August 01, 2008

Tales of the Gimli Film Festival with Guy Maddin

Interlake Spectator, Gimli, MB

o “Tales of the Gimli Hospital”, a story spawned by his reading of the “Gimli Saga”, a community history published by the local women’s guild in the 1970s.
“While I have a Scottish name, I am IcelandMaddin looking for ideas to top ‘My Winnipeg’
By Roger Newman
Friday August 01, 2008

Guy Maddin chats with a fan.
ROGER NEWMAN

Guy Maddin is napping and reading at his Gimli cottage while he ponders the next step in his illustrious movie career
That is what he told his admirers last Saturday when he was interviewed by editor-critic Robert Enright at a public session of the Gimli Film Festival.
Maddin deserves a rest after travelling the world for the past few months to receive plaudits for his latest film “My Winnipeg” in such mega-cities as Toronto, Berlin, London and Sydney. Everywhere he has been barraged with questions about his quirky take on his home town which he sometimes describes as a documentary-fantasy.
“People ask me how much of it is true and I respond that all of it is emotionally true,” he told a full house at Lady of the Lake Theatre at the Waterfront Centre. “But really I suppose it is a third true, a third legends and a third my opinions, laments and wishful thinking.”
The director-writer is pleased with the success of the film which reveals the little known fact that Winnipeg has more sleep-walkers per capita than anywhere on the globe.
“It ended up in general release after starting out as a commission I accepted from hunger from the Documentary Channel,” he said. “This is more than I had hoped.”
While “My Winnipeg” has been acclaimed, Maddin still faces the question of what to do next. He said he is hoping for suggestions while he rests in Gimli, an opening that was immediately seized by a member of his Saturday audience.
“Now that you are established as a cult, are you interested in making a mainstream movie?” asked the questioner.

“Yes, I might if the script is right,” replied the film-maker.
“Are you looking for a property?” the questioner persisted.
“Is your next question ... will I look at your script?” Maddin shot back.
Light-hearted banter and self-deprecating humour have been trademarks of the 51-year-old director whose first feature “Tales of the Gimli Hospital” launched his career two decades ago. Since then, his surreal tales -- such as “The Saddest Music in the World”, “Twighlight of the Ice Nymphs” and “Careful” -- have made him a favourite in movie art houses stretching from San Francisco to New York’s Greenwich Village.
“When I started filming at age 30, I didn’t know anything about it,” he told the Gimli audience.” If I had known it was so much work, I wouldn’t have done it.”
Still, it was better than working as a bank administration manager where he spent his days “mostly crying in the vault”. That led him to “Tales of the Gimli Hospital”, a story spawned by his reading of the “Gimli Saga”, a community history published by the local women’s guild in the 1970s.
“While I have a Scottish name, I am Icelandic on my mother’s side of the family,” he said, noting there was a lot of Icelandic family influence through his grandmother, mother and aunt.
Maddin said that he couldn’t film nude scenes early in his career because his mother could see. But that changed later when “glaucoma led to nudity”.
He also confessed that he shot a deleted scene from “Gimli Hospital” 11 years after he made the movie. “I needed a deleted scene for the DVD,” he told an audience that was in laughing mode for much of the time.
As well, Maddin shot down the theory that his movies pay homage to early silent film-makers. “I don’t do homage, I steal from them,” he joked, adding that he discovered his grainy black and white technique by accidentally over-exposing some film.
Maddin’s “My Winnipeg” shared screen time at the Gimli festival with “No Network”, an award-winning Icelandic children’s movie that brought director-writer Ari Kristinsson to town.
Kristinsson is familiar with Toronto because his film -- about a teenager lost in the wilds -- won the Golden Sprocket Audience Prize at this year’s Toronto Children’s Film Festival. But he was surprised by what he saw last week on his first trip to Gimli.
“I had expected there would be a few houses on a flat land,” said Kristinsson whose film has won three awards and is being shown at eight European festivals. “But Gimli was a pleasant surprise. I enjoyed myself and would like to stay longer, but I have a commitment for a TV project in Iceland at the beginning of August.”
During the festival, Manitoba Education Minister Peter Bjornson announced that a film course will become part of the province’s approved Grade 12 history studies in September. The Gimli MLA and festival board member also said at a reception that Gimli is starting to create lots of excitement in the film world.
“It has been an amazing weekend,” he said. “We are on our way to becoming the Sundance of the North.”

Posted by Ray Pride at 01:53 PM | Comments (0)