Donald Brittain

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Donald Code Brittain (born June 10, 1928 in Ottawa , † July 21, 1989 in Montreal ) was a Canadian screenwriter, film director and producer of documentaries .

Life

His parents were Abram Code Brittain and his wife Elise Adrienne, geb. Duclos. Donald Brittain attended elementary school and the Glebe Collegiate Institute in his native Ottawa. From 1947 to 1951 he studied at Queen's University .

In 1950 Brittain married Barbara Ellen Tuer, who later died. In 1963 he married Brigitte Irmgard Halbig. They had a son and a daughter.

Initially, Brittain worked as a journalist. He was editor-in-chief of the student newspaper Queen's Journal and wrote from 1951 to 1954 as a police reporter for the daily newspaper Ottawa Journal . As a foreign correspondent, he traveled to Europe, Mexico and Africa. In 1955 he began training as a screenwriter with the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). In the following year he wrote his first screenplay for a documentary film, and later he also regularly directed and produced some of his films himself. He often took on the role of (English-speaking) narrator or background speaker at the same time. In his documentaries he often took up the social and political developments in Canada.

After a 13-part television series about Canadian soldiers in World War I and World War II ( Canada at War ), Brittain showed in the short documentary Fields of Sacrifice (1963) the places in the world where they died and were buried.

Starting with the documentary Bethune (1964), in which he portrayed the Canadian doctor Norman Bethune , Brittain put a number of personalities at the center of his work, such as Leonard Cohen ( Ladies and Gentlemen ... Mr. Leonard Cohen , 1965), Roy Herbert Thomson ( Never a Backward Step , 1966) and Ferguson Jenkins ( King of the Hill , 1974). In The Canadian Encyclopedia , Brittain's style is described as “lively, humorous, original and often biting” (Eng .: “lively, humorous, original and often biting”).

Together with John Spotton, Brittain created the documentary Memorandum in 1965 , which was rated by many critics as his best work. In it, a Holocaust survivor returns to Germany and embarks on a trip to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp , during which he relives memories in flashbacks.

In 1968 Brittain left the NFB and went to Japan, where he worked on the first IMAX film, Tiger Child . The short film was shown in the Fuji Group Pavilion at the Expo '70 in Osaka . In the 1970s and 1980s, Brittain worked as a freelance filmmaker for NFB and Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), which broadcast most of his films on television. He criticized the bureaucracy prevailing in both organizations, but positively emphasized that in Canada - in contrast to other countries - he even had the opportunity to implement his documentaries.

One of his most successful films was a documentary about British writer Malcolm Lowry , Volcano: An Inquiry Into the Life and Death of Malcolm Lowry (1976). Brittain and Robert Duncan were nominated for an Oscar in 1977 as its producers . The film crew also received six Canadian Film Awards, three of which went to Brittain, who co-directed with John Kramer and also served as screenwriter and producer.

In the documentary Paperland: The Bureaucrat Observed (1980), which has received four Genie Awards , Brittain illuminates situations in various countries where bureaucratism is assuming absurd proportions in an ironic and critical way . His two-hour docudrama Canada's Sweetheart: The Saga of Hal C. Banks (1985), about a controversial Canadian union official, also won several awards. The last major film project Brittain was able to complete was The King Chronicle (1987), a six-hour docu-drama TV miniseries about Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King .

Brittain has taught film as a visiting professor at McGill University , New York University and Columbia University, among others .

Brittain died of cancer in 1989 at the age of 61. His appointment as Officer of the Order of Canada in the same year was justified as follows: “Canada's premier documentary filmmaker and one of the world's finest, he has won countless prizes at key international film festivals for his masterful visual records of our social and cultural past. ”(“ Canada's leading documentary filmmaker and one of the world's best, he has won countless awards at key international film festivals for his masterful visual recordings of our social and cultural past. ”)

As part of the Canadian Screen Awards (or formerly Gemini Awards ), the Donald Brittain Award is presented in his memory to honor television documentaries with social or political topics.

