Playa Coloniale

Three decades after the shuttering of the mining town of Schefferville, the Innu people, who moved in after the non-natives abandoned the town, are facing a new challenge: the iron mines are about to be reopened. Land, identity and legitimacy are central to the dialogue between peoples locked in parallel struggles, the Québécois and the First Nations.

This short documentary transports us to the Saint-Félicien racetrack, where engines are running hot and excitement has reached a fever pitch. With its thunderous soundtrack, jarring backfires and choking clouds of smoke, Martin Bureau's Hell Runs on Gasoline! takes us deep inside a chaotic battle to the finish. Race cars hit the track, accidents pile up and the flames of burning engines wreak havoc - an infernal vision that soon dissipates into an eerily silent cemetery of abandoned carcasses.

Huge bonfires are lit by Protestants in Northern Ireland on July 12 each year, as part of the celebrations of the 1690 Battle of the Boyne. They are made from wooden pallets, tires, and garbage. To the Protestants, they are symbols of identity affirmation; to the Catholics, they mean arrogance and humiliation.

Blending video art, documentary and music video, Martin Bureau’s film explores the abuses of Western society, at once ravaged by late-stage capitalism and unable to free itself from it. A visceral image and sound experience, All Things Are No Longer Equal juxtaposes an aesthetic of excess and domination with the measured critical commentary of philosopher Alain Deneault, calling for reinvented forms of collective and local solidarity.