The Memories of Angels

Sep 5, 2008

1h 21m

★ 8.0

Overview

Documentary, poetry and essay rolled into one, this compilation of stockshots and clips sourced from NFB productions of the '50s and '60s offers a singular lesson in Montreal history - its famous figures, symbolic places, and ordinary citizens. Without commentary, the film moves from the red light district to Jean Drapeau, the Jacques-Cartier market, department stores downtown, textile factories, and the construction of Place Ville-Marie. We meet Geneviève Bujold, Oscar Peterson, Monique Mercure, and Igor Stravinsky. We hear Raymond Lévesque, Jean Drapeau, and René Lecavalier.

Genres

Documentary

Production Companies

ONF | NFB

The Memories of Angels Trailers

No Trailers found.

Cast

Self (archive footage)

Paul Anka

Self (archive footage)

Geneviève Bujold

Self (archive footage)

Oscar Peterson

Self (archive footage)

Igor Stravinsky

Caroline

Carol-Lynne Traynor

This pioneering documentary film depicts the lives of the indigenous Inuit people of Canada's northern Quebec region. Although the production contains some fictional elements, it vividly shows how its resourceful subjects survive in such a harsh climate, revealing how they construct their igloo homes and find food by hunting and fishing. The film also captures the beautiful, if unforgiving, frozen landscape of the Great White North, far removed from conventional civilization.

8.0

Montréal la nuit

Jul 11, 2023

No overview available.

7.7

The Devil and Daniel Johnston

Mar 31, 2006

This 2005 documentary film chronicles the life of Daniel Johnston, a manic-depressive genius singer/songwriter/artist, from childhood up to the present, with an emphasis on his mental illness and how it manifested itself in demonic self-obsession.

5.5

Urgent ou à quoi bon exécuter des projets puisque le projet est en lui-même une jouissance suffisante

Aug 1, 1977

Gérard Courant applies the Lettrist editing techniques of Isidore Isou to footage of late 70's pop culture. Courant posits that his cinema offers an aggressive détournement to the French mainstream, reifying a Duchampian view of film: "I believe in impossible movies and works without meaning... I believe in the anti-movie. I believe in the non-movie. I believe in Urgent... My first full length movie that is so anti-everything that I sometimes wonder if it really does exist!"

No Image Available

0.0

Vezdekhod

Jun 22, 2012

Image by Carlos Casas. Double screen projection with live soundtrack. Images and sound captured on location. Somewhere in the tundra, Chukotka Region, Northeastern Siberia, Russian Federation. Music by Prurient. Published by Von Archives. N 66° 37’ 916, W 172° 40’ 353, Sept 2006.

8.0

Jack Kerouac's Road: A Franco-American Odyssey

Mar 1, 1987

Part documentary, part drama, this film presents the life and work of Jack Kerouac, an American writer with Québec roots who became one of the most important spokesmen for his generation. Intercut with archival footage, photographs and interviews, this film takes apart the heroic myth and even returns to the childhood of the author whose life and work contributed greatly to the cultural, sexual and social revolution of the 1960s.

7.4

American: The Bill Hicks Story

Apr 10, 2010

American: The Bill Hicks Story is a biographical documentary film on the life of comedian Bill Hicks.

4.2

Naked Rose

Apr 24, 2013

Among the millions of victims of the Nazi madness during the Second World War, Pierre Seel was charged with homosexuality and imprisoned in the Schirmeck concentration camp. He survived this terrifying experience of torture and humiliation, and after the war he married, had three children, and tried to live a normal life. In 1982, however, he came to terms with his past and his true nature and decided to publicly reveal what he and thousands of other homosexuals branded with the Pink Triangle had undergone during the Nazi regime. Il Rosa Nudo (Naked Rose), inspired by the true story of Pierre Seel, depicts in a theatrical and evocative way the Homocaust, focusing on the scientific theories of SS Physician Carl Peter Værnet for the treatment of homosexuality, which paved the way for the Nazi persecution of gay men.

