MONTREAL — With the help of Canadian Heritage, the Université de Montréal will launch a website in March to showcase Quebec film from 1930 to 1952, when television arrived on the scene and the province abandoned movie houses to stay at home and watch the magic box.

‘It’s a very interesting period in Quebec film,” explains Observatoire du cinéma au Québec spokesman Gabriel Perron. Largely unknown in English Canada, where early Quebec cinema is associated with the works of Claude Jutra and Michel Brault, a number of private-sector-produced classics rooted in the distinct culture of post-war Quebec were made in the 1940s and early ’50s, including Le père Chopin (1943), Le gros Bill (1949), Un homme et son péché (1949) and Tit-Coq (1953).

The online showcase will launch on March 31, part of the UofM’s spotlighting of homegrown cinema and the university’s film-related research. The OCQ will host an international conference on the French New Wave in March 2011 and has produced a TV series about Quebec film, Au cúur du cinéma québécois (‘At the heart of Quebec cinema’), currently broadcast on Canal Savoir.

A number of industry players are supporting the UofM project, including Astral Media and Quebecor.