TANGENT

Canadian Film. I'm Canadian and I make films. There is a problem, however, with Canadian film (French Canadian film is exempt). Our funding bodies and educational institutions beat us over the head with Canadian themes and images, the immigrant experience, an old woman stares out from a Saskatchewan farmhouse porch, Hockey (I'm actually a big fan of the sport), Curling, Sasquatch, and the like...but worst of all is our lack of self-confidence in creating the universal. Europeans, Koreans, Russians, and (Independent) American filmmakers don't seem to suffer from this low self-confidence (actually everywhere else in the world, Thailand, Japan, Australia, nobody seems to suffer like English Speaking Canadians).

Some great films slip through the cracks. I'm not an apologist, and I've studied and enjoyed too many Canadian films to list here, but let's examine a few things with similar budgets:

Men with Brooms: Amelie
The Delicate Art of Parking: Incident at Loch Ness
Eve and the Firehorse: City of God
Rub & Tug: Brick

WE CAN MAKE GOOD FILMS THAT FEATURE THE UNIVERSAL or...we can make Mambo Italiano.

Content is everything. If we remove any and all responsiblity/obligation on the part of the artist to "insert" anything, including (but not limited to) Canadian locations, the recent Canadian immigrant experience, kids, sentimentality (Whale Rider style...not Canadian, but come on...yuck), incest, farming, snow, sasquatch, hockey, and goofy Corner Gas style humour. We can make good films.

Please say something to somebody about the infrastructure that perpetuates our move away from the Universal. Help guide us out of the provincial into the Universal. Help me help you...

Rant complete.


WE'VE MADE SOME GOOD ONES:
Atanarjuat (The Fast Runner)
Crash (1996)
C.R.A.Z.Y.
Cube
Dead Ringers
Le Déclin de l'empire américain (The Decline of the American Empire)
Exotica
Ginger Snaps
Goin' Down the Road
I've Heard the Mermaids Singing
Les Invasions barbares (The Barbarian Invasions)
Jésus de Montréal (Jesus of Montreal)
Last Night
Léolo
Meatballs
Mon oncle Antoine
New Waterford Girl
Porky's
Prom Night
Scanners
The Sweet Hereafter
Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould
Videodrome
waydowntown
Whale Music