Take One (Dec 2003 - Mar 2004)

The picture opens on Ste-—Marie—La—M auderne’s Part of a trend that included Denys Arcand’s Les Invasions barbares, Pouliot’s film did better numbers than massively supported releases like The Hulk, Pirates of the Caribbean and Terminator 3, earning over $6 million during its inital Quebec release. Then it was a Special Presentation at the Toronto International Film Festival, closed the Independent Feature Film Project Market (IFP) in New York City and took the Bayard d’Or, top prize at the Festival of Francophone Films in Namur, Belgium. The packed house in Toronto’s cavernous Elgin Theatre “was one of the best audiences,” Pouliot told me. Although he worried about issues like cultural differences and language, as he did in Cannes, both audiences were “there from the very, very beginning,” even applauding an early sight gag. “They loved it, something that did not happen in New York.” To gauge reaction at the IFP, Pouliot says he used a time-honoured method: a lengthy post-screening piss. While the indie types in the wash room liked the film, they didn’t exactly give it up for Seducing Doctor Lewis. The news about the movie sweetened even more when remake inquiries came in from the United States. Yet, however elated Pouliot might be about this prospect, he wants to see his original version earn all possible returns before Americans do their take on the story. Clearly, the film has the kind of universal appeal that ranks as the Holy Grail of the Canadian film industry. Watching Seducing Doctor Lewis, you can easily imagine it being transposed from Quebec to Maine, or northern California. Written by Ken Scott (who previously wrote the 2000 hit La Vie aprés Pamour), the bittersweet comedy unfolds on a remote island where fishermen who can’t earn a living collect welfare cheques and mourn the loss of the days when they had independence and self-respect. ‘The picture opens on Ste-Marie-La-Mauderne’s only village, nestling under a starry sky. We hear a chorus of hyperbolic orgasms, and then exhalations of smoke puff out of the village chimneys. That was the storybook past, when happy lovemaking capped a satisfying working day. In the present, romantic moonlight is replaced by wan, North Atlantic greyness and unshaven men trudging to the post DECEMBER 2003 — MARCH 2004 office to collect their government dole. But before the islanders collapse into total inertia, they have one last shot at redemption. An entrepreneur will hire them to work in a small factory he intends to build on Ste—Marie, but only if they meet an insurance company stipulation that they have a resident doctor. The businessman, played by 1970s vedette Donald Pilon, also demands a hefty bribe. It’s a classic set up. Ste-Marie has never had its own doctor, and when the islanders mass—mail a solicitation to every physician in Quebec, they are greeted by dead silence. Scott’s plot kicks in when, by a twist of fate and some benevolent blackmail, a young doctor is forced to leave Montreal and’ spend a month on the windswept outport. For the rest of the picture, the locals try to entice Christopher Lewis (David Boutin) into a long— term commitment by satisfying his every need and desire. They research him thoroughly before he arrives, and when he is installed in what they deem to be the island’s classiest home, they promptly tap his phone. Dr. Lewis’s conversations with his girlfriend reveal his favourite foods, taste in