0.0

Just Watch Me: Trudeau and the 70's Generation

Sep 20, 1999

Canadian director Catherine Annau's debut work is a documentary about the legacy of Pierre Trudeau, the long-running Prime Minister of Canada, who governed during the 1970s. The film focuses particularly on Trudeau's goal of creating a thoroughly bilingual nation. Annau interviews eight people in their mid-30s on both sides of the linguistic divide. One tells of her life growing up in a community of hard-core Quebec separatists, while another, a yuppie from Toronto, recalls believing as a child that people in Montreal got drunk and had sex all day long. Annau has all of the interviewees discuss how Trudeau's policies affected their lives and their perceptions of the other side, in this issue that strikes to the heart of Canada's national identity.

7.8

Les Mathématiques du Roi Heenok

Jan 21, 2008

No overview available.

6.0

Film Is. 7-12

Oct 10, 2002

The second half of Gustav Deutsch's experimental Film ist. series, constructing new narratives and moods out of existing footage, mostly from early silent era films.

0.0

Evicted City

Sep 15, 2023

Montreal — one of the few remaining affordable cities in North America — is now in the midst of an unprecedented housing crisis. An intimate portrait of socio-political resistance, this multilayered film explores the human impact of real estate speculation on the cities of tomorrow.

0.0

Les dames du 9e

Sep 14, 1998

Ladies of good families and social standing come to have their afternoon tea with their daughters who will someday follow in the same tradition. A charming portrait of a time that is slowly disappearing.

6.4

Chaplin Today: The Great Dictator

Dec 30, 2003

A short documentary about the making of "The Great Dictator."

0.0

It Will Always End in the End

Mar 22, 2025

Gabriel Drolet-Maguire, a designer living in Montreal, takes us into their artistic world to discuss their HIV diagnosis. This is a timely and hopeful look at past and present day HIV/AIDS activism in Quebec.

No Image Available

4.0

The House That Eye Live In

Aug 12, 2014

Migrating by sea from Holland as an eight-year-old, Dirk de Bruyn went on to be a doyen of Australian experimental cinema. But as this intimate film reveals, his work is suffused with the trauma of migration, and the struggle to recognise himself as a ‘new Australian'. In conversation with documentarian Steven McIntyre, Dirk guides us through more than 40 years of his filmmaking: the early years exploring technique and technology, a subsequent phase of unflinching self-examination brought on by upheaval and overseas travel, and more recent projects where he attempts a fusion of personal, cultural, and historical identity. What emerges is an inspiring, rugged, and at times poignant portrait of an artist committed to self-expression and self-discovery through the medium of film.

0.0

Francoeur : On achève bien les rockers

Dec 8, 2023

Drawing inspiration from their unique relationship, Virginie Francoeur explores the journey, work, and imagination of her father Lucien, an atypical creator, an uncategorizable provocateur, and offbeat Dad, worn out by a life of excess.

5.5

Daughter of the Crater

Sep 13, 2019

A woman with a deep love of the land, Yolande Simard Perrault sees her life as having been shaped by a planetary upheaval in Charlevoix, Quebec, millions of years ago. As enduring as the Canadian Shield, she’s a woman of strength and spirit, a child of the crater left by the meteor’s impact. This documentary portrays a determined woman who’s the reflection of a land created on an immense scale. She was the creative and life partner of filmmaker Pierre Perrault, who gave up everything to be by her side. The film charts the influence of her unquenchable dreams and her contribution to the building of a people’s collective memory. In a stream of images and words, Simard Perrault recounts the splendours of the landscape and the people who shaped it. Generous and boundless, she embarks on a quest for identity that nurtures and perpetuates the oeuvre of the man who breathed new life into Quebec cinema.

9.0

Il parle avec les loups

Jun 1, 2001

No overview available.

0.0

Le fantôme de Mirabel

Mar 27, 2011

No overview available.

The Memories of Angels

Overview

Genres

Production Companies

The Memories of Angels Trailers