Pierre Perrault

Pierre Perrault

Birth : 1927-06-29, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Death : 1999-06-23

Profile

Pierre Perrault
Pierre Perrault

Movies

The Covenant
Art Direction
Four young men who belong to a supernatural legacy are forced to battle a fifth power long thought to have died out. Another great force they must contend with is the jealousy and suspicion that threatens to tear them apart.
Icewarrior
Director
Not far from the North Pole on Ellesmere Island, for one hundred and twenty days, a watchful camera stalks a beast of fleece and hoof, the ancient musk-ox, in anticipation of the great bull's duel for dominance. By the light of late summer, in the hush of expectation of mating behaviour, battle is joined between the furry combatants.
Cornouailles
Director
Ougmigmag or The Fickle Art of Documentary Filmmaking
Director
From the bottom of the Baie aux Feuilles, itself in the hollow of Ungava bay, at the summer solstice, a filmmaker is on the lookout. His camera scans the tundra, looking for a herd of muskox stubbornly refusing to be targeted - even by a documentary. A film which illustrates the thoughts of a humanist who is insatiably curious.
Dream Tracks
Himself
From the gardens of Versailles to the Île-aux-Coudres, this documentary feature tells the story of Pierre Perrault's exceptional cinematic adventure. While simultaneously painting a portrait of the poet-filmmaker, the film contains a critical analysis of his work. To allow us to reflect on cinema and on man even further, an image hunter is himself hunted down to reveal his certainties and questions.
The Great Obsession
Director
This documentary produced for TV follows a project consisting in remaking the journey of discoveries in the footsteps of Cartier's book. Sailors, some from Saint-Malo, others from the river, were entrusted with the care of navigation.
Sails Lowered and Safe Harbour
Director
Pierre Perrault takes Stéphane-Albert Boulais (from 'The Bright Beast', one of his films) to discover Saint-Malo and Jacques Cartier, in preparation for the 450th anniversary of the discovery of Canada (1534-1984). City tour with guide. Examination of Cartier's "Relations" and testimonies from the life of Falklands sailors, in an attempt to reconstruct his journey, his life, his time. Dialogue across the Atlantic between Saint-Malo and Île-aux-Coudres, the discoverer's mooring place. Who was Cartier? Who does it belong to? The discussion is open.
The Shimmering Beast
Director
A documentary film about a group of hunters who gather annually to hunt moose near Maniwaki, Quebec.
The Land without Trees or The Mouchouânipi
Director
It is a documentary joining 3 periods of filming in the Mouchouanipi, which is a faraway land in the North of eastern Canada.
People of Abitibi
Director
After 'A kingdom awaits you' and 'The return to the earth', the filmmaker Pierre Perrault concludes, with this documentary feature, his plea for the Abitibi region. The film gives the floor to Hauris Lalancette, farmer, colorful character, who has been fighting for almost half a century to save his kingdom in the Abitibi.
The Taste for Flour
Director
This documentary is about the Montagnais from Saint-Augustin et de La Romaine Indian reserve, in the region of the Côte-Nord in Quebec. Perrault approach those First Nations Citizens in order to discover that even if in our traditional occidental thinking and culture we consider ourselves superior to them, we still have a lot to learn from their traditions and ancestral way of living. Through a warm, human and respectful gaze, Perrault looks at the repercussions of European civilization's influence on Aboriginal culture, exploring the imagination and the codes of Native from Canada. The result, contradictory yet profound, was especially striking thanks to the sublime images captured by Gosselin within close relations with the Cinéma-Direct tradition in witch Perraut is one if not the greatest ambassador in the world.
C'était un Québécois en Bretagne, Madame!
Director
Feature-length documentary on Hauris Lalancette, a Quebecer from Abitibi, who travels and draws surprising parallels between two corners of the country that are considered destitute and left behind. It is also about the search for ancestors and the nostalgia for old jobs that were better, both on the human level and on the technical level.
Back to the Land
Director
Feature-length documentary as part of Pierre Perrault's Abitibian Cycle. The filmmaker questions the past and present of Abitibi and draws up, face to face, the promises of colonization in the 1930s and the great disappointment caused by the closing of the land in the 1970s. There are witnesses to the heroic era, including the cultivator Hauris Lalancette, as well as extracts from films by Father Maurice Proulx (1934-1940).
A Kingdom Awaits You
Director
Feature documentary on the agricultural Abitibi. This film is a real plea for the earth and for a more human kind of life in the face of a society that has become cold and insensitive.
Tickets s.v.p
Director
An incident from the early days of Québec's quiet revolution, tailor-made for the cartoonist. It is the story of a Montréal commuter train, a unilingual ticket collector and a bilingual passenger. The passenger appears on screen himself to describe his bid to have tickets requested in French as well as in English. What ensued, and how even the railway president became involved, is illustrated with wit and humor.
Acadia Acadia?!?
Director
In the late 1960s, with the triumph of bilingualism and biculturalism, New Brunswick's Université de Moncton became the setting for the awakening of Acadian nationalism after centuries of defeatism and resignation. Although 40% of the province's population spoke French, they had been unable to make their voices heard. The movement started with students-sit-ins, demonstrations against Parliament, run-ins with the police - and soon spread to a majority of Acadians. The film captures the behind-the-scenes action and the students' determination to bring about change. An invaluable document of the rebirth of a people.
Un pays sans bon sens!
Director
