THIS LAND IS THEIR LAND

49 min, documentary, Québec, Canada, 1995
Directed byBernard Émond
Produced byClaude Cartier
LanguageFrench

Film details

Synopsis

To explore the theme of tolerance, the director chose, as an example, the conflit between Jews and Arabs in Israel and relate his own experience with Inuits in Nothern lands. ” I have always had a fascination for Israel (…) I could not move on from the idea that the situation between Jews and Palestinians related to us. We are a conquered people but compared to the natives, we are a people of conquerors”. (Bernard Émond)

 

Credits

Script : Bernand Émond

Director assistant : Marthe Pelletier

Photographer : Jean-Pierre Saint-Louis

Image editing : Louise Côté

Sound editing : Richard Angers

Music : Pierre Desrochers

Narrator : Bernard Émond

With : Leila Abu Sinni, Pnina Feiler, Issa Freij, Ahmad Hijazi, Danielle Kitain

Producer : Claude Cartier

Direction

Bernard Émond

In 1992, Bernard Émond enters the cinema industry through documentary with Ceux qui ont le pas léger meurent sans laisser de traces a film about solitary man in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve. An anthropologist by training and a sensitive humanist, Émond documents in his films the dissolution of benchmarks and the loss of ethical values in a changing world.

He directors four other documentary films, — L’épreuve du feu (1997) and Le temps et le lieu (2000), produced by Coop Vidéo de Montréal — before making La femme qui boit (2001), a work of fiction that will impose his signature as one of the most recognizable and consistent in Quebec cinema.

La femme qui boit and 20h17, rue Darling (2003) were selected at the Semaine de la critique de Cannes, whereas  La neuvaine (2005), Contre toute espérance (2007) and La donation (2009), that make a tilogy about faith, hope and charity, had their world premiere at the official selection of Locarno Festival, where they won many prices. His more recent feature length films are Le journal d’un vieil homme (2015) and Pour vivre ici (2017). Throughout his work, Bernard Émond has hundreds of selections in festivals and more than sixty prices and nominations, including prix Genie and un prix Jutra for the script of Ce qu’il faut pour vivre (2008), directed by Benoît Pilon. Bernard Émond also wrote two books of essays published by Lux Éditeur Il y a trop d’images (2011) and Camarade, ferme ton poste (2017).