Julian Biggs

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Julian Biggs (born February 24, 1920 in Port Perry , Province of Ontario , Canada , † December 4, 1972 in Montreal , Province of Québec , Canada) was a Canadian film producer , film director , screenwriter and filmmaker , who produced the short film Paddle to the Sea was nominated for an Oscar and for Herring Hunt , with which the National Film Board of Canada was nominated, as director was responsible. Biggs was on the National Board of Canada.

biography

Julian Biggs graduated from the University of Toronto . During the Second World War he served in the Canadian Army and was a member of the Navy. In 1951 he joined the National Film Board as a production assistant and writer. His first film there was the documentary short Oyster Man made that same year, which he co-directed with Jean Palardy and also wrote the script. The film deals with different stages of oyster farming in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence . This was followed in 1952 by the short films With the Canadians in Korea about the living conditions and military operations of the 25th Canadian Infantry Brigade during the Korean War and The Son about a farmer's son who wants to leave his country to campaign for more independence. Biggs first appeared as a producer, directed and wrote the script for the short documentary Let's Talk About Films , released the following year . Biggs directed the Oscar-nominated short documentary, Herring Hunt , which tells the story of a trawler and herring catch.

The 1965 film 23 Skidoo , for which Biggs was responsible for direction and editing, was nominated for a BAFTA Award in the “Best Short Film” category and for a UN Award. Julian Biggs was praised for his film at the Krakow Film Festival . The experimental film shows urban areas without a soul. The short film Paddle to the Sea , produced by Biggs , for which he received an Oscar nomination, follows the stages of an Indian figure carved by the young Kyle, sitting in a canoe, who the boy put in the water so that she can embark on a journey that he is likely to do never will be able to do. In 1966 Biggs was entrusted with the management of English productions. From 1968 onwards, he returned to his own productions, including several of the early NFB dramas and the Perspective series. It is a series of thirty-minute dramas between 1956 and 1958. The focus was on documentaries that focus on social issues such as alcoholism, drug addiction or adolescence , as well as films about older people and their sensitivities or racial problems. One example of this was the short film Monkey on the Back , directed by Biggs , tragic and gloomy, in which people try in vain to break free from drug addiction. As the successor to the series that was discontinued in the spring of 1958, the documentary series Candid Ayes was launched, which was dedicated to topics such as the Salvation Army, tobacco growing in Ontario and the police in Toronto.

In his last film work, the 1970 documentary A Little Fellow from Gambo: The Joey Smallwood Story , Biggs portrayed Newfoundland's Prime Minister Joey Smallwood . For this work he was honored in the same year at the Canadian Film Awards with a prize in the category "Best Director". Biggs had already dealt with the following Canadian personalities in his short films made in 1961/1962:

Julian Biggs died in his native Canada at the age of 52.

Filmography (selection)

as a producer, unless otherwise stated

  • 1951: Oyster Man (short documentary; director)
  • 1952: With the Canadians in Korea (short documentary; director + author)
  • 1952: The Son (short film; director + author)
  • 1953: Let's Talk About Films (short documentary; + director + author)
  • 1953: Eye Witness No. 57 (short film; + director)
  • 1953: Herring Hunt (documentary short film; director)
  • 1954: Pilgrim Geese (short film)
  • 1954: Dresden Story (short documentation; + director + editor)
  • 1954: Basic Rescue No. 1 to No. 5 (short films)
  • 1955: Why Grow Fat Hogs? (Documentary short film; + direction)
  • 1955: Chickens by the Million (short documentary film)
  • 1956: The Yellow Leaf (short film)
  • 1956: Monkey on the Back (short film; director)
  • 1956: Canadians Abroad (short film)
  • 1956: Back Into the Sun (short film)
  • 1957: Wolfe and Montcalm (short film)
  • 1957: Who Is Sylvia? (Short film)
  • 1957: Capital City (short film)
  • 1958: School for the Stage (documentary short film; director)
  • 1958: Conquest of Cold (documentary; director)
  • 1959: UN in the Classroom (short documentation)
  • 1959: Grassland Farming (short documentation)
  • 1960: This Electronic World (documentary short film; director)
  • 1960: On Prescription Only (documentary short; director)
  • 1961: William Lyon Mackenzie: A Friend to His Country (short film)
  • 1961: Robert Baldwin: A Matter of Principle (short film)
  • 1961: Louis-Joseph Papineau: The Demi God (short film)
  • 1961: Joseph Howe: The Tribune of Nova Scotia (short film; + director)
  • 1961: John A. Macdonald: The Impossible Idea (short film)
  • 1961: Charles Tupper: The Big Man (short film)
  • 1962: Georges-Étienne Cartier: The Lion of Québec (short film)
  • 1962: Alexander Galt: The Stubborn Idealist (short film; + director)
  • 1963: Three Grandmothers (documentary short film; director)
  • 1963: Canada: White Goods (short documentation)
  • 1963: Canada: Animal Vaccine (short documentation)
  • 1964: Three Country Boys (documentary short film; + director)
  • 1964: Phoebe (short film)
  • 1965: Train ride with Buster Keaton ( The Railrodder ; short film)
  • 1965: 23 Skidoo (short film; + director + editor)
  • 1965: Buster Keaton Rides Again (documentary)
  • 1965: John Hirsch: A Portrait of a Man and a Theater (short documentary)
  • 1966: Paddle to the Sea (documentary short film)
  • 1966: High Steel (short documentation)
  • 1966: Notes for a Film About Donna & Gail
  • 1966: Each Day That Comes (short film)
  • 1967: Anti-submarine Warfare: Maritime Briefing (short documentary; director)
  • 1970: A Little Fellow from Gambo: The Joey Smallwood Story (documentary; + director + author)

Film about himself

  • 1955: Raising the Hogs the Marekt Wants (documentary short film)

Awards

Krakow Film Festival 1965

  • Honorable mention for his film 23 Skidoo

British Academy Film Awards 1965

  • Nomination of the film 23 Skidoo for the BAFTA Award in the category "Best Short Film"
  • The film 23 Skidoo was nominated for the United Nations Award

Academy Awards 1968

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Peter Morris: The Film Companion , Toronto, 1984, Irwin Publishing, pp. 30 ff., 237, 238.
  2. ↑ The 26th Academy Awards | 1954 see oscars.org (English)
  3. ↑ The 40th Academy Awards | 1968 see oscars.org. (English)
personal data
SURNAME Biggs, Julian
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Canadian film producer, film director, screenwriter and filmmaker
DATE OF BIRTH February 24, 1920
PLACE OF BIRTH Port Perry , Ontario Province , Canada
DATE OF DEATH 4th December 1972
Place of death Montreal , Province of Quebec , Canada