Archive for July, 2008

Canadian Cancer Society Ad Campaigns

Posted on: by Richard 1 Comment

At the Vancouver French Film Festival last night, I was bombarded with two outrageous ads from the Canadian Cancer Society.

One appeared to offer support to those recently diagnosed with cancer by providing a free help line for questions. At first glance, pretty reasonable. At second, all I could see was a reinforcement of the stigma surrounding the issue: The scene showed a concerned friendly female doctor inform one of her patients she has cancer. Fair enough. Suddenly at diagnosis, the patient pales and all sound fades to a distant room as the message sinks in as if it were a death sentence. We glimpse the terror of death and the unknown that this poor woman must now face.

Now, I understand the mortality rates for cancer patients but to imply that this is the only reaction – the one every one will have is poor taste. This woman is your every day just middle aged educated western easy going socialite slash soccer mum. If blood drains from her face, her lips slightly part at the mention of cancer than it probably means that cancer is meant to be feared unconditionally. If you aren’t scared than you aren’t truely informed or cancer hasn’t touched your life. Let’s continue to spread the fear – great motivation for an ad campaign.

Well shot and cut with good actors.

The second was a blatant lie disguised as a courageous act: The ad likened a mammogram to a child and her mum looking under a bed to make sure there were no monsters hiding there. It can’t hurt to make sure, right? The small child is the patient locked in fear, and the mum is the educated friendly guide to help you overcome your fear. If this isn’t patronizing it’s certainly not accurate.

The fact that mammograms actually increase your rate of cancer by 2% is little known. The fact that doctors often refuse to treat patients unless they agree to regular mammograms displays an outrageous handling of medical procedure by the cancer industry. The ethics of proactive preventative diagnosis has not been adequately investigated.

Identifying cancerous cells is not as clear cut a process as we are led to believe. Different pathologists will diagnose differently. With the continued threat of malpractice suites, are these pathologists going to under-diagnose, or over-diagnose?

These ads are obviously targeting women, trying to instil in them a fear of cancer in order to support a secretly ethically dubious industry. Shocking stuff.

VFFF: Le voyage du ballon rouge

Posted on: by Richard

At the Vancouver French Film Festival last night, Hsiao-hsien Hou’s 2007 release The Flight of the red ballon offered an excerpt from Parisian life. With long takes and slow camera moves, it seemed like a bit of an excuse for Pin Bing Lee to show off some beautiful cinematography.

The narrative and the visuals seem an extension of Felix Vallotton’s 1899 Le Ballon painting above. It’s on display at the Musee d’Orsay, Paris, France behind protective glass. The painting is our story – although transported to the contemporary city (or at least the city at the time Children of Men was released in theatres in France) – and the glass is rather literally often a store window between us and the actors.

Thus we often are looking at two things at once. It’s important to point out that these aren’t Spielberg rear view mirror kind of reflections.

I always felt as if the camera was squeezed into tight spaces at oblique angles to emphasize these reflections. Then again Paris is nothing but tight spaces and oblique angles when you aren’t above it’s glorious skyline.

We also get this sense of nostalgia and restlessness from some slight intensity in exposure. We’ve got the use of great summer lighting – open skies with heat and lens flare.

When I wasn’t watching the fantastic imagery, I was watching Juliette Binoche balance her hectic character against her calm son. Half the time I was mesmerized when she slowed down just enough to be exhaling with the calm of an early morning post marathon peace. Her character was so wonderfully believable at the edge of emotional collapse – struggling to maintain coherence. Too bloody real life for fantasy but not too far away from magic.

Speaking of which, the almost perfectly spherical balloon had a small but magic role: as if it were following along with us, sometimes waiting for as at the next scene. It had an odd compassion that the characters almost took for granted or ignored as if it were the camera. It was outside the story as much as it was in it. I found myself wondering how they manipulated its flight.