Essay-film on a crucial issue: the notion of belonging to a country. Lingered sentimentalism or deep psychological reality if one believes it is rooted in the heart of man? The action here takes place in the context of a nation that seeks: the French Canadians, and other people without a country: the Indians of Quebec, the Bretons of France. And here is the fundamental question posed: what are the "viable" peoples whose "maturity" allows them to "give" the autonomy and territory? And what is the environment that people can call "their country"?
The River Schooners
Director
The people of Ile-aux-Coudres talk of their fading tradition of constructing boats to ride the seas.
Beluga Days
Director
From the lower St. Lawrence, a picture of whale hunting that looks more like a round-up, with a corral, whale-boys and all. In 1534, when he stopped at the island he named l'Île-aux-Coudres, Jacques Cartier saw how the Indians captured the little white beluga whales by setting a fence of saplings into off-shore mud. In the film, the islanders show that the old method still works, thanks to the trusting 'sea-pigs,' the same old tide, and a little magic.
The Times That Are
Director
Four years after Pour la suite du monde (1963), director Pierre Perrault asks Alexis Tremblay if he'll agree to travel with his wife Marie to the country of their ancestors, France. In a montage parallel, we follow them in France and listen to them talking to their friends about it.
Of Whales, the Moon, and Men
Director of Photography
At the instigation of the filmmakers, the young men of the Ile-aux-Coudres in the middle of the St-Lawrence River try as a memorial to their ancestors to revive the fishing of the belugas interrupted in 1924.
Of Whales, the Moon, and Men
Writer
At the instigation of the filmmakers, the young men of the Ile-aux-Coudres in the middle of the St-Lawrence River try as a memorial to their ancestors to revive the fishing of the belugas interrupted in 1924.
Of Whales, the Moon, and Men
Director
At the instigation of the filmmakers, the young men of the Ile-aux-Coudres in the middle of the St-Lawrence River try as a memorial to their ancestors to revive the fishing of the belugas interrupted in 1924.
Attiuk
Script
The people of Unamenshipu (La Romaine), an Innu community in the Côte-Nord region of Quebec, are seen but not heard in this richly detailed documentary about the rituals surrounding an Innu caribou hunt. Released in 1960, it’s one of 13 titles in Au Pays de Neufve-France, a series of poetic documentary shorts about life along the St. Lawrence River. Off-camera narration, written by Pierre Perrault, frames the Innu participants through an ethnographic lens. Co-directed by René Bonnière and Perrault, a founding figure of Quebec’s direct cinema movement.
Attiuk
Producer
The people of Unamenshipu (La Romaine), an Innu community in the Côte-Nord region of Quebec, are seen but not heard in this richly detailed documentary about the rituals surrounding an Innu caribou hunt. Released in 1960, it’s one of 13 titles in Au Pays de Neufve-France, a series of poetic documentary shorts about life along the St. Lawrence River. Off-camera narration, written by Pierre Perrault, frames the Innu participants through an ethnographic lens. Co-directed by René Bonnière and Perrault, a founding figure of Quebec’s direct cinema movement.
Attiuk
Director
The people of Unamenshipu (La Romaine), an Innu community in the Côte-Nord region of Quebec, are seen but not heard in this richly detailed documentary about the rituals surrounding an Innu caribou hunt. Released in 1960, it’s one of 13 titles in Au Pays de Neufve-France, a series of poetic documentary shorts about life along the St. Lawrence River. Off-camera narration, written by Pierre Perrault, frames the Innu participants through an ethnographic lens. Co-directed by René Bonnière and Perrault, a founding figure of Quebec’s direct cinema movement.
The Land of Jacques Cartier
Writer
Did Cartier dream of making a country from this land of a million birds? In his records of his exploration he certainly marvelled at seeing the great auks that have since disappeared from Isle aux Ouaiseaulx, the razor-bills and gannets that are gone from Blanc-Sablon, and the kittiwakes from Anticosti, all the winged creatures of all the islands which he described as being "as full of birds as a meadow is of grass". And that's not even counting the countless snow geese.
Winter Sealing at La Tabatière
Director
Life in a north-shore village where everybody's name is Robertson and where everyone hunts for seal. In December the seals come in great herds from Greenland, and for two weeks in this peaceful village it's all hands to the lines.
The Land of Jacques Cartier
Director
Did Cartier dream of making a country from this land of a million birds? In his records of his exploration he certainly marvelled at seeing the great auks that have since disappeared from Isle aux Ouaiseaulx, the razor-bills and gannets that are gone from Blanc-Sablon, and the kittiwakes from Anticosti, all the winged creatures of all the islands which he described as being "as full of birds as a meadow is of grass". And that's not even counting the countless snow geese.
Whalehead
Director
Shows Tête-à-la-Baleine, Québec, a village with a double life--one on the North Shore mainland during winter months, the other on mossy islands of the Gulf to which the entire population moves for summer fishing.
La Pitoune
Director
Craftsmen of Canada
Writer
Man's need to create beauty, to interpret the world around him in image and color, has found expression in many forms, from the days of primitive culture to the present. This film surveys the work of Canadian craftsmen in many fields, showing how the changing Canadian scene has been their constant inspiration and how business enterprise today is increasingly using the skills of the artisan to enhance the decor of building interiors.
Les diamants du Canada
Director
En r'venant de St-Hilarion
Director
L'Anse-aux-Basques
Director
La Rivière du Gouffre
Director
Tête-à-la-Baleine
Director
Le Jean Richard
Director
Les goélettes
Director
La traverse d'hiver à l'île-aux-Coudres
Director