Tuesday, January 14, 2025
CHRONICLES OF A DEATH FORETOLD
Cinémathèque québécoise
7:00 PM: | Super Happy Forever |
(8:45 PM): | Louis Riel, ou Le ciel touche la terre |
(10:15 PM): | Now He Is in the Truth |
The temporalities of death interweave elegantly in this candid program dedicated to the grieving process. Mourning a lost love, mourning oneself, mourning one’s ecosystem are all creative opportunities for characters who, when faced with the idea of transience, cling on to lyrical and epic forms of legacy. The quest for a lost piece of clothing is a chance to revive the memory of a lost spouse and the epistolary writing of a condemned man is a way to attain freedom, while a nighttime trek through the Cuban countryside reveals the ghosts of progress. The anticipation and the aftermath of passing overlap as part of a mnemonic exercise where personal tales intersect with national histories, where salutary light pierces the engulfing darkness, where the candour of faith transcends the mundanity of terrestrial existence, and where the overarching beauty of nature reminds us that death is but renewal and continuity.
- The screening will be followed by a conversation moderated by Ariel Esteban Cayer (Programming Director) with filmmakers Matias Meyer and Roberto Tarazona along with Renato Rodriguez Lefebvre, writer and staff member at Spirale magazine.
TRIPLE BILL
Super Happy Forever
Kohei Igarashi
94 minutes, Japan / France, 2024
Japanese, with English subtitles
Quebec Premiere
While visiting a resort hotel with his childhood friend Miyata, Sano tries to find a red cap forgotten five years earlier by his now deceased ex-wife. He takes the opportunity to return to the different places of their love in an arduous, but cathartic mourning process that rekindles the humanist tradition of Japanese cinema. Director Kohei Igarashi offers here an impeccable seaside resort melodrama, where Sato’s sweet bitterness acts as a salutary emotional honesty, while the keen sense of blocking and intercutting weaves together the dimensions of love and grief.
With Hiroki Sano, Yoshinori Miyata, Nairu Yamamoto, Hoang Nhu Quynh
Festivals: Giornate degli Autori 2024, San Sebastian 2024, Busan 2024
Louis Riel, ou Le ciel touche la terre
Matias Meyer
83 minutes, Quebec / Mexico, 2024
French & English
Canadian Premiere
Time is up for Metis leader Louis Riel after a trial for high treason leaves him imprisoned, awaiting execution. There, he begins the epistolary exchange that constitutes the primary focus of director Matias Meyer’s new film, who patiently observes and embodies the essential figure in Canadian history with an undeniable Bresonnian touch. The camera lingers on the act of writing while the psyche wanders beyond the confines of the cell into oneiric, natural landscapes that seem mustered by Riel’s exemplary piety, where the heavens touch the earth.
With Matias Meyer, Marc Antoun, Nicolas Lebrun, Julien Francoeur, Gaetano Frangella, Alina Meyer
Festivals: FICUNAM 2024
- Filmmaker in attendance
Now He Is in the Truth
Roberto Tarazona
11 minutes, Cuba, 2025
Spanish, with English subtitles
World Premiere
A camera wanders through the Cuban countryside, a liminal space in which ghostly voices speak of the lost taste of fried bullfrogs, while the blinding light of faith struggles to fully illuminate an evanescent peasantry. An echo postponed.
With Marco Ismael Ramírez Carrión, María Josefa Martínez Chávez “Guachi”, Miguel Martínez Chávez, Rolando Masso Martí
- Filmmaker in attendance