Image+Nation
FACE AU VIH, LA RÉSILIENCE (1983-1995)                  

FACE AU VIH, LA RÉSILIENCE (1983-1995)                  

FRANÇOIS BELLEMARE | CANADA | 2025 | 16 MIN | ENGLISH FST

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FRANÇOIS BELLEMARE | CANADA | 2025 | 16 MIN | ENGLISH FST

ShortI+N CONNEXE

Synopsis

Interview with Gregory Rowe, who came from Western Canada to settle in Montreal in 1983. In addition to his comments on his experience in the English-speaking part of the gay movement, he gives a poignant account of his resilience in the face of the HIV crisis (which he has been carrying for 37 years), and his involvement in organizations that support HIV-positive people.

Filmmaker Bio

Active in journalism and poetry, François Bellemare is also the author of the satirical novel La renaissance de L’interlope (Sémaphore, 2022), a fiction set in 2029 in the Red Light District and the Village. Self-taught in everything and a graduate from Nowhere, he is curator of the exhibition L’Émergence du Village gai (Montréal 1974-1990), currently presented at Archives gaies du Québec (AGQ) to highlight the “foundation” of what was first called Le Village de l’Est (in contrast to the gay sector west of downtown), then Le Village gai, and now simply Le Village.

Producer

Archives gaies du Québec (AGQ)

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Interview with Gilbert Higgins, one of the 146 victims of the police raid on the Truxx, a gay bar on Stanley Street in Montreal, on the night of October 22, 1977. The reaction it triggered became one of the precursor events to the creation of what was first called Le Village de l’Est (in contrast to the gay bar sector west of downtown), then Le Village gai, and now simply Le Village.

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Interview with Denis B. Lapointe (formerly known as Denis Levesque) about the associative movement of the gay community in Montreal — among others, at the ADGQ — during the years leading to the establishment of what was first called Le Village de l’Est (in contrast to the gay bar sector west of downtown), then Le Village gai, and now simply Le Village. The third of the documentary series L'émergence du Village gai.

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