Vaudreuil-Dorion filmmaker spotlights women in politics
The stories of the Fathers of Confederation have been well-told, but many of the women involved in politics and community life before, during and after Confederation remain unknown to all but the most committed Canadian history buffs.
A new series of web-based documentary short films to be developed in Vaudreuil-Dorion by local filmmaker Natalie Poirier hopes to change that.
Through her multimedia production company, Kinescope, Poirier plans to produce a series of five bilingual films designed to be viewed online and shared via social media. Each film will be about five minutes long. Poirier will also produce a trailer to be distributed in promotion of the five shorts.
The series will be called “From Nellie to Today / De Nellie à au jour d’hui,” inspired by Nellie McClung, a trail-blazing suffragette and one of the Famous Five who launched a legal challenge in 1927 demanding that women in Canada be legally recognized as “persons” under the law and therefore eligible to run for political office.
Poirier, who has four daughters of her own, said she has personally struggled with how to become more involved in her community while still being present for her family. She hopes her interview subjects will open up about the real challenges they face balancing family life with public life, and hopes that the films will open a dialogue about how politics can change to become more appealing for women.
“I want to humanize the politicians. They are not superwomen,” Poirier said.
Each film will focus on a particular aspect of women in politics, such as why they became interested in politics, the impact of a political career on family life, and life after politics. The films will aim to include women of note from history, as well as today.
“There will be a historical aspect in all of the five videos. We will always start with where we were, where we are today, where are we aiming for, and what’s next,” she said.
The films will be designed both for viewing one at a time online and to be screened in a sequence of videos at public events or in school classrooms.
Research work began last September. Poirier is currently approaching current and former female politicians from across Canada to participate in the documentary. She expects to eventually launch Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts to share her progress on the project.
While the project is backed by a $50,000 grant from the Canada 150 Fund to get it off the ground, Poirier said additional funding will be necessary to achieve her ambition to travel across Canada to remote regions such as Nunavut.
Ideally, Poirier would like the documentary series to reflect the experiences of women in politics from coast to coast to coast.
“It’s going to be all about storytelling,” she noted.