Killer snowplow takes Tribeca
Anyone who’s experienced the absurdity and terror of being nearly run over by one of Montreal’s little sidewalk snowplows will certainly relate to the feature debut of screenwriter Marc Tulin, BA 99.
Co-written with and directed by Tulin’s long-time creative collaborator Emanuel Hoss-Desmarais, Whitewash premieres April 19 at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival, with additional screenings April 21 and 27. “I just like the idea of someone running over someone else with the snowplow because it’s almost happened to me a million times,” laughs Tulin, who lives in the Montreal area with his wife and two young children.
“Out of that idea, Emanuel and I started thinking why and where this would happen. But the spark was really these snowplows that are just driving down Montreal streets at 80 miles per hour, and wondering what would happen if you actually ran down someone and had reason to run away.”
Starring American actor Thomas Haden Church and Quebecer Marc Labrèche (in his first English-language role), the dark comedy follows the writing pair’s two shorts, Table 13 and Marius Borodine. The latter was ranked one of Canada’s best 10 shorts by the Toronto International Film Festival in 2010 and nominated for a Canadian film Genie Award the following year.
Whitewash examines the theme of guilt’s psychological prison. Bruce (Haden Church) lives in Northern Quebec during a brutal winter. “He’s really down on his luck, he’s a widower and has a bit of a drinking problem, and he meets this guy Paul [Labrèche],” Tulin explains.
“Paul is about to kill himself when Bruce intervenes, and he moves into Bruce’s house. Eventually they have a fight and Bruce runs down Paul with his tiny little sidewalk snow removal machine and accidentally kills him. Bruce flees to the forest and spends the winter living in this little snowplow. He becomes, in a way, dependent for his own survival on the weapon of his crime.”
Up next for Tulin and Hoss-Desmarais is another feature, Birthmarked. It will be produced by Item 7, the company led by Concordia graduate Pierre Even, GrDip 90 (communication studies). Item 7 also produced last year’s award-winning and Oscar-nominated film War Witch.
With three university degrees and a professional history that includes stints with the CBC, the United Nations, a Paris-based economic think tank, the communications department at Université de Montréal and freelance communications consulting, how did this Montreal native get into screenwriting? And, how did he find the time?
Tulin remembers his life in Paris being quite solitary. So, “with nothing better to do,” he says, he spent weekends writing film scripts.
“Screenwriting was like a blank page where I could do whatever I wanted, because all the other forms of writing I’d been doing — such as in the newsroom where I had 30 seconds or 120 words to tell a story — were very confined. The fact that I could just make up quotes as I go along and invent stories was such a liberating process,” recalls Tulin, who adds that he’d love to teach screenwriting someday.
He reveals that screenwriting was just a hobby at first. “I read a lot of books on it. I still don’t believe I’ve mastered the craft. I think it takes a lifetime,” he admits. “It’s a weird art form in that the end result isn’t the piece of art, it’s just the blueprint for someone else to work with and create something.”
For instance, it took three years to get financing after writing Whitewash in 2008 —which Tulin says is quite fast in the film business. “When your work of art costs millions of dollars to produce, everyone gets a say at some point.
“At first, of course, it’s your idea, and you sit down and it takes a couple of months — in our case, six months or a year — to come up with a first draft. Then the producers have a few comments, then the distributor, then the funding agencies. It’s a very long process to write a film, so to have it get made is very exciting.”
Tulin also credits Concordia, where he studied journalism, for his writing training and confidence with the English language. “I’m half English, half French, and before Concordia I was wary to work in English,” he says. “So I’ve always had a special affection for Concordia.”
Related links:
• Concordia's Department of Journalism
• Tribeca Film Festival
• Marc Tulin on IMDB