Francois Bouvier

While studying at the University of Quebec at Montreal in 1970, François Bouvier founded the "subversive vaudeville troupe" La Quenouille Bleue, which boasted famous members such as singer-songwriter Michel Rivard, comedian Serge Thériault, and actor Gabriel Arcand. Bouvier rose to prominence in the 1980s, co-writing and co-directing two films with Jean Beaudry, 1984's "Jacques et novembre" and 1988's "Les matins infidèles," both explorations of death and the fragility of life. After parting professional ways with Beaudry, Bouvier's next hit was the 1993 Gilles Desjardins-penned drama "Les pots cassés," which earned five Genie Award nominations and won Best Film at the Festival International du Film Francophone de Namur. Splitting his time between doing film and television work-most notably over a dozen episodes of Radio-Canada's "Les hauts et les bas de Sophie Paquin"-Bouvier did his most fruitful work adapting novels, first with 1999's "Histoires d'hiver," based on the Marc Robitaille coming-of-age narrative about a hockey-obsessed junior high student, and with 2005's "Maman Last Call," a political comedy by Nathalie Petrowski about a meteorologist going through a mid-life crisis. In 2015, Bouvier returned to themes of family and death, all with a specific Quebecois perspective, with "Paul à Québec." Co-written with famed Montreal cartoonist Michel Rabagliati and based on his best-selling semi-autobiographical graphic novel (known in the United States as The Song of Roland), the film starred François Létourneau, Louise Portal, and Julie LeBreton, and tracked Rabagliati stand-in Paul's tragicomic experiences with his in-laws, most notably his cancer-stricken father-in-law.