''23 Skidoo'' is a 1964 short experimental black-and-white film directed by
Julian Biggs Julian Biggs (1920 in Port Perry, Ontario – 1972 in Montreal) was a director, producer and administrator with the National Film Board of Canada for 20 years responsible for two Academy Award nominees, ''Herring Hunt'' (1953, as director) and '' Pa ...
and produced by the
National Film Board of Canada
The National Film Board of Canada (NFB; french: Office national du film du Canada (ONF)) is Canada's public film and digital media producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary f ...
.
Synopsis
Its central images are "eerie" and "disturbing" scenes of downtown
Montreal
Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...
devoid of people. The film offers no explanation for what happened to the people until a scene in a newsroom where we glimpse a never-completed report about the explosion of the first
neutron bomb
A neutron bomb, officially defined as a type of enhanced radiation weapon (ERW), is a low-yield thermonuclear weapon designed to maximize lethal neutron radiation in the immediate vicinity of the blast while minimizing the physical power of the b ...
.
Accolades
In 1965, the film was nominated for a
BAFTA Award
The British Academy Film Awards, more commonly known as the BAFTA Film Awards is an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) to honour the best British and international contributions to film. The cere ...
for Best Short Film. Also at the 1965 BAFTAs, it was nominated for the
United Nations
The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...
Award for "the best Film embodying one or more of the principles of the United Nations Charter in 1965" (''
Dr. Strangelove
''Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb'', known simply and more commonly as ''Dr. Strangelove'', is a 1964 black comedy film that satirizes the Cold War fears of a nuclear conflict between the Soviet Union and t ...
'' won the award). ''23 Skidoo'' won "Special Mention" in the international competition at the 1965
Cracow Film Festival that year.
Karlow Film Festival (1965) - IMDb
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See also
*Arthur Lipsett
Arthur Lipsett (May 13, 1936 – May 1, 1986) was a Canadian avant-garde director of short collage films.
Life and career
Born in Montreal into a Jewish family, Lipsett saw his mother, an immigrant from Kiev, commit suicide when he was 10 years ...
- another NFB filmmaker similar in content
*The Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of Geopolitics, geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term ''Cold war (term), co ...
References
Notes
External links
*
* {{IMDb title
1960s avant-garde and experimental films
1960s science fiction films
1964 short films
Canadian black-and-white films
National Film Board of Canada short films
Quebec films
Canadian post-apocalyptic films
Canadian avant-garde and experimental short films
Films shot in Montreal
Films without speech
1960s Canadian films