Appelez-moi Salma sur ARTE partout en Europe
C’est tout à fait par hasard qu’on a découvert hier que Appelez-moi Salma a joué sur ARTE les 9 et 16 novembre dernier! On savait déjà que la vente du film à la chaine franco-allemande avait été officialisée, mais on ne connaissait pas encore les dates de diffusion.
Hélas! on l’a découvert un peu trop tard… mais n’empêche, on est très heureux de savoir que tous les Européens on pu voir le film à la télé! En plus, ARTE en a fait la diffusion sur Internet jusqu’au 21 novembre. Quelqu’un s’est même amusé à copier le film et à mettre les 15 premières minutes sur YouTube.
Vue d’en Haut: Trailer
Here it is!
L’avant-première du documentaire aura lieu à Dijon le 3 Novembre prochain au Festival international du film d’aventure à Dijon en France.
Pour plus d’info cliquez ce lien.
Et cliquez ici pour lire un article sur le film et le projet
MERCI!!
Call me Salma @ Vancouver Queer Film Fest
Hello Everybody!
Our documentary Call me Salma will be playing at the Vancouver Queer film Festival, August 13th @5pm. Go check it out if you haven’t already! Spread the word, spread the love!
CLICK HERE FOR ALL THE DETAILS
un (heureux) mélange
On entend souvent parler du « nightlife » de Beyrouth, de ses filles en minijupes et de son bord de mer spectaculaire. Ce dont on entend moins parler, c’est qu’à peine éloigné du centre-ville, les jeunes femmes à l’allure très européenne font place aux femmes plus conservatrices, souvent voilées.
Ni les unes ni les autres ne me choquent. Plutôt, j’ai de la difficulté à comprendre comment les Libanais vivent ensemble. Le traditionalisme côtoie les valeurs libérales tout comme les montagnes surplombent la mer. La cohabitation de ces valeurs est-elle possible, et peut-elle se faire dans la paix? Peut-on seulement, tout d’abord, tisser des liens entre les différences de valeurs et les violences qui ont secoué le Liban depuis les 30 dernières années?
Avec la guerre civile de 1975 à 1990, animée par les différentes factions religieuses, les tensions lancinantes avec la Syrie voisine, le meurtre du Président Rafik Hariri en 2005, la guerre entre le Hezbollah et Israël en 2006 et finalement la dissolution du gouvernement en 2011 suite à la démission de tous les députés du Hezbollah, il est impossible de dire que les différences de valeurs et de religions sont étrangères aux conflits qui secouent le pays.
Il y a quelques semaines, le Hezbollah (chiite), fort de ses appuis dans le sud du pays à majorité chiite, a fait interdire la vente d’alcool à Nabatiyeh, ville au sud de Beyrouth. Bien que cette interdiction aille à l’encontre de la constitution libanaise, les habitants semblent appuyer la décision. Un autre exemple de la faiblesse (pratiquement l’absence de, en ce moment) du gouvernement actuel.
Revenons à Beyrouth, où tous les soirs, les fêtards envahissent les rues du centre-ville sans pudeur et sans limites. Est-ce seulement une question de religion? Les différends religieux font partie du décor libanais depuis longtemps. Ils ont formé le paysage politique de Liban depuis des décennies : le système confessionnel, qui exige la répartition des pouvoirs politiques en fonction des proportions religieuses du pays (chiites, sunnites et chrétiennes), existe depuis 1943.
Alors que dans beaucoup de pays de la région, les populations descendent dans les rues pour demander un changement de régime en réaction à des régimes autoritaires en place depuis trop longtemps, les quelques manifestations qui ont eu lieu au Liban depuis la révolte tunisienne en janvier 2011 demandaient la fin du système confessionnel.
Les Libanais sont-ils mûrs pour un changement de régime? Je suis la dernière à pouvoir le dire, mais je constate néanmoins que les disparités entre classes, entre riches et pauvres et entre religions sont frappantes et sans aucun doute, dans mon esprit, à l’origine de bien des tensions.
Entrevue radio: Appelez-moi Salma
Plus tôt cette semaine nous avons fait une entrevue pour l’émission ‘Aujourd’hui le Monde’ à Radio Ville-Marie. Si vous avez manqué la diffusion la voici.
