Season 3
6 episodes
0 min. per episode
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A passionate filmmaker battles industry norms, uncovering untold stories that redefine Canadian cinema and inspire future generations.
Episodes
The debut feature from Canada's most celebrated filmmaker, David Cronenberg, Shivers provided the young director with a crash course in feature filmmaking and established many of the unsettling themes explored in his later work. In the film, medical professor Dr. Hobbes (Fred Doederlein) creates a genetically-engineered organism he plans to use to bring about a more sensually aware society, but his experiments turn deadly when the aphrodisiac-producing parasite gets out of control and spreads throughout a swinging Montreal apartment complex. Despite the film's success on both sides of the border, the critical backlash against the film was used to launch a cultural attack on Canada's film funding. Since then, Shivers has outlasted its detractors and won over a significant cult following for its effective, low-budget chills and stark social allegories. Producers Ivan Reitman and John Dunning, stars Sue Helen Petrie, Paul Frampton, and makeup effects artist Joe Blasco (Members of the films cast and crew) are on hand to talk about the debut feature of Canada's most prolific and shocking auteur.
A film that only could have been made in Canada, Atom Egoyan's haunting 1997 work The Sweet Hereafter established the filmmaker as a world-class talent. Filmed against a bleak and snowy B.C. landscape, the film stars Ian Holm as a troubled lawyer who visits a small Canadian town in the wake of a tragic school bus accident that has torn the community apart. He soon discovers that his planned class action suit hinges on the testimony of the sole, wheelchair-bound survivor, Nicole (Sarah Polley), who harbours her own deep secret. After the success of his breakout film, Exotica, Egoyan turned down an opportunity to work in Hollywood to remain in Canada and adapt Russell Banks' novel, which he acquired the rights to after a U.S. studio deemed it "not commercial enough." A fascinating journey of sorrow, guilt, and truth, Egoyan's elegant and heartbreaking drama met with popular and critical acclaim around the globe, garnering seven Genies, two Academy Award nominations, and the Grand Prize of the Jury at the 1997 Cannes festival. In this episode, executive producer Robert Lantos, Russell Banks, and Atom Egoyan talk about how unique and uncompromisingly Canadian films like The Sweet Hereafter can still make an impact on the world stage.
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On Screen!, is a documentary series that explores and celebrates the Canadian film industry's most important cultural milestones. Each one-hour program showcases a quintessentially Canadian feature film and the work of the people who made it; artists and auteurs who blazed new paths, opened doors and set new standards for a modern generation of story tellers yet to come. Along with clips from the films, each episode features interviews with members of the cast, crew, and nationally known critics, who reveal the behind-the-scenes trials of how each movie evolved from page to screen. Occasionally sad, sometimes hilarious, but always poignant, these are the stories that changed the face of Canadian film forever.