The Montreal World Film Festival (), commonly abbreviated MWFF in English or FFM in French, was an annual
film festival
A film festival is an organized, extended presentation of films in one or more movie theater, cinemas or screening venues, usually annually and in a single city or region. Some film festivals show films outdoors or online.
Films may be of recent ...
in
Montreal
Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...
,
Quebec
Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...
CBC News
CBC News is the division of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the news gathering and production of news programs on the corporation's English-language operations, namely CBC Television, CBC Radio, CBC News Network, and CBC ...
Montreal, July 22, 2019. Founded and run throughout its lifetime by Serge Losique, it was the only competitive film festival in North America accredited by the FIAPF. (The
Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the most prestigious and largest publicly attended film festivals in the world. Founded in 1976, the festival takes place every year in early September. The organi ...
is also FIAPF-accredited, but is run as a non-competitive event).
The public festival, which was founded in 1977 as a replacement for the defunct
Montreal International Film Festival
The Montreal International Film Festival was an annual Canadian film festival, which took place in Montreal, Quebec from 1960 to 1967.1976 Festival of Festivals, as he reportedly believed that Montreal was a more appropriate location than Toronto to be the host of a prestige film festival. After screening an inaugural program in summer 1977, he pursued the FIAPF accreditation, which was secured in early 1978. The 1978 event, however, saw the first instance of Losique using his position to take a public swipe at the Toronto festival, when he sent four films that had been booked to appear at both festivals back to their distributors instead of forwarding the prints to Toronto as directed.
As early as 1980, the festival was marketing itself as one that was focused more on the films than their stars, with Losique regularly trumpeting that motto through the years as the thing that made his festival better than Toronto's.
By 1985, Losique was already beginning to attract criticism for running the festival in an "authoritarian" and "
Napoleon
Napoleon Bonaparte (born Napoleone di Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French general and statesman who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led Military career ...
ic" manner, with programming driven disproportionately by his own personal taste in film rather than consideration for what would appeal to the general public. Through the 1980s, the Montreal and Toronto film festivals were typically seen as different but complementary events, although Losique continued to lash out at any media suggestion that the events were comparable in prestige or quality,Bruce Bailey, "A tale of two movie festivals". ''
Montreal Gazette
''The Gazette'', also known as the ''Montreal Gazette'', is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper which is owned by Postmedia Network. It is published in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
It is the only English-language daily newspape ...
'', September 14, 1985. and his most consistent public relations strategy in this era was to release public statements criticizing TIFF's public relations statements for being insufficiently deferential to his festival's superiority.
By the 1990s, however, the MWFF was clearly losing prestige as TIFF gained in international clout; even within Montreal, its prominence was being increasingly challenged by the
Festival du nouveau cinéma
The Festival du nouveau cinéma or FNC (English: ''Festival of New Cinema'') is an annual independent film festival held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, featuring independent films from around the world. Over 160,000 people attend each year. One of ...
, which although older than the MWFF had previously been much smaller until gaining momentum in the early 1990s. In 1991, for the first time, newspapers in Montreal began running front-page stories calling for Losique to step down and hand over leadership of the festival to a successor due to poor programming decisions and declining attendance.
In 1998, the festival faced heavy criticism when it opted to present a lifetime achievement award to
Sandra Bullock
Sandra Annette Bullock (; born July 26, 1964) is an American actress and film producer. The List of highest-paid film actors, highest-paid actress of 2010 and 2014, Sandra Bullock filmography, Bullock's filmography spans both comedy and drama, ...
, despite her still having been known only for a few hit films over the past couple of years at that point, rather than the sort of sustained career typically required to earn lifetime achievement honours.
By 2000, even filmmakers from Quebec were frequently bypassing MWFF, instead opting to "stampede down the
401
__NOTOC__
Year 401 ( CDI) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Vincentius and Fravitus (or, less frequently, year 1154 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination ...
" to TIFF due to its much higher international profile before screening in Montreal at the FNC or the
Rendez-vous du cinéma québécois
Rendezvous or rendez-vous may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
Film and television
* ''The Rendezvous'' (1923 film), a silent film adventure melodrama
* ''Rendezvous'' (1930 film), a German musical directed by Carl Boese
* ''Rendezvous ...
instead of the MWFF.
