''Winter Kept Us Warm'' is a Canadian romantic drama film, released in 1965. The title comes from the fifth line of
T.S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns Eliot (26 September 18884 January 1965) was a poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic and editor.Bush, Ronald. "T. S. Eliot's Life and Career", in John A Garraty and Mark C. Carnes (eds), ''American National B ...
's ''
The Waste Land
''The Waste Land'' is a poem by T. S. Eliot, widely regarded as one of the most important poems of the 20th century and a central work of modernist poetry. Published in 1922, the 434-line poem first appeared in the United Kingdom in the Octob ...
''.
An independent film written, directed, and funded by
David Secter
David Secter is a Canadian film director. He is best known for the 1965 film '' Winter Kept Us Warm'', the first English Canadian film ever screened at the Cannes Film Festival.Geoff Pevere"David Secter, the Varsity visionary: How a low-budget st ...
, it occupies a unique place in the history of
Canadian cinema as the first English-language Canadian film screened at the
Cannes Film Festival
The Cannes Festival (; french: link=no, Festival de Cannes), until 2003 called the International Film Festival (') and known in English as the Cannes Film Festival, is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films o ...
. The film was screened at the
1966 festival during the
Semaine de la critique
Critics' Week (french: link=no, Semaine de la critique), until 2008 called International Critics' Week ('), is a parallel section to the Cannes Film Festival organized by the French Syndicate of Cinema Critics. It was created in 1962 after the Fre ...
, a special non-competitive portion of the festival at which works of new filmmakers are shown.
[Martin Knelman, "He shoots The Offering in July". '']The Globe and Mail
''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...
'', May 19, 1966. Its debut was as the opening film of the Commonwealth Film Festival in Cardiff, Wales on September 27, 1965.
[David Secter, "Lack of experience helps: How to make a do-it-yourself movie without money". '']The Globe and Mail
''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...
'', November 17, 1965.
The film stars
John Labow as Doug Harris and
Henry Tarvainen as Peter Saarinen, two very different students at the University of Toronto, who develop a complex quasi-romantic friendship, and
Joy Tepperman and
Janet Amos
Janet Amos (born 12 September 1944) is a Canadian theatre actress, director, educator and playwright.
The daughter of the actress Beth Amos, Janet has led theatre companies as the artistic director of the Blyth Festival (1979-1984 and 1994-1997) ...
as their girlfriends Bev and Sandra.
Thomas Waugh
Thomas Waugh is a Canadian critic, lecturer, author, actor, and activist, best known for his extensive work on documentary film and eroticism in the history of LGBT cinema and art. A professor emeritus at Concordia University, he taught 41 years ...
, "Uncovering a forgotten Canadian gay film–from 1965". ''The Body Politic
''The Body Politic'' was a Canadian monthly magazine, which was published from 1971 to 1987. '', May 1982. p. 36. The film's gay subtext was carefully coded by Secter, who wrote the film based on his own experience falling in love with a male fellow student, but feared that a more explicitly gay film would not attract an audience. Even some of the film's cast have claimed in interviews that they did not know at the time that the film was actually about homosexuality.
Geoff Pevere
Geoff Pevere (born October 1957) is a Canadian lecturer, author, broadcaster, teacher, arts and media critic, currently the program director of the Rendezvous With Madness Film Festival in Toronto.John Semley, "Can we play with madness?: Toronto' ...
"David Secter, the Varsity visionary: How a low-budget student movie went to Cannes and influenced a generation of Toronto filmmakers"
''Toronto Star
The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and part ...
'', June 25, 2011.
Production
The film received a $750 grant from the
University of Toronto Students' Union
The University of Toronto Students' Union (UTSU), legally known as the Students' Administrative Council of the University of Toronto, Inc., is the representative student government of full-time undergraduate students at the University of Toronto ...
, along with permission to film several key scenes at
Hart House;
[Ralph Hicklin, "Friendship and $750 main ingredients of campus film". '']The Globe and Mail
''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...
'', November 21, 1964. however, Secter had to fight the university administration for permission to film in other locations on campus.
[ As well, the film was declined production grants from the ]Canada Council
The Canada Council for the Arts (french: Conseil des arts du Canada), commonly called the Canada Council, is a Crown corporation established in 1957 as an arts council of the Government of Canada. It acts as the federal government's principal i ...
, the Ontario Arts Council
The Ontario Arts Council (OAC) is a publicly-funded Canadian organization in the province of Ontario whose purpose is to foster the creation and production of art for the benefit of all Ontarians. Based in Toronto, OAC was founded in 1963 by O ...
and 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 ...
.[ Secter found much of the cast by placing a classified advertisement in the university's student newspaper '' The Varsity''; however, for technical crew he largely had to go to Ryerson Polytechnic's film studies department.][
According to Secter, "at the time I made it the very idea of making movies in Canada was an alien concept".][ His only prior film experience was the eight-minute short film ''Love with the Proper Guppy''.][ Having been a film reviewer for ''The Varsity'', he has stated that he was inspired by the ]French New Wave
French New Wave (french: La Nouvelle Vague) is a French art film movement that emerged in the late 1950s. The movement was characterized by its rejection of traditional filmmaking conventions in favor of experimentation and a spirit of iconocla ...
: "A lot of those New Wave guys had started out as critics, and I thought, ‘Hey, if they can move from talking about movies to making movies, why can’t I?’"[
]
Critical response
The film was given a Special Jury Award at the Festival of Canadian Films in Montreal.
