Une histoire du cinéma : Monique Fortier

From Festin des morts (Dansereau, 1965) to Naked Lunch (Cronenberg, 1991), Monique Mercure has played an astonishing range of roles, both large and small, with distinctive intensity and character. Launching her career at a time when the profession of film actress was hardly recognized in Quebec, she quietly established her powerful presence. Her friend Claude Jutra cast her in À tout prendre (1963), and Deux femmes en or (Fournier, 1970) would consolidate her popularity. Winning the Best Actress Award at Cannes for her extraordinary performance in J.A. Martin photographe (Beaudin, 1976), she went on to work with the biggest names in Quebec film--Jutra again, Labrecque, Poirier, Pool, Lepage, Aubert--crossing generational and linguistic divides. In La brunante (2007), she reunited with director Fernand Dansereau, reprising the role of Madeleine 40 years after she first played the character in Ça n'est pas le temps des romans.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

One of the overlooked giants of Canadian film and broadcasting, Pierre Juneau played a key role in NFB history and in ensuring the place of the francophones within the agency. He arrived in 1949, having been involved in film clubs through a Catholic youth group. By 1954, at the age of 32, he was Assistant Regional Supervisor and official French Advisor. He was instrumental in the decision to relocate NFB headquarters to Montreal in 1956, a move that played a vital role in the evolution of Quebec cinema. When a fully independent French program was established in 1964, Juneau was appointed its first director. In 1968, he was appointed President of the Bureau of Broadcast Governors, later renamed the CRTC, and in 1982 he became President of the CBC, Canada's public broadcaster. He is remembered as one of Canadian culture's great public servants.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

Schooled in the creative freedom of Direct Cinema, Jacques Leduc would excel in documentary-inflected drama like On est loin du soleil (1970), composed entirely of long shots, as well as sensitive vérité-style projects like Chroniques de la vie quotidienne (1977–1978), an imaginative series of seven films corresponding to the days of the week. Audacious and endlessly inventive, Leduc explored the terrain between fiction and documentary in films such as Albédo (1982) and Le dernier glacier (1984). His critically acclaimed feature Trois pommes à côté du sommeil (1988) paved the way for further work in fiction film. A gifted cinematographer, he has collaborated with directors like Tahani Rached, Jean Chabot, Paule Baillargeon and Yves Dion. In 1993, he co-founded Casa Obscura, a Montreal-based, artist-run space where he hosts regular film-related events.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

The NFB would be Jean-Claude Labrecque's school. Arriving in 1959, the dedicated young cinephile quickly grasped the essentials of cinematography, leaving a bold mark on early Quebec films like Le chat dans le sac (Groulx, 1964) and La vie heureuse de Léopold Z (Carle, 1965). A cinematographer of singular talent, Labrecque went on to direct his own films: 60 cycles (1965) and Jeux de la XXIe Olympiade (1977). Keenly tuned to the evolution of Quebec society, he would capture important cultural events on film in Nuits de la poésie (1970, 1980) and André Mathieu, musicien (1993), and document key historical moments like de Gaulle's "Vive le Québec libre!" and Bernard Landry's 2003 electoral campaign. Prolific and erudite, Labrecque produced a body of work that constitutes a richly detailed and deeply humane record of modern Quebec history.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

Art lover and cinephile Jacques Giraldeau established Quebec's first film club in 1948, the year of the Refus Global, an anti-establishment manifesto championed by his art-world peers. He got early film training at the NFB alongside comrade-in-arms Michel Brault and then cut loose for a few years to experiment with the 16mm Bolex, the new lightweight alternative to heavy 35mm cameras. He and Brault collaborated on Petites médisances (1953-1954), a series of 39 shorts that foreshadowed Direct Cinema. Returning to the NFB in 1960, he thrived in the creative atmosphere that soon gave birth to French Program. In 1963, Giraldeau co-founded the Cinémathèque québécoise. In a career spanning over 50 years, from La neige a neigé (1951) to L'ombre fragile des choses (2007), he has created an extraordinary body of work, bearing witness to the evolution of Quebec culture.

