Godard film

Teagan Kaldor-Mair and William Bessai-Saul

Today was my last lecture for the term. The work handed in was very good. I'm almost always pleased with the diary film project I assign as the final in this course (experimental film), perhaps because I give them better guidance and perhaps because they have more control over the outcomes. Hard to say.This evening the Godard show opened at the Dunlop, followed by the screening curated by the Filmpool of Godard-inspired films. The event began with my project "All the Boys are Called William" staring William and Teagan. The program notes read:

When the scoundrel William sets his sights on the seemingly innocent Teagan, it seems that there is no power on earth which will dissuade him from hounding her for a date. However, when Teagan finally ceases to be the docile girl, William quickly realizes that he has bitten off more than he can chew. Armed with Freud and Mulvey, Teagan crushes William's ego, forcing him to leave the world of the 1950s. Intellectual indifference falters in the face of sympathy. Teagan befriends William and the two of them exit the cinematic frame and enter the contemporary world together.

Saul's adaptation faithful follows the visual approach of the 1959 Godard film, altering the script to make a nod to the attention to academic theory of Godard's later work. Through the casting of nine-year-olds in the film, including his son in the title role, Saul is asserting a domestic vision of cinema and the city of Regina, looking through their eyes and forcing us to face the dual nature of identification and ironic distance.