''Pour la suite du monde'' (also known as ''For Those Who Will Follow''; ''Of Whales, the Moon, and Men'', or ''The Moontrap'' in English) is a 1963 Canadian

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional film, motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". Bill Nichols (film critic), Bil ...

directed by

Michel Brault Michel Brault, OQ (25 June 1928 – 21 September 2013) was a Canadian cinematographer, cameraman, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He was a leading figure of Direct Cinema, characteristic of the French branch of the National ...

Marcel Carrière Marcel Carrière (born April 16, 1935) is a Canadian film director and sound engineer. Biography Marcel Carrière joined the NFB in 1955 after studying electronic engineering and developed his skills as a sound engineer while working on wildli ...

and

Pierre Perrault Pierre Perrault (29 June 1927 – 24 June 1999) was a Québécois documentary film director. He directed 20 films between 1963 and 1996. He was one of the most important filmmakers in Canada, although largely unknown outside of Québec. In ...

. It was entered into the 1963 Cannes Film Festival.

Synopsis

The film is a work of

ethnofiction Ethnofiction refers to a subfield of ethnography which produces works that introduces art, in the form of storytelling, "thick descriptions and conversational narratives", and even first-person autobiographical accounts, into peer-reviewed academi ...

. It shows life in a small isolated community, when the influence of the Catholic Church in Quebec was still strong. For centuries the inhabitants of Ile-aux-Coudres, a small island in the

St. Lawrence River The St. Lawrence River (french: Fleuve Saint-Laurent, ) is a large river in the middle latitudes of North America. Its headwaters begin flowing from Lake Ontario in a (roughly) northeasterly direction, into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, connecting ...

, trapped

beluga whales The beluga whale () (''Delphinapterus leucas'') is an Arctic and sub-Arctic cetacean. It is one of two members of the family Monodontidae, along with the narwhal, and the only member of the genus ''Delphinapterus''. It is also known as the whi ...

by sinking a

weir A weir or low head dam is a barrier across the width of a river that alters the flow characteristics of water and usually results in a change in the height of the river level. Weirs are also used to control the flow of water for outlets of l ...

of saplings into the offshore mud at low tide. After 1920, the practice was abandoned. In 1962, a team of

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 ...

filmmakers led by director Perrault and cinematographer Brault arrived on the island to make a cinéma-vérité documentary about the people and their isolated life. They encouraged the islanders to revive the practice of beluga fishing. The live animal they caught was then driven on a truck to an aquarium in New York City. The film also shows the daily life of the islanders, and their celebrations, such as the festival at mid-Lent (''mi-carême'').

Cast

* Léopold Tremblay as Marchand and president of the new beluga fishing co. * Alexis Tremblay as Cultivateur et politicien * Abel Harvey as Capitaine et maître de pêche * Louis Harvey as Cultivateur et chantre d'église * Joachim Harvey as Capitaine du Nord de l'Île *

Stanley Jackson Sir Francis Stanley Jackson Jackson's obituary in the 1948 ''Wisden Cricketers' Almanack''. This gives his full name as ''Francis'' Stanley Jackson, whereas Cricinfo and CricketArchive both give his full name as ''Frank'' Stanley Jackson. This ...

as Narrator

Reception

The resulting film was hugely popular in

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

, and today is recognized as a classic of Canadian cinema. ''Pour la suite du monde'' has been consistently ranked by critics as one of the best ever made and it represents a major development in the Direct Cinema movement, moving away from simple observation to a more immediate participation and a great emphasis on the words of the people portrayed. ''Pour la suite du monde'' was the first Quebec film shown 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 ...

. It received a Special Award and was named Film of the Year at the 1964

Canadian Film Awards The Canadian Film Awards were the leading Canadian cinema awards from 1949 until 1978. These honours were conducted annually, except in 1974 when a number of Quebec directors withdrew their participation and prompted a cancellation. In the 1970s ...

. In 1984 the

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a permane ...

ranked the film eighth in the

Top 10 Canadian Films of All Time The Top 10 Canadian Films of All Time is a list compiled by the Toronto International Film Festival ranking what are the considered the best Canadian films. The list has been compiled once roughly every 10 years starting in 1984, typically assembl ...

. The film was followed by two more installments in Perrault's "Île-aux-Coudres Trilogy", ''

The Times That Are ''The Times That Are'' (french: Le règne du jour) is a Canadian documentary film, which was directed by Pierre Perrault and released in 1967. A sequel to his 1963 film ''Pour la suite du monde'', the film follows Alexis Tremblay and his family on ...

(Le règne du jour)'' and ''

The River Schooners ''The River Schooners'' (french: Les Voitures d'eau) is a 1968 Canadian documentary, produced by the National Film Board of Canada and directed by Pierre Perrault.David Clandfield, ''Pierre Perrault and the Poetic Documentary''. Indiana University ...

(Les voitures d'eau)''. Quebecois filmmaker

Denis Villeneuve Denis Villeneuve (; born October 3, 1967) is a Canadian filmmaker. He is a four-time recipient of the Canadian Screen Award (formerly Genie Award) for Best Direction, winning for '' Maelström'' in 2001, '' Polytechnique'' in 2009, ''Incendies ...

declares that Perrault's "Île-aux-Coudres Trilogy" is "amongst the most beautiful films he has ever seen". It remains a major source of inspiration and influence for him.

Legacy

Perrault made two other films about the inhabitants of

L'Isle-aux-Coudres L'Isle-aux-Coudres is a municipality in Quebec, Canada, in the Charlevoix Regional County Municipality in the Charlevoix area of the Capitale-Nationale region. It is located on and contiguous with Coudres Island (''Île aux Coudres''), located i ...

, ''

'' and Les Voitures d'eau''.

Alternate English versions and titles

The film has been screened in various versions and with no less than four English-language titles. At its 1963 Cannes premiere, it was billed as ''For Those Who Will Follow''. The NFB has also promoted the film in English as ''Of Whales, the Moon and Men'' or ''The Moontrap'', depending upon whether it was the 105 minute or 84 minute version, respectively. The release of a 2007 "Île-aux-Coudres Trilogy" DVD trilogy also translates the film title as ''For the Ones to Come.'' The film is commonly referred to as simply ''Pour la suite du monde'' in both French and English.

References

Works cited

External links

*
Watch ''Pour la suite du monde'' at NFB.ca
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pour La Suite Du Monde 1963 films 1963 documentary films 1960s French-language films Canadian black-and-white films Canadian docufiction films Ethnofiction films Films about whaling Films directed by Michel Brault Films directed by Pierre Perrault Films set in Quebec National Film Board of Canada documentaries Best Picture Genie and Canadian Screen Award winners Films shot in Quebec Films directed by Marcel Carrière Whaling in Canada French-language Canadian films 1960s Canadian films