4 Korean stars out of 5!
Call me self-absorbed or simply a good procrastinator, but somedays i find myself googling the title of our documentary ‘Call me Salma‘.
Today i randomly came across this Korean blog that gave our doc 4 stars out of 5.
You can attempt to understand what they wrote by using google translator …But that might confuse you even more…
thanks,
Interview on CBC radio’s Masala Canada
Hello,
If you have a few minutes to spare check out the interview i did on CBC radio’s Masala Canada
Click here to listen to it. I get on roughly 39 minutes into the show.
thanks again,
Arctic Mosque opens it’s doors!
The little mosque in the arctic that’s been causing an international media buzz has finally opened its doors yesterday november 10th at 2pm.
Since the mosque’s arrival in Inuvik on September 23rd, many people lent a helping hand to help finish the final needed renovations. A contractor from Ontario, who had heard about the mosque on the news offered to help out, he later designed and built a 32 foot minaret.
Hussain Guisti, general manager of the Zubaidah Tallab foundation in Winnipeg, organized and raised funds to build and send the mosque to Inuvik. He arrived in Inuvik yesterday to inaugurate its opening.
We would like to show you images and video, but all we can say is that we’re in negotiations to broadcast a little piece on this amazingly uplifting story. So keep on reading our blog for the latest news!
It’s great to see this story get press, below are a few links from international media:
Nouvelle interface! New look!
L’automne est une saison de changements, et pour l’occasion notre site adopte une nouvelle allure! Un look un peu different, mais les mêmes contenus et à peu près la même navigation. Merci de nous suivre, à contre-courants, ou dans le sens du poil…
Fall is a season of change, and for this occasion our site has adopted a new look! A look that might be a bit different but where the content pretty much still navigates the way it used to. Thanks again for supporting us, even if some of you might have given us the hairy eyeball along the way…
Dernières photos en ligne
Toutes nos meilleures photos du Dempster et d’Inuvik enfin en ligne sur Picassa.
Mosque arrives in Inuvik!
picture courtesy of 'Saira Rahman'
If you overheard the small-talk in Inuvik these past weeks you probably heard something about the ‘little mosque in the tundra’, or ‘the little mosque in the arctic’. Everybody in Inuvik, us included, were eagerly anticipating the arrival of the mosque.
Rumours were circulating and everybody (this included the shipping company) seemed to have a different idea of when the mosque was to arrive. The mosque which was built in Winnipeg by the Zubaidah Tallab foundation was shipped on September 1st by truck to Hay River NWT and then by barge to Inuvik on the Mackenzie river to finally arrive, to the surprise of many in Inuvik, September 22nd at 5:30pm. The total distance travelled by the mosque was roughly 4000 kms.
After having called our taxi driver friends (who are almost all muslim) about the mosque’s immediate arrival, it wasn’t long before they showed up alongside their family and friends. Roughly 30 people greeted the mosque with waves, cameras, prayers and smiles.
The mosque is in town, but a lot of work still needs to be done before it’s opening. Tomorrow, it will be lifted and dropped on their newly purchased plot of land. Afterwards, a good month of interior touch ups will be needed in order to officially open its doors.
A lot more information to come, including video!
So stay tuned!
Nouvelles photos!
Elles ne sont pas encore toutes là, mais voici une bonne poignée de photos prises depuis notre départ (le site inclut aussi des photos de projets précédents)
http://picasaweb.google.com/aude.lerouxlevesque
They’re not all there, but you can now have a look at some of the pictures we took since we left for the North (some come from previous projects)
http://picasaweb.google.com/aude.lerouxlevesque
Petite mosquée dans le grand nord/ Little mosque in the great north
future site for the mosque in Inuvik/Terrain où la mosquée va être déposée
Cette petite histoire de mosquée commence à faire beaucoup de vagues dans les médias canadiens.
En effet, dans moins de 2 semaines va arriver à Inuvik une mosquée construite à Winnipeg et financée par la fondation musulmane Zubaidah Tallab. La communauté musulmane d’Inuvik compte environ 70 personnes et jusqu’à présent, ils se regroupaient pour prier dans une espèce de maison mobile trop petite et trop vieille.
Nous vous fournirons toutes les anecdotes reliées à cette histoire dans les semaines à venir, comme nous avons eu le feu vert d’Upside Télévision, la boîte qui nous a permis de venir jusqu’ici, pour rester plus longtemps et filmer cette histoire!