The WFF lost the sponsorship of its previous government cultural funders, SODEC and
Telefilm Canada
Telefilm Canada is a Canadian Crown corporation that supports Canada's audiovisual industry. Headquartered in Montreal, Telefilm Canada provides services to the Canadian audiovisual industry with four regional offices in Vancouver, British Colu ...
as a result of disagreements with Losique in 2004, after Losique refused to cooperate with a review by those agencies of Canada's major film festivals. Subsequently, these two funding agencies announced that they would support a new international film festival, called the
New Montreal FilmFest
New or NEW may refer to:
Music
* New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz (South Korean band), The Boyz
* New (album), ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013
** New (Paul McCartney song), "New" (Paul McCartney song), 2013
* New (EP), ''New'' (EP), ...
(FIFM), to be managed by Spectra Entertainment and headed by
Daniel Langlois
Daniel Langlois (6 April 1957 – 2023) was a Canadian businessman who was the president and founder of the Daniel Langlois Foundation, Ex-Centris, and Media Principia Inc.
He was founder and inaugural president of Softimage Inc., which i ...
.Brendan Kelly, "Battle royale". ''
Variety
Variety may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats
* Variety (radio)
* Variety show, in theater and television
Films
* ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont
* ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'', August 29, 2005.
Despite the competing festival and the loss of government funding, however, Losique continued to organize the World Film Festival, and filed lawsuits against both Telefilm and Spectra, further suing
Moritz de Hadeln
Moritz de Hadeln (born 21 December 1940 in Exeter, Devon, England) is a Swiss documentary film director and photographer, who became a Film Festival director. He was the founder of Swiss documentary film festival Visions du Réel. He also head ...
personally after he was announced as FIFM's artistic director. The 2005 FIFM was not successful, and the event was discontinued; as of July 2007, Losique's lawsuits were dropped, paving the way for a restoration of government funding.
In 2005, Losique first announced and later withdrew the film '' Karla'' from the festival after the principal sponsor of the festival,
Air Canada
Air Canada is the flag carrier and the largest airline of Canada, by size and passengers carried. Air Canada is headquartered in the borough of Saint-Laurent in the city of Montreal. The airline, founded in 1937, provides scheduled and cha ...
, threatened to withdraw its sponsorship of the festival if that film were included. The film — about
Karla Homolka
Karla Leanne Homolka (born May 4, 1970), also known as Karla Leanne Teale, Leanne Teale and Leanne Bordelais, is a Canadian serial killer who acted as an accomplice to her husband, Paul Bernardo, taking active part in the rapes and murders of at ...
, a young woman who was convicted of manslaughter and who served twelve years in prison for her part in the kidnapping, sex enslavement, rapes and murders of teenage girls, including her own sister, in a case said to involve
ephebophilia
Ephebophilia is the primary sexual interest in mid-to-late adolescents, generally ages 15 to 19 and showing Tanner stages 4 to 5 of physical development. The term was originally used in the late 19th to mid-20th century. It is one of a number of ...
— was controversial in Canada, with many calling for its boycott throughout the country.
In 2015 a group of employees claimed they were not paid. In 2016 many of the employees resigned, citing poor leadership and financial uncertainty amongst other issues. In an interview with CTV News, ''
Montreal Gazette
''The Gazette'', also known as the ''Montreal Gazette'', is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper which is owned by Postmedia Network. It is published in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
It is the only English-language daily newspape ...
'' entertainment columnist Bill Brownstein referred to Losique as having a "Napoleonic complex" and not "playing well with the other children" resulting in government and sponsors withdrawing their funding support.
In the same year
Cineplex Entertainment
Cineplex Inc. (formerly Cineplex Entertainment and Cineplex Galaxy) is a Canadian operator of movie theater and family entertainment centers, headquartered in Toronto. It is the largest cinema chain in Canada; as of 2019, it operated 165 loc ...
withdrew its support from the festival, causing it to lose the Forum Theatre as a venue. Left with only the Imperial Cinema for a venue, the festival had to cancel some of its planned screenings and proceed with a reduced lineup, although several of the city's independent theatres stepped in to help screen films at the last minute.
In 2017, power was cut at the Imperial Theatre in July, just a few weeks before the festival, due to unpaid electricity bills, with that year's festival being saved by a last-minute intervention by Pierre-Karl Péladeau and Québecor.
