The Montreal International Documentary Festival (RIDM) announced the first five titles for this year’s edition. RIDM hosts the Quebec homecoming for Matthew Rankin’s Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney, an irreverent docufantasia about Canada’s 18th prime minister and his ascent through the corridors of power thanks to his adeptness with bilingualism and backstabbing alike. The NFB doc has its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in September as part of the equally irreverent Midnight Madness program. Subscribe today to read more about Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney, which is the cover story of our upcoming issue.
Also coming to RIDM is Gabin, director Maxence Voiseux’s decade-spanning portrait of a French youth’s journey through boyhood and adolescence. The film observes the young as he follow’s his father’s butcher trade and weighs his possibility of carrying on the family practice. Reviewing the film at Cannes, POV’s Jason Gorber called the film a “remarkable accomplishment, one that shows a decade of transformation as effectively as few films before it.”
Meanwhile, Karl Lemieux’s Platforms brings an experimental work to RIDM with its unique perspective on the dismantling of decommissioned oil platforms. The 16mm work screens as the centrepiece of an installation presented at the artist-run OBORO in collaboration with the NFB.
The oil economy also fuels RIDM selection An Incomplete Calendar. Sanaz Sohrabi’s prize winner looks at the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, which was created in 1960 to help control global oil prices.
Rounding out the first wave of selections is the North American premiere of Virages (Summer Drift), Céline Carridroit and Aline Sute, an empowering story about a motorist charting her own path. Additional titles for this year’s RIDM will be announced on Oct. 28 ahead of the festival’s run from Nov. 19 to 29.
