Nick de Pencier Movies
Nick de Pencier began making short films while studying at McGill University of Montreal, Canada in the late 1980's. He then moved to New York City and worked as a researcher for PBS in their documentary film division. Back in Toronto, he began working in production on feature films and produced and directed the video segments and interviews for the CD-ROM Understanding McLuhan, published by Southam/Voyager. He was a producer resident in the Canadian Film Center's 1997 Producers' Lab. As a Director of Photography, de Pencier has shot music videos, industrials, documentaries, segments for The National (Canada), and contributed regularly to CBC Newsworld's On The Arts and Ph@t TV. He has also directed and photographed seven modern dance performance films, which won awards at international festivals. He is the producer and cinematographer of Let It Come Down: The Life of Paul Bowles(1998) and Unlikely Pilgrimage (1998) both directed by Jennifer Baichwal. ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, All Movie Guide- 2009
- NR
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Documentarian Jennifer Baichwal helmed this reflective documentary that ponders the spiritual, emotional, and metaphysical ramifications of being struck by a lightning bolt. According to the National Weather Service, the odds of this incident befalling any given person are about one in 700,000, which makes many a survivor question why he or she fell prey to this unusual calamity; some infer a cosmic reason, some reject that possibility, but most fall somewhere in between as they feebly attempt to come to terms with it. In the film, Baichwal speaks with a number of well-known victims, including the novelist and screenwriter Paul Auster (The Music of Chance), the improv-driven prog rock guitarist Fred Frith, and others, and evaluates how the interviewees' lives forked off in new directions after a massive discharge of electricity descended from the sky and landed on them. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Paul Auster, James O'Reilly, (more)
- 2008
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This nature documentary from NOVA follows the epic migration of the monarch butterfly over 2000 miles, providing a butterfly's-eye-view as the two month journey passes over forests, swamps, desserts, and open water, eventually touching down at their destination in Mexio. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stockard Channing
- 2008
Confronted by his own mortality after being diagnosed with virulent form of cancer, a disillusioned twenty-something rails against the many disappointments in his life by impulsively purchasing a motorcycle and heading out west, instead of taking his doctor's advice to begin immediate treatment. Ben Tyler (Joshua Jackson) has an unfulfilling job as a high school English teacher and a manuscript that's gathering dust after being rejected by every publisher in town. And while Ben is undeniably comfortable in his relationship with faithful fiancée Samantha (Liane Balaban), he can't help but feeling that there's something in their relationship that he has never truly confronted. Informed by his doctor that he is suffering from a highly malignant form of cancer and has only a 10% chance of survival if he begins treatment immediately, Ben rails against his fate by straddling a vintage motorcycle and embarking on a 4,000 kilometer journey from Toronto to Tofino, B.C., meeting a variety of people who help him understand what it truly means to be alive along the way. Later, while hiking in Banff, Ben becomes dangerously sick and desperately lost before an intense encounter with a woman named Tracey (Emm Gryner) convinces him once and for all that he isn't in love with Samantha. In the emotional aftermath of that encounter, Ben terminates his relationship with Tracey and makes a pledge to live a lifetime with each passing day. It isn't long before Ben's condition begins to deteriorate, however, and by the time he finally arrives at mile zero of the Trans-Canada highway, he's fresh out of road and seriously close to death. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Joshua Jackson, Liane Balaban, (more)
- 2007
The nature documentary Four Wings and a Prayer charts the life of the monarch butterfly. The film shows the life cycle of the animal, paying special attention to its migratory patterns and the animal's relationship with its environment. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
Documentarian Jennifer Baichwal's latest film, Manufactured Landscapes, represents a multifaceted effort. The picture ostensibly provides a thought-provoking investigation of photographer Edward Burtynsky's legacy, with its aesthetic studies of industrial landscapes. But Baichwal's documentary probes deeper than a mere surface-level glimpse of Burtynsky's life and work. It uses the topic of Burtynsky as a springboard, segueing, from there, into a protracted exploration of "the aesthetic, social and spiritual dimensions of industrialization and globalization." Whereas Burtynsky's photographs reveal human beings dwarfed by the massive industrialized landscape that surrounds them, Baichwal (much as Louis Malle did in his Humain, trop Humain) sheds a light on the tedium and monotony suffered by workers who are assigned small components of huge manufacturing processes, and must endure the repetitive work that it entails. She and cinematographer Peter Mettler also travel to China and Bangladesh - the corner of the world that serves as a destination for much of the west's industrial waste - and convey the devastating impact that corporate disposal makes on indigenes - such as the two young men who must wade around, waist deep, in toxic sludge while tearing ships apart with their bare hands. The picture thus raises some significant and sobering questions about the impact that we, as humans, make on our environment. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- 2002
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Like many photographers, Shelby Lee Adams has a favored subject, and in his case he prefers to turn the lens of his camera on the poor Appalachian families of Eastern Kentucky. As a fellow Kentuckian, the Appalachians are an area and a people Adams knows well, but while his subjects usually live in devastating poverty, Adams was the son of a wealthy and privileged family, and as his work began to attract a worldwide audience, many began to question if Adams was attempting an honest portrayal of lives lived under near-tragic circumstances, or if the photographer was exploiting the naivete and subjects and playing on stereotypes of the poor in the Deep South. The True Meaning of Pictures: Shelby Lee Adams' Appalachia is a documentary which offers an in-depth look at Adams and his work, as well as the people he documents and the perspectives of other photographers. The True Meaning Of Pictures was directed by Jennifer Baichwal, who previously helmed the acclaimed documentary Let it Come Down: The Life of Paul Bowles. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- 2001
