Year: 1973
Language: French
Format: 16mm Black & White
Runtime: 95 min
Director: Jean-Guy Noël
Producer: René Gueissaz
Executive Producer: Marc Daigle
Writer: Jean-Guy Noël
Cinematographer: François Beauchemin
Editor: Marthe de la Chevrotière
Sound: Claude Beaugrand, Pierre Blain
Music: Michel Gonneville
Cast: Guy L'Écuyer, Pierre Curzi, Louise Francoeur, Raymond Lévesque, Serge Thériault, Marie Eykel, Janine Lebel, Gabriel Arcand
Production Company: Les Productions Prisma Inc., Association Coopérative des Productions Audio-visuelles

Twenty-three-year-old Gabriel (Gabriel Arcand) is the local fireman in a small village in the Mauricie region of Quebec where his father (Guy L’Écuyer) is both fire chief and mayor. One day he decides to leave his family, his job and the village and live alone on an abandoned farm in the mountains. He has breakfast each morning with the political poet Letendre, who lives in a tent in a nearby wood. The village, meanwhile, is in danger of burning and one after another the townsfolk arrive to persuade Gabriel to return to the fire pump. His sister Nicole (Louise Francoeur) fails to sway him, even after telling him the fire has already claimed several lives. His father offers a bigger salary but again Gabriel refuses. The village priest (Raymond Lévesque) chats man-to-man to Gabriel about the danger to his immortal soul, but Gabriel continues to resist. When his mother arrives with his father’s body in a coffin, he just plays his fiddle. Finally, Gabriel moves to Montreal, where he believes people have freedom of choice, but finds himself in the same bind as before.

This first feature by Jean-Guy Noël blends comic fantasy and observation in a gentle piece of social satire. Along with André Forcier’s Bar salon, Tu brûles … tu brûles ... marked the emergence of a new generation of Quebec filmmakers.

By: Peter Morris