This short film is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

In the late '50s and early '60s, Jacques Godbout was part of a brilliant young gang who would transform the NFB's French Program. They came from diverse backgrounds and most had no previous film training. For his part, Godbout had just returned from Ethiopia, where he'd been teaching French, when he was hired in 1958. He would soon be collaborating with some of the most inventive artists of his generation: Hubert Aquin, Claude Jutra, Michel Brault, Fernand Dansereau, Gilles Carle and others. Active on many cultural fronts, Godbout launched the magazine Liberté, founded the Mouvement laïque de langue française, and served as the first president of the Union des écrivans du Québec. He would display a spirit of experimentation in both documentary and fiction, and his many credits include YUL 871, Kid Sentiment and Ixe-13, now considered a cult classic.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

Monique Fortier was one of the few women to make her way in the male world of the NFB in the 1950s. But make her way she did. Beginning as a secretary, she graduated to editing and in 1963 she became the first francophone woman to direct her own film, À l'heure de la décolonisation. Her NFB colleague Anne Claire Poirier would make her first film the same year. Fortier subsequently returned to editing, quietly labouring at the Steenbeck, shaping films that helped define Direct Cinema.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

Michèle Cournoyer came to the NFB with a background in the fine arts. During the 1970s, she made her own independent shorts, including a striking experimental collage films. Arriving at the NFB in the early 1990s, she would make inventive use of the rotoscope, a technique that allows animators to draw over live-action footage. She turned to a new medium with The Hat (1999), a work executed in ink. Rendered in minimalist black and white, the film addressed the difficult visual metaphors. The Hat won worldwide acclaim-and Cournoyer went on to tackle similarly challenging subjects with Accordion (2004) and the chilling Robes of War (2008). Mastering the art of film without words, she has left us speechless.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

Paule Baillargeon was among the members of the Grand Cirque Ordinaire, an adventurous theatre collective that burst onto the scene in 1969. Shifting to cinema, she had roles in Entre tu et vous (Groulx, 1969) and Le temps de l'avant (Poirier, 1975), in which her character confronts the issue of abortion. The role set the tone for her career: feminist by necessity, she would approach cinema as a form of rebellion. With La cuisine rouge (1979), she directed her first feature film, and with Vie d'Ange, she shared a writing credit with Pierre Harel. The '80s brought a string of strong roles--in films by Jutra, Pool, Rozema, Leduc--but she gravitated to directing with Sonia (1986) and Le sexe des étoiles (1993). Her most recent documentary is Trente tableaux (2011), an autobiographical work that draws upon her multiple talents.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

Having fallen under the spell of Fellini in the movie theatres of his native Abitibi, André Melançon wandered into the NFB at a time when anything could happen. He nabbed a role in Clément Perron's Taureau (1973), a gig that led to another offer--to direct children's films. With no directing experience, he forged ahead, drawing upon his natural ease with kids and previous experience as a school counsellor. 1978 would be a banner year: Melançon's documentary Les vrais perdans earned widespread praise and Comme les six doigts de la main was hailed as the year's best Quebec feature film. La guerre des tuques (1984) consolidated his stature in the growing genre of children's film. He went on to direct other features, along with TV series and theatrical productions, returning to the theme of childhood with the touching documentary Printemps fragiles (2005).

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.

Claude Pelletier witnessed the radical transformation of recording technology in the course of his career: from heavy, unwieldy gear that needed to be trucked to location to lightweight, portable Nagras. The new technology would spark an aesthetic revolution, liberating soundmen from old constraints and nurturing a new era of experimentation. Pelletier worked alongside Gilles Groulx and Arthur Lamothe, contributing to seminal Direct Cinema titles like Golden Gloves (1961) and Bûcherons de la Manouane (1962). He would collaborate on over 100 productions, including important Quebec films like De mère en fille (Poirier, 1968) and Où êtes-vous donc? (Groulx, 1969). Fascinated by genealogy, Pelletier found time to explore local parish archives during film shoots, compiling a list of close to 90,000 names linked to his family surname. Since they retired, he and his wife, Laura Gauthier, have become certified genealogists.

This interview is part of Making Movie History: A Portrait in 61 Parts.