Jean Gagné

Trying to describe oneself is a movie about representation. How it is possible, through film, to describe oneself and describe others. With the camera as mirror and third eye. At first, a collage-like combination of letter-writing, investigation and journey, something between documentary and feature film. Finally, a portrait of Boris Lehman from 1989 to 1995, part II of BABEL.

A road movie whose journey intersects with and extends the events of the International Counter-Culture Meeting that took place in 1975 in Montreal. This meeting, at the heart of the film, features several important figures of the counterculture in Quebec. Throughout the film, these individuals, often through their creative endeavors, question the evolution of their society and counterculture itself.

"The Red Hotel: flying car. Filmed from the backseat, images scroll at the speed of miles fleeing, forwards, backwards ... and on this road, Venice. Floating lights, gratings, bridges above, below. The city was coming out of the Red Hotel to bend under the magnifying glass and the flashlight of the projector, drunk by the narrow streets and carried by the seasickness emanating from the "flicker" which returns in waves. Venice left the Red Hotel to take another turn, detached from the previous trip, it seems to become a suite of old postcards and gives to people who pass and search at a second-hand dealer, memories of yesteryear.“