Nous en profitons aussi pour mieux connaître Inuvik et les différentes communautés… et pour voir arriver l’hiver à une vitesse folle. Les flaques d’eau gèlent déjà la nuit!
À suivre donc.
—-
The little story about the mosque is starting to make a lot of waves across Canada.
As a matter of fact, in less then 2 weeks the prefabricated mosque will arrive in Inuvik by barge. It was built in Winnipeg and financed by the Zubaidah Tallab foundation. The muslim community in Inuvik is approximately 70 strong and currently prays in a small run-down trailer.
Throughout the next weeks we will be posting interesting stories related to this event. This is thanks to Upside Télévision, the production company that sent us here in the first place, who just gave us the green light to stay here a little longer and shoot this story!
We’ll take advantage of this time to get to know Inuvik and it’s various communities a little better…. but also to watch the winter approach, which is coming a lot quicker then we imagined. Puddles are already freezing up over night!
So stayed tuned.
Mohammed Alley: cabby and keeper of the night
It’s easy to spot the taxi cabs in this arctic town of 3500 people. Their cars and mini-vans account for almost half of the city’s traffic and their massive cab numbers are on their back windshield like numbers on a hockey jersey.
But what’s even more interesting are the people driving the cabs. There are two taxi companies in this small town, both run and driven almost exclusively by Muslim men. And interestingly enough, these are the men who know everything and everybody in town. They keep people moving, they keep the town on schedule and to a certain point, they keep the city in line.
Take Mohammed Alley, (no, it’s not spelt Ali) taxi cab number 8 and manager of United Taxi cab co. Lebanese by origin, he has been driving cabs here for the last 15 years and in turn saw his town change and grow. Generous and open, he invited me to sit in the passenger seat during one his Saturday night grave yard shifts. I was in for a ride.
He picked me up at 10pm, I barely have a chance to say hi, because he’s constantly getting phone calls from people wanting him to pick them up. His clients call him directly rather then by dispatch. He’s seen these people grow up, go to school, get jobs, have babies and has developed a close relationship with the community that he says ‘wouldn’t be possible if he was in any other town.’
He’s more then just a driver, he’s an adviser and counsellor. A few days back a girl entered his car with a severely swollen ankle. Although she was reluctant to go see a doctor, Mohammed almost without her consent brought her immediately to the hospital. Saturday night, we picked her up from the emergency, cast on her foot all she said was ‘Sorry Mohammed, you were right, I’m sorry!’
It’s 2am and as the bar closes, northern lights are shining bright above the street that everybody crowds onto. Suddenly two police cars arrive, like wolves to a weak herd of caribou, they look for an easy catch. But here comes Mohammed, cutting through the street telling people to stay out of trouble and to get into his mini-van. Here he is once more saving the day.
When people drink here, he keeps them in check. He tells them they drank too much, tells them to stay away from certain people, reminds them to wake up in the morning for work, school or practice. I wondered how the night would have been if he wasn’t around.
I could keep on writing but to be short, I would just like conclude this blog by mentioning a moment which for me symbolizes what this town is all about. It happened when Mohammed dropped off his neighbour, a small quiet Inuvialuit women. She slowly walked out, waved to Mohammed and said ‘Salam, Shukran!’ that’s ‘See you and thanks’ in Arabic. The world, cultures and people are changing and who would have thought that one day Inuvialuits would speak a bit of Arabic. As much as we need to preserve our cultures, languages and heritage we also need to be proud of the links and bonds we have created between them.
Prochain Blogue/Next blog: La mosquée/the mosque!
Just givin’r on the Dempster
Our parents got worried when we told them we were going to drive the infamous Dempster Highway from Dawson to Inuvik. The Dempster is a 700 km gravel road (or mud depending on the weather) that snakes it’s way through mountains, tundra and boreal forests of Northern Canada. There are no cities or towns along this highway expect for a pit stop at the half way mark called Eagle Plains (Stay tuned for a post about that!)
A view from the Dempster Highway of Tombstone National Park (yes this is a real picture we took ourselves! and no color correction!)
We were told to bring a satellite phone, extra tires, wood and a Sherpa guide in case something went wrong but unfortunately all we could afford was a bag of chips and some carrots. So we set off, naively driving into nowhere slipping our way through the nicest scenery I’ve ever seen.
