After three chapters to his series of short films Imeldaa nice tribute to his paternal grandmother, filmmaker Martin Villeneuve has decided to extend his project and add five episodes to be broadcast on Unis TV and, he hopes, in festivals.
Posted yesterday at 9:00 a.m.
To Robert Lepage and Ginette Reno who had played in episodes 2 (The notary) and 3 (simone) will be added new actors and artisans of the cinema, namely Michel Barrette, Lynda Beaulieu, Antoine Bertrand, Marc-François Blondin, Anne-Marie Cadieux, Yves Jacques and… a certain Denis Villeneuve who will make an appearance in the eighth and final chapter .
“After completing the third installment, I didn’t think I would follow up on Imelda because filming without funding represents quite an investment,” says Martin Villeneuve (March and April) who has carried this project at arm’s length from the start.
Its distributor, Danny Lennon, was able to get help from Unis TV, which bought the next five episodes. These were shot between March and October 2021.
Robert Lepage, who played the son of Imelda, and therefore father of the Villeneuve brothers, in the second film, will be back in two other episodes. Mr. Lepage and his sister Lynda Beaulieu play Martin’s parents, Jean and Nicole.
“It’s no coincidence, because they acted as mentors, even spiritual parents, for me, says Martin Villeneuve. And for the anecdote, my own parents do their understudy on the film set. »
PHOTOS PROVIDED BY MARTIN VILLENEUVE
Jean and Nicole Villeneuve, parents of the filmmaker, are the doubles of Robert Lepage and Lynda Beaulieu who are their incarnation in the series Imelda.
According to the IMDB site, the titles of the upcoming episodes are Gift, Imperial 59, Pills, Pipo and Mary Vone.
It is, let us remember, Martin Villeneuve himself who embodies his grandmother in each of the films. Her overall project is a tender, nostalgic and humorous tribute to this woman who died at the age of 101.
“Ultimately, my goal is to bring together the eight short films to form a feature that would be released in theaters at the end of 2022 or the beginning of 2023,” says Martin Villeneuve. However, he still has to find a distributor.