Wednesday 7 November

Mathieu Denis (Feature Filmmaker, Montreal)

Bush House Lecture Theatre 2, 4:30pm

Event co-hosted by KCL French, EIS and the Centre for Quebec and French Canadian Studies (IMLR University of London)

What is Political Filmmaking Today? A View from Quebec

For many in present-day Quebec, the simple fact of shooting a film in French, with Québécois characters acting in a Québécois story, is a political gesture in itself. It was not always thus. In the 1960s, when filmmakers like Gilles Groulx were making Le Chat dans le sac (1964) or Où êtes-vous donc? (1969), such minimal conditions of production would have been insufficient to constitute “political filmmaking”. What does this change tell us about the state of politics and culture in Quebec today? Or indeed elsewhere in the world?

 

Those Who Make Revolution Halfway Only Dig Their Own Graves (French: Ceux qui font les révolutions à moitié n'ont fait que se creuser un tombeau) is a 2016 Canadian drama film directed by Mathieu Denis and Simon Lavoie. It stars Charlotte Aubin, Laurent Bélanger, Emmanuelle Lussier-Martinezand Gabrielle Tremblay as four young people, veterans of the 2012 Quebec student protests, who have been disillusioned by the failure of their past activism to effect meaningful social change and now engage in small-scale public vandalism. The film competed in the Platform program at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival, where it won for Best Canadian Film. It was also nominated for three Canadian Screen Awards, including Best Motion Picture.