That Cold Day in The Park
The work of Canadian Bruce LaBruce has been acclaimed in the US and France, and have been shown at prestigious festivals, but the filmmaker remains relatively unknown in the Land of the Maple Leaf. This retrospective, the largest ever organized in Canada, will allow us to measure the audacity and exuberance of LaBruce's work while depicting all the variations of sexuality on screen, from gay eroticism to transgression. Here is a subversive, pleasurable and combative queer cinema which will leave no one indifferent.
A young, wealthy spinster invites a mute teenager into her apartment after finding him freezing in the park. Despite her efforts, their lack of communication only increases her sense of loneliness, as her possessiveness spirals into frightening new realms.
Robert Altman
Robert Altman was an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. He is considered an enduring figure from the New Hollywood era, comparable to directors such as Martin Scorsese, Sidney Lumet, David Lynch, and was nominated for five Academy Awards for Best Director for M.A.S.H. (1970), Nashville (1975), The Player (1992), Short Cuts (1993), and Gosford Park (2001). Altman's particular style of filmmaking covered many genres — referred to as Altmanesque — but usually with a subversive or anti-Hollywood twist which typically relied on satire and humor to express his personal views. Actors especially enjoyed working under his direction because he encouraged them to improvise. He preferred large ensemble casts for his films, and developed a multitrack recording technique which produced overlapping dialogue from multiple actors. This produced a more natural, more dynamic, and more complex experience for the viewer. He also used highly mobile camera work and zoom lenses to enhance the activity taking place on the screen. Critic Pauline Kael, writing about his directing style, said that Altman could "make film fireworks out of next to nothing." In 2006, Altman's body of work was recognized with an Academy Honorary Award. Three of his films have been selected for the United States National Film Registry. Altman is one of three filmmakers whose films have won the Golden Bear in Berlin, the Golden Lion in Venice, and the Palme d'or at Cannes — the other two being Henri-Georges Clouzot and Michelangelo Antonioni.