A nice guy discovers just how complicated his life can get in this quirky comedy-drama. John Toma (Chris Owens), an Italian immigrant living in Canada, is the manager of a successful Italian restaurant. John's work puts no small amount of pressure on him, and it hardly helps that he's having an affair with Rochelle (Veronika Hurnik), the wife of the owner, Lino Rossi (Dino Tavarone), who is adamant that John take over the business some day. John hardly gets any respite at home, where he has to look after his rather eccentric family. His elderly mother Talia (Nicola Lipman), whose husband abandoned the family years before, refuses to learn to speak English. His thirty-ish sister Celia (Tara Rosling), who is mentally retarded, has recently become keenly interested in sex and motherhood -- and has developed the bad habit of bringing home babies she's taken from women in the neighborhood. And John's younger brother Marco (Kelly Harms) is stumbling through college, more interested in sports than in his grades. John's problems come to a head when Rochelle announces she wants a baby, and since Lino isn't interested in helping her get pregnant, she wants John to do the honors. The Uncles was the first feature film directed by Jim Allodi, who is better known for his work as a character actor. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Chris Owens
- 1999
Documentarian Jennifer Baichwal (Let It Come Down: The Life of Paul Bowles) delves into her own family history with The Holier It Gets. The video, originally produced for Canadian television, tells the story of Baichwal's trip to India to fulfill the wishes of her late father, who had asked for his ashes to be submerged in the Ganges in a traditional Hindi ritual. This desire surprised his children, who never thought of their father as a religious man. Baichwal goes into her family history, describing how her father, an Indian doctor, married her mother, a British woman, and emigrated to Canada to raise a family. Baichwal travels back to India with her brother and two sisters, while her husband, Nick de Pencier, documents the trip on video. The family is shocked at the chaos and squalor of Bombay when they arrive, and Baichwal begins to wonder whether or not they will find the spiritual fulfillment they seek on their journey. Arriving at the city of Varanasi, which was recommended to them as a holy city in which to perform their ceremony, the siblings are dismayed to find the Ganges filthy and crowded, and decide they have to balance their British side (a desire for cleanliness and privacy) with their Indian side (the spirit of their father's request). They travel up the Ganges into the Himalayas, on a harrowing drive, to find a more tranquil spot. But in Badrinath, a Hindu priest tells them that the tributary they seek is not the proper place to submerge their father's ashes. The more rivers that flow into the Ganges, it is explained to them, "the holier it gets." ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide
- 1998
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Expatriate American writer Paul Bowles came to the limelight with an adaptation to screen by Bernardo Bertolucci of his first novel The Sheltering Sky. Subsequently, ambitious documentarists from several countries went down to Tangiers, Morocco where Bowles has been living for more than 50 years to capture the last days of an aging artist and composer, who played an important role in shaping the artistic trends of the 20th century along with other celebrities such as Allen Ginsberg, Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams and William S. Burroughs.
In this definitive film biography which took director Jennifer Baichwal more than four years to complete, the 87-year-old Bowles reflects on his life, work and friends while lying in bed at his home in Tangier smoking kif (cannabis) from an elegant black cigarette holder. Although his monologue serves as the structure of the film, director Baichwal cuts to archival footage of North Africa in the 1930s and 1940s to set the mood and uses the comments of late William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and David Herbert on Bowles and his work to counterbalance what Bowles says about the same issues. Moroccan writer Mohammed Choukri's harsh analysis of the expatriate scene in Morocco before Independence provides another perspective.
One of the highlights of the film is the exclusive footage of the last meeting of Bowles, Burroughs and Ginsberg in 1995 in a Manhattan hotel room in New York before the latter two passed away. This was Bowles's first visit to the U.S. in 33 years at the invitation of The EO Orchestra, which performed two sold-out performances of his music at the Lincoln Center. Let It Come Down is compact and well balanced. It avoids being voyeuristic, which is not easy to do considering the iconoclastic nature of its subject. Whether it brings the viewer closer to the enigmatic artist is arguable, simply because as Burroughs says of Bowles' autobiography, he might look like he's saying a lot about himself, but in fact, "he says nothing." ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, All Movie Guide
In this definitive film biography which took director Jennifer Baichwal more than four years to complete, the 87-year-old Bowles reflects on his life, work and friends while lying in bed at his home in Tangier smoking kif (cannabis) from an elegant black cigarette holder. Although his monologue serves as the structure of the film, director Baichwal cuts to archival footage of North Africa in the 1930s and 1940s to set the mood and uses the comments of late William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and David Herbert on Bowles and his work to counterbalance what Bowles says about the same issues. Moroccan writer Mohammed Choukri's harsh analysis of the expatriate scene in Morocco before Independence provides another perspective.
One of the highlights of the film is the exclusive footage of the last meeting of Bowles, Burroughs and Ginsberg in 1995 in a Manhattan hotel room in New York before the latter two passed away. This was Bowles's first visit to the U.S. in 33 years at the invitation of The EO Orchestra, which performed two sold-out performances of his music at the Lincoln Center. Let It Come Down is compact and well balanced. It avoids being voyeuristic, which is not easy to do considering the iconoclastic nature of its subject. Whether it brings the viewer closer to the enigmatic artist is arguable, simply because as Burroughs says of Bowles' autobiography, he might look like he's saying a lot about himself, but in fact, "he says nothing." ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, All Movie Guide
