Following the screening of Mécanique de l’assassin: les premiers courts de Denis Côté at the Rendez-vous Québec Cinéma, the online magazine Panorama-cinéma, which co-presented the event, announced the launch of its streaming platform, Le Panoptique. It is now accessible at: le-panoptique.ca.
Not seeking to present works currently shown in theatres, Le Panoptique rather offers a programming that falls between the cracks of the distribution system and finances the restoration of some titles that are still missing from the digital ecosystem. Each program offered on the platform will be accompanied by previously unavailable bonus features. Le Panoptique will never require a subscription — programs can be rented for 7 days at various prices, with profits shared between the rights owners and Panorama-cinéma.
To launch the platform, Panorama-cinéma is revisiting a key period in the history of Quebec cinema, from the point of view of a critic who then became one of the most singular of our local filmmakers. The program Realm of the Assassin features eight short films directed by Denis Côté between 1999 and 2005, in a new restoration approved by the director and sponsored by Panorama-cinéma. It was done at CineGround from a scan by François Auger, former technical director of the Cinémathèque québécoise. As a bonus, cinephiles can discover a location scouting tape for Drifting States, edited by Joël Morin-Ben Abdallah.
Between the late ’90s and 2005, Denis Côté acted as both a filmmaker and a film critic. In the pages of the alt-weekly ICI, he wrote nearly 1000 articles over six years, covering the latest manifestations of an art form that was evolving in ways that anticipated the current forms of contemporary cinema. Those who attended the screening at the RVQC received a copy of the book Denis Côté: Cahier critique 1999–2005, a previously unreleased, limited edition 110-page anthology featuring 26 of the best texts written by Denis Côté in parallel with the creation of his early films. It also includes a foreword by Marcel Jean, executive director of the Cinémathèque québécoise, and an afterword by Alice Michaud-Lapointe, author and film critic. The digital version of this book can be downloaded for free on Le Panoptique.
