During his five years there, he produce features, including Morris has called him "the best produced two Oscar-winners, Bruce Beresford's Black Robe, and brightest of Canadian Special Delivery and Every Child, as Atom Egoyan's Exotica, Patricia cinema." Les fleurs sauvages well as such lauded shorts as The Rozema's When Night is Falling (which won the International Sweater and Afterlife. Lamb's and in 1996, David Cronen- Critics' Prize at Cannes in 1982), exceptional talents as a script berg's Crash. Jusqu'au coeur, Les dernieres editor and a teacher inspired fiancailles, Le vieux pays ou such animators as John Weldon, Rimbaud est mort, and many other Caroline Leaf, Ishu Patel and Carole Laure films (20 features frOm 1964-84) Eugene Fedorenko to produce Actor. Born, Shawinigan, approach human frailty and incertitude with an eccentric, mature, often challenging work Quebec, 1950. Following a while maintaining a focused troubled childhood, Laure self-referential mix of wit, narrative line. While at the embarked on a career in music. surreal contrast and reverie. Respected for his integrity, Board, he scripted and co- Her charismatic beauty attracted directed Why Me?, a black comic director Gilles Carle who cast her Lefebvre is also a skillful teacher of screen writing, directing and look at death and dying. in La tete de Normand St. Onge in 1975 and in the sensuous and the use of democratizing technology like Hi-8 video. In controversial L'ange et la femme in 1995, he won Quebec's Micheline Lanctot 1977. During the filming of the prestigious Prix Albert-Tessier, latter, the sultry actress became Actor and director. Born, an annual tribute to artists and romantically involved with Montreal, 1947. Lanctot made an intellectuals. indelible impression as the musician-filmmaker Lewis restless, questing heroine of Furey, who eventually directed Gilles Carle's masterpiece, La her in Night Magic, a fantasy film vraie nature de Bernadette. Soon written by Leonard Cohen. In Colin Low after, she created another pictures such as Bertrand Blier's Director and animator. Born, memorable character, Richard 1978 Oscar-winning Get Out Your Cardston, Alberta, 1926. Like his Dreyfuss's beguiling, long- Handkerchiefs, as well as in her mentor, Norman McLaren, Low suffering girlfriend in The singing career, Laure seems to be has worked in animation and Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz in permanently eroticized—dark, documentary with his eyes 1974. Following an unhappy sulky, lubricious—a post-Bardot clearly fixed on the experimental sojourn in L.A. with director Ted actress who has reinvented the in form and the socially relevant Kotcheff, Lanctot returned to screen goddess. in content. He directed Romance Quebec and built her present of Transportation in Canada, a key career as a moviemaker with a advance for the NFB in reputation for unsentimental, Jean-Claude Lauzon character-driven animation and unconventional, probing films. Director. Born, Montreal, 1953. Corral, a lyrical celebration of the Her directorial debut, L'homme If the wiry, intense Lauzon Canadian cowboy. Low also co- tout faire, was a critical success as released a movie tomorrow, it directed the multi-award winning was her 1993 release, Deux would set off an instant buzz. City of Gold, a film which made actrices. Sonatine, which probes a Amazingly, his reputation is historical photos of the Klondike suicidal bond between two based on only three films: a gold rush come alive. For Expo 67 Francis Mankiewicz Director. Born, Shanghai, China, 1944.