The director Kent Martin made the documentary Donald Brittain: Filmmaker (1992) about him .

Awards (selection)

  • 1964: Canadian Film Award in the "Best General Information" category for Fields of Sacrifice
  • 1966: Canadian Film Award in the "Best TV Information" category for Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Leonard Cohen
  • 1967: Centennial Medal
  • 1977 : Oscar nomination for Best Documentary for Volcano: An Inquiry Into the Life and Death of Malcolm Lowry
  • 1975: Canadian Film Award (Etrog) in the "Best Non-Dramatic Script" category for Dreamland: A History of Early Canadian Movies 1895–1939
  • 1976: Canadian Film Awards (Etrog) in the categories "Best Documentary", "Best Direction - Non-Dramatic" and "Best Non-Dramatic Script" for Volcano: An Inquiry Into the Life and Death of Malcolm Lowry
  • 1980: Genie Awards in the categories “Outstanding Documentary - 30 Minutes and Over”, “Outstanding Direction in a Documentary” and “Outstanding Non-Dramatic Script” for Paperland: The Bureaucrat Observed
  • 1986: Gemini Awards in the categories "Best Direction in a Dramatic Program or Series", "Best Writing in a Dramatic Program" and "Best Writing in a Dramatic Program or Series" for Canada's Sweetheart: The Saga of Hal C. Banks
  • 1987: Gemini Award in the category “Best Writing in an Information / Documentary Program or Series” for Tommy Douglas: Keeper of the Flame
  • 1989: Officer of the Order of Canada

Filmography (selection)

  • 1962: Canada at War (TV series, 13 episodes)
  • 1963: Fields of Sacrifice
  • 1964: Bethune
  • 1965: Buster Keaton Rides Again
  • 1965: Ladies and Gentlemen ... Mr. Leonard Cohen
  • 1965: Memorandum
  • 1965: Stravinsky
  • 1966: Never a Backward Step
  • 1966: What on Earth!
  • 1967: labyrinth
  • 1968: Saul Alinsky Went to War
  • 1970: Tiger Child (short film)
  • 1974: King of the Hill
  • 1974: Dreamland
  • 1975: Whistling Smith
  • 1976: Volcano: An Inquiry Into the Life and Death of Malcolm Lowry
  • 1978: The Dionne Quintuplets
  • 1979: Paperland: The Bureaucrat Observed
  • 1981: On Guard for Thee
  • 1981: Running Man
  • 1984: The Children's Crusade
  • 1985: Canada's Sweetheart
  • 1986: Tommy Douglas: Keeper of the Flame
  • 1986: The Champions trilogy
  • 1987: The King Chronicle

literature

  • Terry Kolomeychuk: Donald Brittain: Never the Ordinary Way. National Film Board of Canada, Winnipeg 1991, ISBN 0-7722-0188-9 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Brittain, Donald Code. In: Creative Canada: a biographical dictionary of twentieth century creative and performing artists. University of Toronto Press, Toronto 1971.
  2. ^ A b Donald Brittain In: Canadian Film Encyclopedia ( Memento of September 26, 2007 in the Internet Archive ).
  3. ↑ Donald Brittain. In: The Canadian Encyclopedia . Retrieved January 3, 2019.
  4. ^ A b Robert M. Stamp: Brittain, Donald. In: The Canadian obituary record: a biographical record of Canadians who died in 1989. Dundurn Press, Toronto 1989.
  5. ^ Brittain, Donald Code In: Canadian who's who 1979. University of Toronto Press, Toronto 1979.
  6. ↑ a b Mr. Donald Brittain, OC, D.Litt., RCA gg.ca. Retrieved January 3, 2019.
personal data
SURNAME Brittain, Donald
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Brittain, Donald Code (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Canadian documentary filmmaker
DATE OF BIRTH June 10, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Ottawa
DATE OF DEATH July 21, 1989
Place of death Montreal