Part of Winter 1999
An evening dedicated to the lowly home movie. Often dismissed as monotonous or naive, home movies are the contrary. They are a mesmerizing map of the pyscho terrain of the family and a detailed catalogue of the endless styles and objects that make up 20th century culture.
7 pm The Catherine Films
This screening presents a remarkable collection of home movies rediscovered last year. The Catherine Films is six reels of vivid full colour 16mm film that follow Catherine, a girl born into a wealthy Toronto family, from her birth ca.1939 through to her early teens in the fifties. Impeccably shot, the movies reveal a mid-century upper-class life of fancy garden birthday parties, Muskoka cottages, rail trips to the Rockies and carefully decorated Christmas parlours. The Catherine Films show us an idyllic portrait of smiling family life among the wealthy, while fascinating clues to the interpersonal family relations and the social class roles of the day appear in the frame with surprising frequency. The colour footage of Toronto bedecked with Union Jacks for the 1939 Royal visit is not to be missed! This is your only chance to see these movies on film before they are permanently archived.
9 pm Show Your Own Home Movies
Alright, it’s time for you all to dig out those old rolls of Super 8 of your parent’s wedding, your first birthday or your grandparent’s Regular 8 of their trip to Jasper in the fifties! Bring them to our home movie clinic on Saturday afternoon from 2 to 5 pm at Cinecycle, where we’ll check and repair them for protection and, if you wish, help make a selection of the most interesting reels for this evening’s show. (Maximum of three 50 ft. rolls or 10 min. per person.) Even if don’t have any films to show, join us to see the wild, wonderful and truly odd things ordinary people have put on film! (All films for the 9 pm show must be dropped off @ Cinecycle between 2 and 5 pm or call us at 656-5577 prior to March 13th.)