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La maudite galette [Dirty Money] (Denys Arcand, 1972)
Jun
16
Berthe (Luce Guilbeault) points a rifle offscreen. Next to her a perpetual wall calendar from Desjardins with the date. It's June 16. DP: Alain Dostie.
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La maudite galette [Dirty Money] (Denys Arcand, 1972)
Jun
1
Oscar the Grouch Day
Rolland (René Caron) and Berthe (Luce Guilbeault). She's had it with these money troubles. DP: Alain Dostie.
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Reason Over Passion [La raison avant la passion] (Joyce Wieland, 1969)
May
19
Victoria Day
A winding road. nearos oevr isoasnp. DP: Joyce Wieland.
“sroena evor ssiapon”
– Pierre Trudeau
Joyce Wieland's heart and camera travel from the Canadian east coast all the way to the west. Cars drive by, suns set, suns rise, and Pierre Trudeau's motto rings on in 537 permutations.
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Una giornata particolare [A Special Day] (Ettore Scola, 1977)
Apr
19
National Hanging Out Day
Antonietta (Sophia Loren) and Gabriele (Marcelo Mastroianni) on the roof of their building, clean sheets like a fort around them. DP: Pasqualino De Santis.
– As they say, 'Tidiness is the virtue of a mediocre mind.'
– Then I'm a genius.
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The Adventure of Faustus Bidgood (Andy Jones + Michael Jones, 1976/1986)
Apr
17
Constitution Act, 1982
Faustus Bidgood, President. DP: Michael Jones.
“I'm dead as a doornail
Though very high strung
I can make loud noises
Though I have no lung”
Clerk Faustus Bidgood dreams of becoming the president of Newfoundland and lead the province to secede from Canada.
Newfoundland's first and only all-Newfoundland film. It took ten years to complete.
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Drylanders [Un autre pays] (Don Haldane, 1962)
Apr
14
Great Depression
A woman runs from one wooden house to the other, barely visible in the dust whirling up around her (via). DP: Reginald H. Morris.
A film set during the Great Depression (or set in Oklahoma) on the date John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath was published in 1939.
A man who returns from the Boer War decides to become a wheat farmer, but – like so many others in North America – falls victim to the Dust Bowl.
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Waiting for Fidel (Michael Rubbo, 1974)
Mar
8
International Women's Day
Time flies while waiting for Fidel, and before you know it, it's March 8.
Film du Jour posts does not list holidays on their respective date, unless a film or scene happens to take place on one.
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To Lavoisier, Who Died in the Reign of Terror (Michael Snow, 1991)
Mar
6
chemistry
Shot from below through a glass pane, a man pushes a sulphur-yellow substance around.
Chemistry: Dimitri Mendeleev presented his version of the periodic table on this date in 1869. He claimed to have had a dream in which he envisioned a table in which all the chemical elements were arranged according to their atomic weight (via).
“Antoine Lavoisier (1743-1794) was a French chemist who gave the first accurate scientific explanation of the mysteries of fire. He also provided the law of conservation of matter which states that matter can be neither created or destroyed.n His work and this film are situated between modern chemistry and alchemy. The film stages a drama of abstraction and theoretical realism. Everyday life seen photo-chemically and musically. The film is a materialist projected-image conversion of matter.”
– Michael Snow, via
The film stock was chemically altered, giving it an dreamlike quality.
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Gina [Stone Cold Revenge] (Denys Arcand, 1975)
Dec
11
1952
Gina (Céline Lomez) stripping in front of a silver tinsel curtain. The silhouette of a woman is visible in the foreground. DP: Alain Dostie.
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Gina [Stone Cold Revenge] (Denys Arcand, 1975)
Dec
5
فَاطِمَة بِنْت مُحَمَّد
Gina (Céline Lomez) waiting at an airport. DP: Alain Dostie.
