Montreal: One of the more ambitious new projects out of the Societe et Sciences studio of the National Film Board’s French Program is Les medias, a multiple-hour documentary coproduction with France’s La Sept-arte. The series will look at the behind-the-scenes machinations of the media and their impact on society.

The studio’s exec producer Eric Michel says several directors are being approached for the project.

The studio and La Sept are working with another group of directors, including Luc Gonthier, on a second coproduction series, Identite et la vie privee, an assessment of new technologies and their implications for human and social rights.

The studio’s primary mandate is to develop original point-of-view documentaries on societal trends and choices, work and citizenship issues, and the role of science in society.

Societe et Sciences docs currently in production or delivery include Sylvie Groulx’s A l’ombre d’Hollywood, a two-hour (also three one-hours) look at American cultural hegemony through the filter of the movies, presold to Tele-Quebec and arte; Manon Barbeau’s Barbeau le tumultueux, a portrait of the filmmaker’s father and Refus Global painter; Catherine Fol’s Connexion cosmique, an examination of cosmic origins and evolution; and Jean-Claude Labrecque’s utopian history Epoque des Menier a Anticosti, sold to Tele-Quebec and Radio-Canada.

L’Armee de l’ombre, Barbeau’s chronicle of the life of punks, recently had its theatrical premier.

The studio also financed Peter Wintonick’s doc history Cinema verite, coproduced with the English Program and now in distribution; Jean-Claude Berger’s A la sueur de ton front (working title), a stark hypothesis on the end of work; Karl Parent’s Main basse sur les genes, an examination of trends in biogenetics and one of a series of documentaries on the subject; Nicola Zavaglia’s La Saga des Italiens au Canada; and Jean-Claude Coulbois’ Le Territoire du comedien, a 75-minute portrait of the late actor Jean-Louis Millet, broadcast recently on src.

Michel is also producing the latest Jacques Godbout documentary, Traitre ou Patriote, a look back at the life of Adelard Godbout, the director’s great uncle and a controversial, reform-minded Quebec premier during the 1940s.

Michel says the board has ‘the luxury’ of not being driven by presales, opting instead for ‘editorial control.’ Perhaps the most active of all nfb studios, Societes et Sciences delivered 15 films in the past year. Ten additional projects are in development or under evaluation.

Michel emigrated to Montreal in 1969 when he opened a news bureau for French broadcaster ortf. He’s worked with src and as an indie producer and has been was the nfb for 20 years. He recently returned to Europe to attend the London Program Market and Telefilm Canada’s successful networking workshop, Industry Immersion – Documentaire.

The producer and his experienced seven-person team are coordinating 22 filmmakers – three permanent directors, a resident and 18 freelance directors.

Michel points out few science films are made because of the extensive research required and prohibitive cost, typically as much as $800,000 or $850,000.

He says the average studio doc costs $350,000. This year the studio’s budget is $3.5 million.

*Gypsies like us

The new Michel Gauthier Productions drama Gypsies is set in the marginal world of a traveling circus whose troupe moves from one small-town agricultural fair to the next.

The 10-hour Radio-Canada series is scripted directly for tv by Arlette Cousture and chronicles 10 rather rainy days in the lives of the impoverished and sometimes miserable characters, who nonetheless still find moments of happiness and trust. Cousture’s two earlier dramas, the hugely successful Les Filles de Caleb and Ces Enfants d’ailleurs, were adapted from her novels.

Series producer Michel Gauthier, one of the original founders of Cite-Amerique, says all the rain (a rarity on Quebec tv) is a pretext for a closer look at the personal lives of the humble troupers, who would otherwise be too busy putting on a side show.

Gypsies’ cast of romantic campers includes a semi-paralyzed Marcel Leboeuf, the talented Benoit Briere (Monsieur b in Bell Quebec commercials) as a dimwitted cuckold, Linda Roy who has a ‘chum’ 20 years her junior, Marcel Sabourin in the role of the aging vet ‘The Kid,’ Luc Senay, Robert Toupin and Guy Nadon as ‘the big boss.’

Craft credits go to director Francois Bouvier (Histoires d’hiver); cinematographer Philippe Lavalette, who shot on digital video; picture editor Claude Palardy of Montage Metaphore; and Myriam Vezina of casting agency Andrea Kenyon and Associates.

Gypsies was produced for $5.6 million, with funding from Telefilm Canada, src, the Canadian Television Fund’s Licence Fee Program, agency sodec, the Cogeco Program Development Fund and tax credits. Distributions Tele-Action is the sales agent.

Gauthier is producing 24 one-hours of the src variety/talk show L’Ecuyer, starring Patrice L’Ecuyer, and is developing a new six-hour Monique M. Messier miniseries, Portes disparus, dramatizing cases of missing children.

*Treasure is a ‘terror’

Cinar Corp. has announced production starts on four new animation series coproductions in the past two months, the latest being Treasure, a 13 half-hour series partnership between Cinar Europe and the bbc in association with u.k.-based Halo Productions. The show is slated to air on bbc primetime in late 2000 or early 2001, and has also been presold to ytv in Canada. Cinar has most worldwide rights.

Treasure is aimed at primetime family audiences and follows the adventures of a shopping-crazed, out-of-control, 15-year-old girl.

The series is written by Michele Hanson and adapted from the popular newspaper column of the same name. Producers are Cassandra Schafhausen for Cinar and Orly Yadin and Sylvie Bringas for Halo. Francois Perreault is directing.

The other new coproduction starts at Cinar are The Baskervilles, 26 half-hours partnered with Alphanim s.a., a division of France’s Vivendi, sold to Teletoon in Canada, itv in the u.k. and France 2; 26 10-minute episodes of the stop-motion preschool series Upstairs Downstairs Bears, a coproduction with Scottish Television and Denmark’s Egmont Imagination Productions; and Twins, 13 half-hours partnered with Flextech Rights of the u.k.

*Docs from Max Films TV

Launched only a year and a half ago, Max Films Television’s documentary unit already has an impressive range of projects in development and production.

Jean Lemire, the studio’s producer, is codirecting with award-winning animator Frederic Back on Memoire de la Terre/Memories of Earth, a one-hour film/cel animation rendition of the legends of the Haida of the Queen Charlotte Islands. Shooting took place throughout the summer, with about a year still to go.

The film is budgeted at more than $1.2 million and includes about 10 minutes of Back’s evocative work. Animation sequences are being done at Covitec. Hubert Tison is Back’s animation coproducer, with presales to cbc/Radio-Canada, Bravo! and TV5.

The house is in editing on Mack Sennett: King of Comedy, a one-hour profile of the prolific movie-maker and comedy pioneer. The $635,000 doc includes dramatizations and archival elements and is a coproduction with Kalamazoo International, Paris.

A Canadian by birth, Sennett was involved in some 1,400 films, most notably in the period from 1920 to 1930, among them The Keystone Comedies. He’s credited with ‘the discovery’ of stars like Charlie Chaplin and Carole Lombard.

Jean Chabot is directing, with funds from the Canadian Television Fund and presales to src, TV5, Bravo! and cfcf-tv.

Other docs from Max Films Television include Alain Belhumeur’s La Grande mouvee, a one-hour examination of harp seal populations from Greenland to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and Kun Chang’s Think Skin, a film about the meaning of touching. Danish-born and u.k.-educated, Chang has been in Canada for two years and has special effects credits on Lucasfilm’s Star Wars: Episode One – The Phantom Menace, the imax movie T-Rex and the Luc Besson blockbuster The Fifth Element.

Lemire says all the docs are being produced in both official languages. The Multimedia Group of Canada is handling international sales.