In 2018 the festival was accused by
Revenu Québec
Revenu Québec (; formerly the Ministère du Revenu du Québec, Quebec Ministry of Revenue) is an agency of the government of the Province of Quebec, Canada. It collects taxes to fund public services, ensures that all citizens pay their fair shar ...
of owing almost $500,000 in unpaid taxes, but the festival was allowed to proceed that year after Losique made an initial payment of $33,000.
By this time, Brendan Kelly of the ''
Montreal Gazette
''The Gazette'', also known as the ''Montreal Gazette'', is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper which is owned by Postmedia Network. It is published in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
It is the only English-language daily newspape ...
'' was explicitly calling for the festival to be shut down, writing that "Way back in the early days of the festival in the late '70s and early '80s, the FFM was a happening event that could be said to be seriously rival the Toronto fest, then called the Festival of Festivals. But that hasn't been true for 30 years, and it's almost entirely Losique's fault. As long as the FFM exists, it drags down the city's film scene. Agencies and producers in other countries who don't realize Losique's fest is irrelevant send films and filmmakers, and the poor auteurs turn up to discover they're screening films in front of near-empty rooms. It also causes enormous problems for the other much more relevant film festivals in our city, notably the Festival du nouveau cinéma and
Fantasia
Fantasia may refer to:
Film and television
* ''Fantasia'' (1940 film), an animated musical film produced by Walt Disney
** '' Fantasia 2000'', a sequel to the 1940 film
* ''Fantasia'' (2004 film), a Hong Kong comedy film
* ''Fantasia'' (201 ...
. These festivals have not been given the chance to step up and become the city's première festival with Losique's event staggering from edition to edition."
In 2019, the WFF announced that it was cancelling the 43rd edition of the event. The stated reason was that Losique was suffering from extreme fatigue, with the festival intended at that time to return in 2020; however, with the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
emerging over the winter, the festival's return in 2020 was not possible, and the festival subsequently failed to see a revival in 2021. Robert Everett-Green of ''
The Globe and Mail
''The Globe and Mail'' is a Newspapers in Canada, Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in Western Canada, western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of more than 6 million in 2024, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on week ...
'' noted that while an event like TIFF, with its strong programming team, could easily work around the health difficulties of a single programmer, the stated reason for the MWFF's cancellation effectively confirmed the longstanding charges that Losique ran the festival as a personal fiefdom rather than cultivating a team.
In 2022, Losique announced plans to revive the festival as the Global Montreal Film Festival, with a 2022 edition featuring free screenings of a selection of films that had previously screened at FFM, leading to a full revival of the festival in 2023. The free screening series in 2022 attracted only a few dozen people; filmmaker
André Forcier
André Forcier (born Marc-André Forcier on July 19, 1947) is a Canadian film director and screenwriter. His work has been linked to Latin American magic realism by its use of fantasy but is firmly rooted in Quebec's reality. His unromanticized, ...
, whose 1994 film '' The Wind from Wyoming (Le Vent du Wyoming)'' was one of the titles being screened, criticized the event as having been poorly advertised.Olivier Du Ruisseau "L’hommage au FFM tient le coup" ''
Le Devoir
(, ) is a French-language newspaper published in Montreal and distributed in Quebec and throughout Canada. It was founded by journalist and politician Henri Bourassa in 1910.
is one of few independent large-circulation newspapers in Quebec ...
'', August 29, 2022. The 2023 revival did not materialize, and there has been no subsequent news about the festival's return.
Festival
The festival was organised in various sections, including the World Competition (features and shorts) and First Films World Competition (features), and non-competitive streams for Canadian and world cinema, documentaries, student films and repertory programming of classic films.
Prior to the beginning of each event, the festival's board of directors appointed the juries who held sole responsibility for choosing award winners. Juried awards were presented for the Grand Prix des Amériques, a Special Grand Prix of the jury, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Actor, Best Screenplay, Best Artistic Contribution, Best Short Film, an Innovation Award and gold, silver and bronze Zenith Awards for first films. Audience-voted awards were also presented for the most popular film, the most popular Canadian film, most popular Latin American film, most popular documentary film, and most popular Canadian short film.
Grand Prix des Amériques
Golden Zenith Award
Best Canadian Film
The Best Canadian Film award varied over its lifetime, sometimes being presented based on adjudication by a jury and other times as an audience-voted "people's choice" award.