An Imaginary Tale (1991)
Genre : Drama
Runtime : 1H 31M
Director : André Forcier
Synopsis
In this tragicomedy, Toni is the director of a staged rendition of Othello in Montreal. It is a pet project of his, financed by his loving mafia uncle. Unbeknownst to him, the audiences are also rounded up (and paid) by the same uncle. Some of them have seen every performance of this tragic play, and are understandably bored, so when the backstage romantic shenanigans of the actors result in absurd situations onstage, the audience is delighted. There are a huge number of romantic situations going on in this film at the same time. One of them involves Gaston a somewhat world-weary jazz musician, and Florence, a glamorous middle-aged woman who has been pining for him for years. Another involves to members of the musician's jazz trio. Yet another involves the play's Desdemona, Soledad, the girlfriend of the man playing Othello, who can't keep his hands off his (female) dresser.
Vincent Vivant agrees to Stephan the spy's proposal: he is to cross the border with a mysterious suitcase.
The film covers a hundred years in the lives of the Ricordi family, the Milan publishing house of the title, and the various composers and other historic personalities, whose careers intersected with the growth of the Ricordi house. It beautifully draws the parallel between the great music of the composers, the historic and social upheavals of their times, as well as the "smaller stories" of the successive generations of Ricordi.
Long-time friends Yan, Simon, Roxanne, Maxime and his sister Lily are in their early 20s, the age when anything is possible. They are just embarking on their careers. Then one fine summer day, Yan is involved in a fatal car accident. The young man is killed instantly and the rest of the gang is thrown into turmoil.
Jean-Marc Phaneuf, an unmarried electrical engineer, travels to Burundi as a volunteer for the NGO Radio du Monde. He finds a country ruined by grinding poverty, famine, war, disease and appalling social inequality. At the same time, he meets a joyful, brave people hungry for happiness, knowledge and human dignity. The camera that becomes his personal diary also helps Jean-Marc expose the shaky, ineffective workings of NGOs. His investigations turn up a few praiseworthy examples of international cooperation, but on the whole he finds himself drawn to a terrible, inescapable conclusion: humanitarian aid is a utopian mirage. After falling victim to an attack and losing whatever ideals he still had, Jean-Marc becomes entangled in an impossible relationship. He is ultimately forced to leave Africa in disgrace.
Young Chinese-American filmmaker Wei-ming travels from New York to his childhood home on Lamma Island to make a video documentary about the imminent opening of a Disneyland theme park in Hong Kong. While doing research for the project, he meets Larry, a dancer/choreographer.
A 30-year old man is forced out of his inert and absent-minded existence when it's complicated by the three women in his life.
A young man and his girlfriend visit his parents at their lake house for the weekend. While there, the couple meets an eccentric artist who comes between them.
The same day of their marriage, Jean's wife dies of a strange ailment in the middle of surgery. Afflicted by the loss, the young man abandons his medical studies and takes refuge in the memories of his time of courtship. At the same time that this happens, a wave of murders shakes the city with the same pattern of behavior: the victims are surgery students whose bodies have had both hands amputated.
Two social outcasts in 19th century Eastern Europe, Alexandre and Ulysse, become friends and settle down to live alone on the edge of a marsh that is reputedly haunted by demons, monsters and goblins. These two men have been outcasts all their lives. Alexandre was raised in a nomad family that traveled from town to town, being rejected by the people of his homeland. Due to his physical abnormalities, Ulysse has always been pushed aside ever since his childhood. When a strange murder is committed in a nearby village, the peasants turn their suspicions on Alexandre and Ulysse, because they are different. In the eyes of the villagers, they are demons that must be hunted, burned and killed.
A Montreal man imagines a mermaid in place of the writer whose picture appears on a novel.
Depuis une sérieuse dispute avec son frère Fred, qui lui servait de modèle, Viviane, photographe professionnelle, a mis en veilleuse ses ambitions artistiques. Or, le hasard lui fait rencontrer Guillaume, un jeune mécanicien dont la photogénie naturelle l'inspire. Réticent, ce dernier se laisse convaincre de poser pour Viviane qui, retrouvant son énergie créatrice, fait de lui le sujet d'un projet d'exposition. Bientôt, l'artiste constate que le jeune homme, qui vit toujours chez ses parents, porte les stigmates d'un douloureuse expérience familiale, qui le rend asocial et autodestructeur. Tout en cherchant à percer le mystère de Guillaume, Viviane tente un rapprochement avec son frère.
Five years after an economic catastrophe, the government and banks have collapsed. At a fortified village in rural Quebec, three individuals with very different pasts see their destinies unwillingly intertwined. Léon is part of a band of honest scavengers. Following a murderous attack, Léon has a falling out with the surviving members of his gang. Marianne, survivor of a brutal assault and the last living member of her family, is travelling to the village to find her aunt — and is soon to find that her attackers are there too. Old Bob has only one goal, to reconnect and make peace with his brother, since years estranged. During his journey, he encounters Josée, a teen with attitude who sees a father figure in him. After a bloody altercation at a bar, Bob has no choice but to tolerate Joe’s company.
In this Canadian made oddball mix of music and drama, an actress (Carole Laure) in a traveling musical revue is involved with the show's director until she meets and falls for an aging ecological activist. He too is drawn to her, and together they try to stop a factory from being built over an old-growth forest.
Nine oldtimers come upon a young woman stuck in a swamp.
A pilot who has not flown in years due to an accident has to deal with unexpected visitors and financial woes on the day he decides to return to the sky.
Alex has a deeply troubled mind. He also has a seriously dysfunctional - not to say incestuous - family. Why then, has he returned from his merchant seaman job to the rocky coasts of his home? Perhaps he couldn't cut manage to march in his father's footsteps in that job. His mother doesn't seem to mind, and lets him stay at her bed and breakfast hotel. His sister still seems to have the hots for him, just as she does for his (and her) old boyfriend Jean-Louis, who has just shown up. Even his mother seems to find him sexy. All these people appear eager to get their hands on his body, but he's too wrapped up in what's going on inside his head to notice.
Based on a story by Vietnam veteran Paul Staples, the film concerns six American Green Berets, held for 17 years in a Vietnamese POW camp. They are finally released in secret, during a delicate trade-talk session between Vietnam and the United States. Captain Tom Watkins, the ex-prisoners' CO, begins to suspect that government-man Adam Roth, who is in charge of the debriefing, may be pursuing a hidden agenda that will result in the early deaths of Watkins and the five men under his command.
In this French Canadian film, when the provincial government tries to move two young farmers from their land to make way for development, the two fight back, accidentally killing a policeman and becoming outlaws in the process.