Frank Morriss of ''The Globe and Mail'' noticed the "overtones of homosexuality" in Doug and Peter's friendship. He reviewed the film positively overall, writing that "when the two fall into a casual relationship, Labow's accent on having a good time, and Tarvainen's earnest desire to make good, has interest. It is when Tarvainen gains confidence and Labow's emotional feelings begin to run amuck, that the movie begins to go down the drain, and lose direction." He ultimately concluded, however, that the film "has enough in its favour to deserve the patronage of film fans who want to see what a group of university students can do with the challenge of a feature movie."
Writing about the film for ''The Body Politic
''The Body Politic'' was a Canadian monthly magazine, which was published from 1971 to 1987. '' in 1982, Thomas Waugh
Thomas Waugh is a Canadian critic, lecturer, author, actor, and activist, best known for his extensive work on documentary film and eroticism in the history of LGBT cinema and art. A professor emeritus at Concordia University, he taught 41 years ...
expressed concern about the fact that gay-themed films of its era rarely depicted positive same-sex relationships, but instead usually centred on love triangles involving a woman;[ while acknowledging that ''Winter Kept Us Warm'' reflected this trope, he complimented the film for portraying its women characters with greater integrity than usual for the genre.][
]
Legacy
Although not widely remembered among the general public, ''Winter Kept Us Warm'' is considered a major milestone in the Canadian film industry as one of the first Canadian films ever to attract international attention. Secter made a second film, '' The Offering'', in 1966, one of the first Canadian films to depict an interracial
Interracial topics include:
* Interracial marriage, marriage between two people of different races
** Interracial marriage in the United States
*** 2009 Louisiana interracial marriage incident
* Interracial adoption, placing a child of one raci ...
romance.[ Secter subsequently moved to the United States. In 1976, he directed the low budget sex comedy '']Getting Together
''Getting Together'' is an American musical sitcom that aired on ABC during the 1971–72 U.S. television season. It starred Bobby Sherman and Wes Stern as Bobby Conway and Lionel Poindexter, a songwriting duo. The pilot for the series had aired ...
'', but subsequently left the film industry.
The film was screened at the 1984 Festival of Festivals as part of Front & Centre, a special retrospective program of artistically and culturally significant films from throughout the history of Canadian cinema.
In the 1990s, Secter's nephew Joel Secter Joel or Yoel is a name meaning "Yahweh Is God" and may refer to:
* Joel (given name), origin of the name including a list of people with the first name.
* Joel (surname), a surname
* Joel (footballer, born 1904), Joel de Oliveira Monteiro, Brazili ...
rented ''Getting Together'', not knowing that his uncle had directed films. Seeing David's name in the credits, Joel contacted his uncle to talk about his film career. Those discussions ultimately led to Joel Secter's own debut as a filmmaker, the 2005 documentary '' The Best of Secter and the Rest of Secter''. Notable figures who discussed Secter and ''Winter Kept Us Warm'' in the documentary included David Cronenberg
David Paul Cronenberg (born March 15, 1943) is a Canadian film director, screenwriter, and actor. He is one of the principal originators of what is commonly known as the body horror genre, with his films exploring visceral bodily transformation ...
, Michael Ondaatje
Philip Michael Ondaatje (; born 12 September 1943) is a Sri Lankan-born Canadian poet, fiction writer, essayist, novelist, editor, and filmmaker. He is the recipient of multiple literary awards such as the Governor General's Award, the Giller P ...
, Philip Glass
Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer and pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century. Glass's work has been associated with minimal music, minimalism, being built up fr ...
, Ed Mirvish
Edwin "Honest Ed" Mirvish, (July 24, 1914 – July 11, 2007) was an American-Canadian businessman, philanthropist and theatrical impresario who lived in Toronto, Ontario. He is known for his flagship business, Honest Ed's, a landmark disco ...
and Lloyd Kaufman
Stanley Lloyd Kaufman Jr. (born December 30, 1945) is an American film director, screenwriter, producer and actor. Alongside producer Michael Herz (producer), Michael Herz, he is the co-founder of Troma Entertainment film studio, and the director ...
.
The film was released on DVD by TLA Video
TLA Releasing is a US film distribution and production company owned by TLA Entertainment Group. In March 2011, a new LLC was formed for the operation. Its primary output is LGBT-related films from all over the world under the "TLA Releasing" lab ...
in early 2011.
In 2015, the film was screened at Buddies in Bad Times
Buddies in Bad Times Theatre is a Canadian professional theatre company. Based in Toronto, Ontario and founded in 1978 by Matt Walsh, Jerry Ciccoritti, and Sky Gilbert, ''Buddies in Bad Times'' is dedicated to "the promotion of queer theatrical ex ...
during Toronto's Pride Week
LGBT pride (also known as gay pride or simply pride) is the promotion of the self-affirmation, dignity, equality, and increased visibility of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people as a social group. Pride, as opposed to sh ...
as the centrepiece of a selection of LGBT-themed Canadian films, to mark the launch of Thomas Waugh's Queer Media Database project."Online database of queer Canadian movies launching at Toronto Pride"
''The Globe and Mail
''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...
'', June 24, 2015.
References
External links
* {{IMDb title, 0232954, Winter Kept Us Warm
1965 films
1965 independent films
1965 LGBT-related films
1965 romantic drama films
Canadian black-and-white films
Canadian romantic drama films
Canadian independent films
Canadian LGBT-related films
English-language Canadian films
Films directed by David Secter
Films set in Toronto
Films set in universities and colleges
Films shot in Toronto
LGBT history in Canada
LGBT-related romantic drama films
1965 directorial debut films
Canadian student films
1960s English-language films
1960s Canadian films