Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney is, in the words of our former honourable Prime Minister from Baie-Comeau, a "little bit of genius in everybody that causes something to happen in Canada, and that thing has got to be rewarded.” And rewarded it shall be: With post-modern satire that is both gentle and savage.
Matthew Rankin’s propulsive, stylised and hyper-ironic political tele-visual remix is a work of staggering amusement. Both him and his team have assembled an unfathomable amount of archival footage and RetroOntario ephemera.
They have leavened it with sensational fantasia-constructs, and slathered it all visually with the remix-aesthetic of 21st century Twitch-collective RacerTrash set to the sounds of Francophone electro-pop. The result is a whirligig of Canadian political machination, Game of Thrones filtered through the lens of Hockey Night in Canada whilst on the giggling-high of British Columbia cannabis. All tax-payer funded, of course.
You do not have to necessarily be hip to the paradoxical political party named the Progressive Conservatives that occupied the Canadian right from the back half of the 20th century, mainly losing elections to the juggernaut Liberal party. Such things rarely leave Canada's borders.
If you are, you can further appreciate the razor wit of many of the broader political jokes and obscure media references that lock together like lego blocks adorned with sparkling rhinestones and VHS tracking errors. Be advised that there are more Canadian in-jokes than a binge-watch of SCTV.
The rise of Brian Mulroney (figuratively, and quite literally as he is launched, Liberace-like in a sparkling cape from a retro-futuristic Ferrari to the rafters of the 1976 leadership convention, only to disappear quietly into an ocean of blue balloons) and his circuitous, often machiavellian, path towards PC party dominance that resulted in his landslide victory in 1984, is offered in five parts.
Like a TV miniseries, each part has its own evocative opening title sequence, built out of familiar tropes: Sleazy-noir! Danger Bay action! Game show glitz! The sharp jabs even extend to the typography and credits. The “Introducing Joe Clark” gag is splendid. Maybe you had to be there, or then.
Like a TV miniseries, each part has its own evocative opening title sequence, built out of familiar tropes: Sleazy-noir! Danger Bay action! Game show glitz! The sharp jabs even extend to the typography and credits. The “Introducing Joe Clark” gag is splendid. Maybe you had to be there, or then.
This is not Rankin’s first run at the iconography and reinvention of a Prime Minister. His surreal Guy Maddin-esque The Twentieth Century was a fetishised look at Canada’s longest running leader, William Lyon Mackenzie King. That one was framed through 8, 16 and 35mm cinematic styles of the era, between the two world wars. Here we are in the 1970s and 1980s. It was the time of public television and video cassette recordings. One can only imagine the hubris of Justin Trudeau or Pierre Poillevre through reddit memes and vertical video content, if Rankin is down to make this a trilogy.
On the subject Brian Mulroney, you can see the kind of awe that Rankin has for the construction of a political image, the construct of a smooth, well-dressed but working class, baritone crooner, that could bounce onto the world stage and sing "When Irish Eyes are Smiling” with Ronald Reagan while Margret Thatcher watched, but still refer to himself as humble and working class. One particularly earnest montage, in which Mulroney trounces liberal leader John Turner at a CBC debate (on a series of patronage scandals), and repeats the performance again and again on the campaign trail with unrestrained glee, is a marvel. It nearly detaches itself from the passive-aggressive style for a moment to celebrate some actual panache in party politics.
On the subject Brian Mulroney, you can see the kind of awe that Rankin has for the construction of a political image, the construct of a smooth, well-dressed but working class, baritone crooner, that could bounce onto the world stage and sing "When Irish Eyes are Smiling” with Ronald Reagan while Margret Thatcher watched, but still refer to himself as humble and working class. One particularly earnest montage, in which Mulroney trounces liberal leader John Turner at a CBC debate (on a series of patronage scandals), and repeats the performance again and again on the campaign trail with unrestrained glee, is a marvel. It nearly detaches itself from the passive-aggressive style for a moment to celebrate some actual panache in party politics.
This is contrast to his own PC party rivals, the severe and curmudgeonly elder statesmen John Diefenbaker and the ‘Joe Who’ charisma-vacuum Joe Clark, which is played up here in lengthy asides that are both educational and batshit crazy. The Diefenbaker Museum presented here is truly something to behold, while the holodeck-deathstar-MaxHeadroom sequence of Pierre Elliot Trudeau lording over his minions is equally sinister and daft. Various interview asides with voters, friends and family, TV broadcasters, and political pundits are equally square and deftly lampooned (not even Pierre Burton is spared) compared to the twinkling slick energy of “The Chin that walks like a man.”
Matthew Rankin (and the NFB) wants to make politics cool again. If by cool, you mean Canadian. And if by Canadian, you mean ironic, iconic and delightfully weird. The secret success in Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney is making something so utterly niche, and profoundly out of this current moment, be one of the most energetic and contemporary pieces of Canadian media since Heated Rivalry.
Here is hoping it penetrates as many eyeballs and brains. The never fully forming, always elusive, Canadian Identity is riding on it.