And it’s only after we completed the drive that I realized how remote the arctic was. The Dempster was only completed in 1979 and is the only all-weather road that connects a few arctic communities to the remainder of the world, or should I say North America. The majority of all other first nation communities that are at this latitude or higher are only accessible by boat or plane, making their access to the south extremely slow or extremely expensive.
So that’s when I wondered, why did the communities of the Mackenzie-Beaufort Delta luck out on getting a road linking them to Canada and not others?? Are they cooler? Did they win a draw? It’s not hard to find out when you dig deeper, and no pun intended on that one, that the Dempster is more then just a road linking friendly communities and cultures together.
The fact is that during the 50 and 60’s geologist, researchers and whole slew of smart people concluded that there were vast and abundant resources available underneath their ground. Whether it’s minerals, gas or oil the MacKenzie Delta has it. And eager to get a hold on it, the Canadian government quickly decided to link this area to the south. So that’s why they cut through crazy landscapes to create an abnormally long and lost highway.
Eagle Plains: only safe spot on the Dempster
So what did this highway bring to these communities? How did it and how will it change them? I guess that’s a big question to answer and I’ll try, in the blogs to come, to shed a bit of light on this extremely complex issue. But for now I got to go. We took over 300 pictures along the Dempster and I can’t believe they’re real. That’s why I want to have a look at them… for a 3rd time today.
see you..
‘Be careful, some people might be wanted here!’
‘Be careful, some people might be wanted here!’ That’s what Al the gold miner told us after we took out our camera in the local bar of ‘Dodge’… or as tourists and everybody else calls ‘Dawson City’.
We arrived in town late afternoon after a very beautiful 5 hour drive from Whitehorse. After having heard so much about this town, I had built many pre-conceived notions, thinking it would be sort of a small Mont-Tremblant/Disney World, where the early 20th century architecture and style was maintained for the drones of tourists coming to see what the gold rush might of been. It is, to a certain point, true but there is raw and authentic feeling bubbling from this town that I’m having trouble explaining.
After having supper in a century old diner with loads of cowboy hat wearing German tourists, we left trying look for the locals. We walked around and heard some yelling coming from a dark musky bar.
We hesitated to enter at first, with the majority the patrons being native and middle aged, we felt out of place and almost unwelcomed. But we bit the bullet and asked for a beer. After having sat down we began speaking to the people next to us, who later introduced us to Al.
Al is the person we wanted to meet. Originally from Newfoundland he moved to Dawson many years ago to find work as a meat cutter. He later decided to change hats and begin work as a gold miner, yes there are still gold miners here.
Working 12 hour days, 7 days a week for 5 months straight in the summer, Al works in a ‘dry’ mine with 3 other colleges, one being the multimillionaire Australian owner. The camp is an hour away from Dawson, where they set up and live there for the majority of the summer. I say ‘dry’ mine, because alcohol, as he said was not welcome into his work place.
Al had a lot to say, so much that I won’t have time to write it all up in this blog. But the one thing that struck me was that he said he was related to one the man who lead the way for the Dempster Highway construction. Married to a local first-nations women, her grand-father had a trap line starting from Fort McPherson ending near Dawson City (nearly 800km long). The RCMP, basically followed his route and constructed a gravel road along his trap line.
He also mentioned that there was a small first-nations community just south of Dawson, where the real history was, he said. He promised to bring us there and show us where the natives where forced to live when the gold rush began, note that many still live there today.
That said, after hearing his stories, I realized that this city still had the heart and soul that we read of in history books. Excited we decided to take pictures in the bar, but soon after, Al brought Aude in a corner and tell her that she should be cautious of who she takes pictures of. That’s when Al said, ‘Some people might be wanted here!’ I’m getting chills… these are the next people we’ll have to meet.
p.s. did I say there’s a guy that lives in a cave?
The bar that told us stories
‘Going to drive as far north as Canada will let me’
‘Going to drive as far north as Canada will let me’ is what i posted on my facebook wall yesterday only realizing this morning, as I woke up from my first night in Whitehorse, the real implications of what we have in store for us.
It seems unreal, for the last 4 months we’ve been reading, researching and writing about the North, and now we’re here and we have to drive through a large portion of it, but why?
