During the presentation of shitty daye at the Rendez-vous Québec Cinéma, Kevin T. Landry, emeritus kinoite, screenwriter, director and editor, to whom we owe And then, Amélie left (prize for the best international web series at the Copenhagen Web Fest 2019), was very moved when he told the spectators, among whom was the author of his days, that he was dedicating his first feature film to mothers of single-parent families.
“I drew a lot of inspiration from women I’ve met over the years — I’ve been dragging the film for about ten years — women who took a lot on their shoulders, who endured a lot of abuse. employers, exes, relatives, but who said absolutely nothing to protect their child. I always wondered what would push them over the edge, when they freaked out and what would happen when the gasket was going to jump,” says the proud winner of the Gilles-Carle Prize.
When everything explodes
freak out, the gasket or his tick, Kevin T. Landry knows well. Hadn’t he extolled its therapeutic virtues in six scenes in the short film Check markwhich won him the audience award at the We Like Em Short Film Festival 2021?
“There is something fun in there, it’s very liberating. I have the impression that in Quebec, we have not yet accepted it in our culture. The story of Check mark came to Kino Kabaret in 2019; I was talking to a French composer and he was complaining about the fact that Quebecers are used to being nice, so they pile up, pile up, pile up… and then it explodes in a somewhat off-key way. God knows that the character of Ève Ringuette is getting the wool eaten on her back, and not nearly! »
I drew a lot of inspiration from women I’ve met over the years — after all, I’ve been dragging the film for about ten years — women who took a lot on their shoulders, who endured a lot of abuse from employers, exes, relatives, but who said absolutely nothing to protect their child.
In fact, in shitty daythe Innu actress, discovered years ago Mesnak (2011) by Yves Sioui Durand, embodies Maude, a single mother to whom her son (Louka Amadéo Bélanger-Léos), her ex (Sylvio Arriola) and her boss (Lou Scamble) at Loto-Gold show it all colors. Things go from bad to worse when Maude has to interview the grand prize winner, Gaétan Dubois (Réal Bossé), living alone in the woods. Then will enter the scene the sisters of the sinister hermit, Catherine (Valérie Blais) and Emmanuelle (Isabelle Giroux), who would pass the ugly stepsisters of Cinderella for angels of sweetness.
“It was important for me to have an Innu character because I wanted someone who understood dark, twisted humor well. To anchor him in a real reality, I also wanted to uproot the character, and the North Shore is not next door. I knew that having an Innu character added a layer of complexity. »
winter in the forest
Having received funding for shitty day in 2021, Kevin T. Landry was forced to postpone filming the following year due to sanitary measures. What allowed him to shoot the choral drama First wave (2021) with three other directors, Max Dufaud, Rémi Fréchette and Reda Lahmouid, and to reconsider his decision to camp the action in the fall.
“I had first thought of autumn for the very violent red, but blood on the snow is hard to beat. We felt a bit stupid for not having chosen winter first. Of course it adds a lot of costs, but in the end, I wouldn’t have done it any other way,” he says of the 15-day sprint that filming in Varennes was.
Beyond the nordicity that he embraced with joy, Kevin T. Landry confides that since Woodpeckers (2021), a short film where Valérie Blais played a cruel mother, he reconnected with his wild nature.
“My family comes from the Matapédia Valley, I come from Shefford Township, near Granby, so I grew up in isolated places. When I arrived in Montreal, I somewhat denied them; I was discovering cultural life and I wanted my identity to be Montreal. In the last few years, I realized that Montreal stories didn’t interest me that much because it wasn’t my roots. There is something more inspiring in seeking out the disturbing and wild side of the forest to tell a story, to isolate the characters since loneliness is one of the themes that I like to tackle the most. »