reFrame Films and les Productions du Boulevard is the home of award-winning filmmakers Garry Beitel and Barry Lazar, who produce enduring social documentaries about compelling contemporary subjects.
What's New
Giota’s Journey
47 minutes 2011
Directed by Garry Beitel
An intimate portrait of Giota Boussios, a 48-year-old Montreal woman, born with cerebral palsy.
Warm, good humoured, acutely sensitive and keenly intelligent, Giota is wheelchair-bound and unable to speak. She has learned to communicate through an intriguing system that uses subtle eye movements and slight facial gestures. Supported by a loving Greek family, she spends her days at an educational program for adults with similar disabilities. Giota’s Journey explores her unique relationships with family and caregivers, her dreams of love and travel, the poetry of her eyes and words. Here is a short excerpt.
Giota’s Journey is an official selection of
Les Rendez-vous du cinema quebecois
The film will be screened on
Saturday Feb 18 at 6 PM
Grande Bibliothèque Auditorium
475 boul. Maisonneuve est
Montreal H2L 5C4
Les Rendez-vous du cinema quebecois
Bourse de carrière (Lifetime Achievement Award)
Garry Beitel is the 2011 recipient of the Bourse de carrière (for lifetime achievement) awarded annually by the Conseil des arts et des letters de Québec. He is the first Anglophone filmmaker in Quebec to receive this prestigious award.
Bonjour! Shalom!
Les Productions du Boulevard is now the Canadian distributor for Garry Beitel’s award winning documentary. Described by the Gazette’s John Griffin as “…a remarkable look at twin solitudes… insightful, compassionate and beautifully composed…”, Bonjour! Shalom! takes us inside the relationship between the Hassidic Jews in Montreal’s Outremont district and their predominantly Francophone neighbours.
Now available on DVD to commemorate the 20th anniversary of its first release in 1991.
More than Half the Sky
21 minutes 2010
Directed by Garry Beitel
A documentary for the University of Manitoba highlighting the efforts by Canadian social workers to introduce basic social work practice to cadres working with women in rural China.
The “Socalled” Movie
87 min 2010
Directed by Garry Beitel, produced by Barry Lazar (reFrame) and Ravida Din (NFB)
Feature documentary on Montreal-based musical wizard Josh Dolgin a.k.a. Socalled.
“If Woody Allen and Lil Wayne had a lovechild, it would be Josh Dolgin, a.k.a. Socalled, the Montreal-based hip-hop-klezmer-funk musician at the centre of this kaleidoscopic documentary about one man’s incredible creative process.” – Lynne Ferrie, Hot Docs 2010
“a marvelously textured and intriguing portrait of the artist as an almost-young man.“ **** (4 stars) – The Gazette’s Bill Brownstein
English version broadcast on Super Channel and Ovation. French version (Socalled, le film) was broadcast on ARTV.
The “Socalled” Movie was awarded the Mike Moskovitz Prize for Best Film on a Jewish Theme by the Jewish Public Library of Montreal
Upcoming Screenings in Montreal
Feb 9 7:30 PM – Socalled le Film (French version)
Maison de la Culture Cote-des-Neiges
5290 chemin Cote-des-Neiges
Screening info here
Feb 29 7:30 PM – Socalled le Film (French version)
Maison de la Culture NDG
3755 rue Botrel
Screening info here
Director Garry Beitel will be at both screenings for a Q & A after the film
The DVD (with extra scenes) is available through Mongrel Films.
Twice Upon a Garden
52 min 2010
Directed by Philippe Baylaucq, produced by Barry Lazar and Garry Beitel
Documentary on the Gaspe’s Metis Gardens – captures the lush beauty through the changing seasons of Quebec’s most visited garden.
The world tour of award winning FIFA films – including Twice Upon a Garden which won the ARTV People’s Choice Award – has now finished. Cities included Washington, D.C. (at the National Gallery of Art), Paris (at the Musée de Louvre) and Turcoing in France, London, England (at the Tate Modern), Boston, New York City, and Ottawa.
Twice Upon a Garden was nominated for a Golden Sheaf at the Yorkton Film Festival in the category: Nature/Environment Documentary.
The DVD is now available and includes English and French versions of the film and over 100 photos – Métis Gardens flower photos by Louise Tanguay and archival photos of Elsie Reford.
If you belong to a library or garden club, contact us to arrange a screening.
To purchase DVDs of our films, click Order Films.