BurlFilm

from Canada’s Top Ten film review (2008 films, viewed Feb 2009)
at Cinematheque
Dir. Luc Bourdon, who was there to open the film and give a short talk, and Q and A, afterwards.
Canada, 2008
With spot appearances by
Geneviève Bujold Bujold (very, very young – I wonder which film?), Igor Stravinsky, Oscar Peterson, and Paul Anka. Hmmm.
IMDB 8.0

Now it’s Canadian, it’s about lovely Montreal, and it’s a nice film. So one must be careful not to dislike it because it gets treated like something exceptional, given an IMDB 8.0/10 (!), makes the top ten, and all the blog reviews are ecsatatic. But really now – it’s found footage of Montreal from the NFB, pretty much all from the 50’s and 60’s, and it’s beautifully edited with really good sound. The sound is more exceptional when Bourdon explains that’s it is all original – just as it seemed. HHe/they added no footage, altered no colors, and only used sounds from existing Montreal footage as well. So for all of that, it’s great.

But let’s get down to brass tacks. It is by definition somewhat of a marginal film – a very good marginal film – but there is of course no plot to speak of, no acting, and it is a little boring to watch. It is an excellent boring movie! But stuill, let’s be honest and say it’s a bunch of old footage put together very skillfully. It’s not a giant work of art. But it’s good.

A givaway too, in the talk, was Boudon explaining that they purposefully used pre-political footage (not about the uprisings to free Quebec) and non-famous films – unknown films – to keep that particular quality that it has. But that does not quite gel with the Paul Anka, Peterson and especially the Stravinsky, which Bourdon says is actually from Toronto. (It’s Stravinsky conducting and speaking, in instrucvtive terms, to his orchestra). Now I agree that the Stravinsky part is great, and as Bourson says, ‘film is lies’… I like all that. But it does show a little how the film needed some spicing up. Found footage may be the darling of a quickly aging avant-garde set, but one can try over and over again to explain how it’s art and how fascinating it is, but it’s never going to be a Rembrandt. That’s why you have to explain it – it lacks the intrinsic narrative on it’s own.

Very likeable fellow, that Bourdon. And the editing was seemless. the sound was great. It all had an authentic charm. Good for a chilly night in February. Perfect sort of film to have a nice down-to-earth film-maker do a talk about afterwards – no posing about it’s ‘radical’ structure, or some such nonsense. And it seemed a lot like Montreal, here is our less civilized Toronto.

Oh – and the scenes with a so young Bujold were very nice to look at. one must admit more Montreal then Paul Anka. And it shows that a little bit of fame – dispite the claim to be aiming for anonymous films – can add to this sort of portrait. Because after all, she’s so lovely to look at, who would want to leave her out, famous or not? Certainly not, if she were not. Ah ha, the internet says the film was Le temps des amours, by Hubert Aquin.