As some of you may already know the production company behind our last documentary is helping us push our next. An idea that spawned after an American told us in one of the only coffee shops of Bangladesh ‘There’s this guy in Inuvik, who drives down to Vancouver to pick up fruit and then he sells them in the arctic…that should be you’re next story!!’
And it will be, in sorts. After digging deeper and making a few more calls, we have a vague idea of what our next documentary might be. You can read more about our proposal and story by visiting this page of our blog.
But in the meantime, keep on reading our blog because throughout the next 3 weeks, we’ll be driving from Whitehorse, Yukon all the way to Inuvik, NWT and back. We’ll be meeting people, visiting places in hopes of coming back with a better understanding of the North. Note that we’re not shooting our documentary, but rather here for research and development.
So here we are, which is the complete opposite of where we were last year. We’ve moved from a hot, crowded and inexpensive environment, to an empty, cold and expensive world. Can’t wait to get lost.
Stay tuned,
‘Appelez-moi Salma’ Sélection Officielle du FFM 2010/Official Selection of the WFF 2010
Our documentary ‘Appelez-moi Salma’ will have it’s north American premiere at the Montreal World Film Festival this summer.
Date, place and time to come soon!!!
Watch the trailer in HD by clicking here
Notre documentaire ‘Appelez-moi Salma’ jouera en primeur nord-américaine au Festival des Films du Monde de Montréal cet été.
Date, lieu et heure à venir bientôt!!!
Camera man of Call me Salma: Daniel Lanteigne’s amazing photo essay on the leather tanneries of Dhaka
Being the multitasker that he is, while in Bangladesh, Daniel Lanteigne: D.O.P/camerman for ‘Call me Salma’ put together a great photo essay on Dhaka’s leather tanneries.
must see.
Étant l’homme avec plusieurs talents, lors de son séjour au Bangladesh, Daniel Lanteigne: Directeur Photo/cameraman d’Appelez-moi Salma’ a réalisé un excellent photo reportage sur les tanneries de cuir à Dacca.
À voir.
http://ourworld.unu.edu/en/colours-of-water-bangladesh’s-leather-tanneries/
Part One – Dhaka Chronicles
Husain Amer, a friend from Montreal currently living in China, will be our guest writer for 4 little chronicles about Dhaka inspired by his visit in July.
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As the plane started to lower its altitude, I was able to look at Dhaka from the sky. It seemed as if the city was flowing on a river. The lights are low, close to the ground as there are no high rises, and some of them are flickering. It was as though I was watching fireflies sitting on a lake, while the moon reflected off the water in a dream like fashion.
I got picked up by Sam and Korvi who came along with Seb, giving us a ride back to Seb’s apartment where I will be crashing for the next 4 days. The city was dark during the ride but the geography is quite refreshing compared to Beijing. Palm trees and fresh air provided by all the greenery around and the humid wind blowing along. It was refreshing.
I didn’t want to sleep as I was too excited but did feel the need for some rest. The next morning, Aude, Seb and I headed out to “New Market”. On our way there, I got to see the city for the first time as it truly is, not quiet and sparsely populated like the night before but loud and packed with rickshaws and some cars and busses that don’t seem to ever stop, even when dropping off or picking up their customers.
I’ve taken the rickshaw rides 6 times today. I feel terrible about these short men peddling with all their strength, getting off the bike pulling when arriving at an uphill slop. The streets are simply packed with them and they are fashionably pimped up with glitter and silver ornaments to… I guess it adds some style to their ways.
We shopped in the markets for a while and during our visit, Seb and Aude’s tailor spotted them from across the mall and called them to invite us for tea. My first tea invite for this trip!! Hurray!! The tailor could speak some English, which is good compared to the rest of his competitors. I found it amusing when I asked him what his favorite meal was and he answered “rice and meat”. I guess I was expecting a name of a certain meal or something.
That night I decided to sleep on the living room floor. When it comes to fading to the dream world I need sound, noise, a constant stream of something, anything to get me to drift. Seb’s apartment is perfect for this. Their balcony overseas a lake and at night, the local Bangladeshis are all around it sipping tea and chatting. The sound of the rickshaw bells and honks coming from afar definitely got me to flow away nicely, in a trance which I’m sure I will miss once I leave.
