Polytechnique (2009)

A dramatization of the Montreal Massacre of 1989 where several female engineering students were murdered by an unstable misogynist.

Director:

Denis Villeneuve

Writers:

Jacques Davidts (scenario and dialogue), Denis Villeneuve (collaboration)

Stars:

Maxim Gaudette, Sébastien Huberdeau, Karine Vanasse

16 wins & 9 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Maxim Gaudette	...	The Killer
Sébastien Huberdeau	...	Jean-François
Karine Vanasse	...	Valérie
Martin Watier	...	Jean-François (voice)
Evelyne Brochu	...	Stéphanie
Johanne-Marie Tremblay	...	Jean-François' Mother
Natalie Hamel-Roy	...	Jean-François' Mother (voice) (as Nathalie Hamel-Roy)
Pierre-Yves Cardinal	...	Éric
Pierre Leblanc	...	Mr. Martineau
Francesca Barcenas	...	Injured Student at Copier
Eve Duranceau	...	Student with the Ear Injury
Mathieu Ledoux	...	Injured Student
Adam Kosh	...	Killer's Roommate
Larissa Corriveau	...	Killer's Neighboor
Manon Lapointe	...	Killer's Mother

Storyline

On December 6, 1989, a lone gunman walked into Montréal's École Polytechnique, a post-secondary institution focusing primarily in engineering, and began a shooting massacre. This event and its aftermath are shown from the perspective of three people. The first is the shooter himself, who blamed the problems in his life on who he considered feminists, such as female engineering students, who were his primary targets. This event was the culmination of a seven year plan, which had a self-defined end. The second is female mechanical engineering student Valérie, who earlier that day had an interview for her dream internship, working on an aerospace project. The interview process itself was a disturbing one for her in the stereotypical view by the male interviewer, who did not believe that females could work in the business and still have aspirations to have a family. And the third is Jean-François, Valérie's friend and fellow mechanical engineering student, who was one of the few who did ...

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Plot Keywords:

misogynist | gunman | in medias res | montreal quebec | insanity | 

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | History

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

Canada

Language:

French

Release Date:

14 January 2017 (Japan)

Also Known As:

Politechnika

Filming Locations:

Sir George-Étienne Cartier Monument, Montreal, Canada

Box Office

Opening Weekend:

CAD 214,419 (Canada), 8 February 2009

Company Credits

Production Co:

Remstar Media Partners,Remstar Productions,Don Carmody Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

77 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Director Denis Villeneuve was disappointed with his first two movies, Un 32 août sur terre (1998) and Maelstrom (2000), so he took a nine-year sabbatical as a stay-at-home dad. He vowed to return "when I was ready to make a film I could be proud of", which was Polytechnique (2009).

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Quotes

Valérie: If I have a boy, I'll teach him how to love. If I have a girl, I'll tell her the world is hers.

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Alternate Versions

In addition to the French-Canadian language version, an English language version was also shot (back-to-back).

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Connections

Featured in The Hour: Episode #7.83 (2011)

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Soundtracks

Tainted Love
Written by Ed Cobb
Embassy Music Corporation
Performed by Mark Arnell
With permission of Music Sales Corporation

User Reviews

Meh

I wasn't terribly impressed by this movie, in fact at times I found it rather boring, especially the last 20 minutes which felt a bit pointless.

The first 40 minutes were alright though, even though I have no idea what the point was in filming it all in black & white (didn't know it was gonna be and the poster is slightly misleading as that is indeed in colour) it's set in 1987 after all not 1957, but I'm sure many think that that was a brilliant idea.

Anyway, lack of colours aside, yeah I wasn't terribly impressed with it, you don't get to know the characters much, or what made the killer actually snap (what made him hate feminists remains a mystery).

I mean I understand that maybe they didn't want to take too many liberties with the script, but maybe it would have worked better as a documentary instead. And then we'd get a little more insight as well.

The true story of which it's based is of course awful but that doesn't make the story anymore engaging, at least for me, certain others disagree and that's fine good for them.