Bittersweet Memories (film)
Bittersweet Memories | |
---|---|
French | Ma vie en cinémascope |
Directed by | Denise Filiatrault |
Written by | Denise Filiatrault |
Produced by | Daniel Louis Denise Robert |
Starring | Pascale Bussières Michel Barrette |
Cinematography | Pierre Mignot |
Edited by | Yvann Thibaudeau |
Music by | Jean Robitaille Jean-Sébastien Robitaille Paul Bisson |
Distributed by | Alliance Atlantis Vivafilm |
Release date |
|
Running time | 105 minutes |
Country | Canada |
Language | French |
Bittersweet Memories (French: Ma vie en cinémascope; lit. My Life in Cinemascope) is a Quebec, Canada film released in 2004. This biographical drama depicted the career of Quebec singer Alys Robi, as portrayed by Pascale Bussières. The film makes use of flashback sequences in order to connect her childhood, adolescence and adulthood to her later emotional crisis.
Plot
Alice, later Alys, is a teenager who wants to go to
Catholic
upbringing.
Canada joins the
Second World War, with protests in Quebec against conscription. Alys begins touring Quebec's military bases, giving her a successful career as a pin-up girl. She eventually meets Lucio Agostini, a composer and married man, who gets her a job with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
. She wants him to marry her, which her refuses, which triggers her descent into addiction and depression.
Her condition worsens when her little brother Gerard is diagnosed with spina bifida, a birth defect that will later take his life. She is eventually diagnosed with
hebephrenia, a form of schizophrenia. She spends five and a half years in an asylum, receiving multiple electroshock therapies and a lobotomy
. The treatment is successful, and she returns to her career.
External links
- Bittersweet Memories at IMDb
- Ma Vie en cinémascope at The Canadian Encyclopedia (in French)