Séraphin: un homme et son péché

Father Ovide, I have a confession to make. The two main reasons I went to see this movie were A) the Winnipeg Free Press gave it four stars, and B) the movie listings said "warning - sexual content." All you guys out there, can any of you relate? Heck, I'd go watch professinal lawn bowling if it had a sexual content warning.

Turns out I lucked into seeing a fine little movie. It caused me to think of the decisions we make and why we make them, and the errors we commit and how they can wind up controlling us.

It also made me very mad at Seraphin. At one point I was loudly thinking, "SHOOT HIM! SHOOT HIM!" But then, truly he was an evil man who deserved his comeupance.

The sweet lady Donalda bugged me too. If you've made a mistake but you get a chance to get over it, wouldn't you get over it? "No, it's much better to stay put and accept your punishment." AARGH!! What's wrong with you people? But then, I'm coming from a 20th century anglo-protestant perspective, not an 18th century french-catholic one.

Neat film. I'd love to see these actors again.

Too many people thought this was going to be a splashy production of les Belles Histoires du Pays d'en Haut. Unfortunately that series is long gone and the main actors are no longer with us either. The series was a laundered version of Un Homme et son Peche (sorry no accents on my keyboard) which was a brutal novel about avarice. Avarice is one of the seven deadly sins and Claude-Henri Grignon (the author) wanted to show this in the context of a rural Quebec setting. French-Canada has a mythology and Seraphin Poudrier the mean and cruel became with the help of Radio-Canada Seraphin the miserable and sometimes ok tightwad. Otherwise the series would have become unbearable, I mean, how can you love a man who deforms his wife's dead body to fit in a cheap coffin??? Grignon worked on the series so it was done with his blessing and as a result French-Canada ended up with a sanitized version that became its best-loved series ever. Indeed, to this day, anyone over 40 will fondly remember the adventures of a group of hard working French Canadians in the colonial era during the late 1890's. They were easily identifiable and very human. Naturally those who did not read the novel were shocked at the baseness of the main character Seraphin Poudrier. Jean-Pierre Masson's magistral interpretation of his character in the series was nothing short of absolute perfection. Sadly he became so typecast that he died a drunken miserable person who tried to escape this identity with very few actually realizing that he was indeed a first-class actor.

The French-Canadian society in Quebec is very selfish in a loving way and will not let its heroes go. Being so insular, it will raise its favorites to the highest level but at what cost. Anyway, the novel was a classic and must be studied to understand another view of French-Canadian rural mores. Today Quebec has become a dreary socialist third-world type society and frankly I miss the older more pictoresque place. The present day society: anti-religious, vociferously anti-English and very stupid about it, double names, silly socialism etc.. is not to my liking. Oh well...

Another wonderful drama out of Quebec - not enough recognition is given to the caliber of acting in this movie. Roy Dupuis of course is well known for his dramatic talent but Karine Vanasse also did a very credible job for one so young and inexperienced.

Without giving away any plot detail, here is another classic example of a man without soul. What goes around comes around and the moral in the story is not belaboured but left to the watchers intelligence.

Beautiful scenery and a good depiction of the hardship that the early Quebec settlers endured.

Once again, this is a movie well worth seeing and you won't be wasting your money on it.

Growing up, I used to watch the popular weekly TV serial that this movie is based on. This was in the 60's, and it lasted for quite a while. Everybody followed the lives of these characters, and the kids would imitate a few of them in the schoolyards during recess. It was a cornerstone of Quebec culture back then. Episodes are even being aired nowadays, but they don't have the same magic anymore... The pacing was very slow, and you'd only get a part of the story in each episode, to the point where I'd never even gotten to know how such a splendid "creature" as Donalda came to be that monster's wife, and the ties she had with Alexis, her true love. What a surprise to have that story told so wonderfully after all those years! Very nice work, Mr. Binamé... And thanks for making me see "the whole picture". I only wish you'd put Bill Wabo in the mix, so that I could figure out how he fit in there.

Un Homme et Son Peche is not an uncommon film. The plot follows the exploits of a rural Quebec village at the turn of the century. This movie has been made before, in fact this film is based on a TV show which itself is based on a radio play.

What is unique about this film is its attention to details. The sets are impressive, built for the film. The cinemagraphy captures the natural beauty of Northern Quebec perfectly. Its as though you could touch the screen and feel the characters world.

The acting is not bad. I'm not a big fan of Roy Dupuis, but he did manage to make me feel genuine emotion for his character.

This film has become a phenomenon in Quebec, likely to become the Provinces highest grossing domestic film ever. I think this film will be remembered more as a force than for its story, but that's ok as long as it is remembered at all