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Director Ryan J. Noth takes a look at Canadian identity with The National Parks Project: Gros Morne

TO411 documentary review
by staff writer Daisy Maclean

The Group of Seven is today one of the most famous Canadian artistic groups. Known mainly for their collective work of landscape paintings of a country that was deemed unworthy of being painted, the group’s influence has transformed them into Canadian icons, today. In 1995, the National Gallery of Canada compiled a show of their work and commissioned a band to write a score to accompany the show. The National Parks Project continues in the same vein, with a little help from modern technology. 

Noth has gathered together a group of Canadian filmmakers and musicians in order to create thirteen films of national parks within Canada. Each team will spend four days camping together in the park to create short films and soundtracks that reflect their experience of the vast landscape we call our own. The first of these films is his own directorial debut, Gros Morne, which explores one of the Atlantic Coast’s more breathtaking spaces. 

Gros Morne is different from its future counterparts, in that the musicians did not come with him to compose within the park. Instead Noth edited the footage together after they had shot, using a kind of temp track, and when it premiered at Hot Docs the music was improvised live by Sandro Perri. In future though, the music will be composed at the same time as the footage is shot and recorded in the same location, which is very different from traditional film making, and very intriguing.

Traveling with Noth on this first of the series was acclaimed cinematographer Peter Mettler, who’s work on the award winning Manufactured Landscapes makes him an ideal addition to the project. “Our trip to Gros Morne was like a journey through time. As filmmakers we were there, graced with the technologies science has provided, to witness the foundation of nature under our precarious human advance, [and see how] the identity of every Canadian is firmly connected to the very ground they tread upon.”

Noth is very passionate about our vast Canadian landscape and how it has become an under-celebrated facet of our culture. “You get a certain sense of awe – and why do you need more than that to recognize that this is an important space that should be a) protected and b) celebrated? That’s why we’re trying to celebrate these spaces that, in many cases, a lot of Canadians can’t ever get to. If you live on the East Coast, you may not be able to go to the Northwest Territories, ever, and there are many people who live in a city who may never think to go to a park,” says Noth in an interview with Eye Magazine. “Our screening at Hot Docs was one of the top three or four to sell out, so I think that says something about people’s passions for this… We’re kind of tired of Paul Gross making films about mock-Canadian icons. We wanted to make something about a truer Canadian experience, rather than having something shoved down your throat through an advertising-and-marketing campaign. Let us create new mythologies.”

So if you are tired of being defined by beer ads, or felt let down by the Olympics opening and closing shows, perhaps The National Parks Project will speak to a different, more authentic part of your Canadian soul. The film has rich visuals that ebb and flow like the tides it captures. There is no story to follow, but themes do emerge through the skilled editing done by Noth. 

“It is largely through the basic interplay between this vast land and the response it evokes in our hearts and minds … it is through the arts, as creative and expressive mediums, that we bring both our great environments and our outlook on life into effective focus.” Lawren Harris (The Group of Seven)

Daisy Maclean will review recently completed documentaries for TO411 Daily – please contact her for more information: daisy@to411.com.