Director
Jean-Claude Lord
Writer
Jean-Claude Lord, Michel Capistran, Roch Poisson, Jean Salvy, Lise Thouin
Cast
Anne-Marie Provencher, Réjean Guénette, Gilles Pelletier, Alexandra Stewart, Claude Michaud
contact
Éléphant, mémoire du cinéma québécois
A political and social thriller, BINGO tells the story of a naive, deluded, photography-loving college student who, outraged by a labour dispute in which his father is embroiled, is treacherously drawn into a terrorist plot to kidnap five businessmen while his grandmother hosts a big bingo party. Like many of Jean-Claude Lord's local productions, the youth and the common people are victims of widespread, systemic corruption, both in the political sphere and in the insidious backroom dealings of the business and communications world. The script is built around several trios—generational, political, and ideological—but also contrasts a strategic game (chess) with a game of chance (bingo) and a theatrical game (pretend play).
Sadly, Lord passed away in January of 2022. He was the first recipient of the Denis-Héroux award. This year, we are presenting the award to Pierre David, producer of Lord's Quebec films. BINGO is the first part of a trilogy about the exploitation of the masses. In the words of the filmmaker: "How do people use social disorder and the ignorance of the people to get elected, to protect themselves or to increase their power?” This work denounced the actions of the right to discredit the left. To do so, it drew on the protest movement of the late 1960s, May 1968, the rise of the FLQ in Quebec, and the events of October 1970. Lord's film was one of the first productions inspired by this crisis, being released a few months before Michel Brault's LES ORDRES and Robin Spry's ACTION: THE OCTOBER CRISIS OF 1970. A film of its time, it would attract over 500,000 spectators upon its release, becoming one of the most popular Quebec films of its time. All three films in the “Marionettes” trilogy were produced by Pierre David, to whom we will present the Denis-Héroux award before the screening. – Translation: Rupert Bottenberg
Showings
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