In collaboration with

Throughout the history of documentary cinema, from Mario Ruspoli (A Look at Madness, 1962) to Nicolas Philibert (Every Little Thing, 1996; On the Adamant, 2023) via Johan van der Keuken (Hermann Slobbe, 1966), Werner Herzog (Handicapped Future, 1971) and Frederick Wiseman (Deaf, 1986; Multi-Handicapped, 1996; Blind, 1987), many filmmakers have taken an interest in people with diverse abilities (physical, intellectual, cognitive, mental, sensory, learning, language and communication). Yet only a few have filmed a relative who is deaf, neurodivergent, and/or living with one or more disabilities. The question: "How can I film my child or a member of my family who is living with a disability?" becomes one of "What can I share of their experience, of our intimacy, while preserving their dignity?” Filming is a living, human, and dialogic experience that links aesthetics and ethics.

The films in Handicap & Family: Towards a New Ethics of Documentary Filmmaking place us at the heart of a number of families, with each film representing a means of weaving new relationships - whether it’s to "tame" to quote Claire Doyon (Pénélope My Love) - or preserve links with one's relatives. Sound recordings and film shots are often intended to provide care, attention, and concern for the well-being of a loved one (The Brother). Filming others means learning to respect their rhythm, whether that of young children (Alphée of the Stars, Pénélope My Love), a medicated brother (The Worlds of Vincent), or a running athlete training for the Special Olympics World Games (Champions). A number of themes run through these documentary films, including the body (fragile, constrained, sculpted, trained, overpowered, clumsy, drawn, tired from taking medication, static, in motion, victorious), time (before and after an illness, the moment a diagnosis is announced and accepted… or not, of an uncertain or inversely desired future) and the refusal to view a human being solely in terms of his or her illness or disability.

Mouloud Boukala
Professor at the École des médias, UQAM
Chairholder of the CRCMHA

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