Denys Arcand

  • Denys Arcand – Gina (1975)

    1971-1980CanadaCrimeDenys ArcandDrama

    Quote:
    Gina (Céline Lomez), a Montreal striptease dancer, is sent by her agency to small-town Louisville to give a show at a local hotel. Also arriving in Louisville that same day are Bob Sauvageau (Claude Blanchard), leader of a gang of snowmobilers known as “Les Pinguins,” and a director (Gabriel Arcand) and a small crew of filmmakers from the Office National du Cinéma who are making a film on the oppressive working conditions at the local textile factory (a reference to Arcand’s own NFB-banned documentary On est au coton). The friendly relationship that is established between Gina and the filmmakers upsets the snowmobilers, while the filmmakers, having persuaded the manager of the factory to allow them to film, are discovering a long history of alienation and submission among the workers.Read More »

  • Denys Arcand – Love & Human Remains (1993)

    Denys Arcand1991-2000ArthouseCanadaDrama

    Set in a dreary urban landscape of Edmonton, LOVE AND HUMAN REMAINS is a dark comedy about a group of twentysomethings looking for love and meaning in the ’90s. The film focuses on roommates David, a gay waiter who has has given up on his acting career, and Candy, a book reviewer who is also David’s ex-lover. David and Candy’s lives are entangled with those of David’s friends (a busboy, a psychic dominatrix, and a misogynistic civil-servant) and Candy’s dates (a male bartender and a lesbian schoolteacher). Meanwhile, a serial killer menaces the concrete and asphalt neighbourhood in which David and Candy live.Read More »

  • Denys Arcand – On est au coton AKA Cotton Mill, Treadmill (1976)

    1971-1980CanadaDenys ArcandDocumentaryPolitics

    Quote:
    One of the most controversial films in Canadian history, On est au coton is an examination of the exploitation and repression of textile workers in Quebec. This National Film Board production, more social inquiry than documentary, contrasts the lives of textile workers and their bosses and places their situation in an historical context by employing footage from old films about the industry. (The title is a pun which literally means “we are in cotton,” but it also connotes “we are fed up.”)Read More »

  • Denys Arcand – Le déclin de l’empire américain AKA The Decline of the American Empire (1986)

    1981-1990CanadaComedyDenys Arcand

    Quote:
    Sexual revelations emerge when a group of academics and their partners spend a weekend at a country retreat.

    Roger Ebert wrote:
    Here is a movie where everybody talks about nothing but sex, and the real subject is wit. The movie takes place during a little more than 24 hours in the lives of some friends, who either work in the history department of a Canadian university, or sleep with people who do. They meet for dinner, and as they prepare and eat the food and drink the wine, they talk and talk about sex. But if you listen carefully, you will find that their real subject is not sex, but verbal cleverness, and that their real passion comes in the area of intellectual competition.Read More »

  • Denys Arcand – On est au coton AKA Cotton Mill, Treadmill (1976)

    1971-1980CanadaDenys ArcandDocumentaryPolitics

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    From the Film Reference Library:
    One of the most controversial films in Canadian history, On est au coton is an examination of the exploitation and repression of textile workers in Quebec. This National Film Board production, more social inquiry than documentary, contrasts the lives of textile workers and their bosses and places their situation in an historical context by employing footage from old films about the industry. (The title is a pun which literally means “we are in cotton,” but it also connotes “we are fed up.”)Read More »

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