A Montreal producer is bringing Quebec’s World War Two conscription crisis to the big screen with Le déserteur, a $2.9-million drama based on the real-life story of an army deserter.

Filmed in rural Quebec, Le déserteur is produced by Films du Boulevard (Délivrez-moi) and helmed by first-time director Simon Lavoie.

The story follows Georges Guénette, who hid from federal authorities in the backwoods of Quebec after abandoning the army in order to take care of his family. In 1944, he was shot by two RCMP officers. ‘This isn’t meant to be a political film,’ says producer Réal Chabot. ‘This is a human story about the conscription crisis and the events around it. Many people in rural Quebec had at least one family member who had deserted during the war and hid out in the countryside.’

In 1942, 72% of Quebecers voted ‘no’ to conscription in a government plebiscite, while the majority of Canadians in other provinces said ‘yes.’ Soon after the vote, then-prime minister William Lyon Mackenzie King authorized conscription.

The film, which follows Guénette’s life in the years before he was killed, stars Émile Proulx-Cloutier (Les hauts et les bas de Sophie Paquin). Claude Legault (Les 3 p’tits cochons) plays a journalist hired by the anti-conscription party Bloc Populaire Canadien to find out more about the deserter’s death.

The film is loosely based on accounts of Guénette’s life and the Quebec conscription crisis published by Bloc Populaire founder André Laurendeau.

The winter portion of the shoot wrapped at the end of February. Filming will continue in April once ‘the snow is gone,’ says Chabot.

Le déserteur was financed by Telefilm Canada and SODEC and is distributed by TVA Films. It will be released in autumn 2008.