Sing the body authentic Boudoir body-image doc 'I Would Like To Thank My Body' also uncovers reality of totally accessible film
Read this article for free:
or
Already have an account? Log in here »
To continue reading, please subscribe:
Digital Subscription
One year of digital access for only $205*
- Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
- Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
- Access News Break, our award-winning app
- Play interactive puzzles
*First annual payment billed as $205.00 + GST for one year. This annual subscription will automatically renew at $233.00 + GST every 52 weeks (10% off the regular annual price of $259.35). Offer available to new and qualified returning subscribers only. Cancel any time.
To continue reading, please subscribe:
Add Free Press access to your Brandon Sun subscription for only an additional
$1 for the first 4 weeks*
- Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
- Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
- Access News Break, our award-winning app
- Play interactive puzzles
*Your next Brandon Sun subscription payment will increase by $1.00 and you will be charged $17.95 plus GST for four weeks. After four weeks, your payment will increase to $24.95 plus GST every four weeks.
Read unlimited articles for free today:
or
Already have an account? Log in here »
Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/07/2023 (1123 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
The irony of accessible viewing options, such as closed captioning, described video and live sign language interpretation, is that finding them often requires an extensive search, a road map and a magnifying glass.
Festival preview
Gimli International Film Festival
• Through Sunday in Gimli, Man.
• Tickets and info at gimlifilm.com
That’s not the case in I Would Like To Thank My Body, Manitoba filmmaker Catherine Dulude’s latest short documentary, screening this weekend at the Gimli International Film Festival, which runs to Sunday.
From the moment the film — which follows a woman confronting her body-image issues as she prepares for a boudoir photo shoot — begins, it has all its accessibility bases covered.
As the title rolls across the screen, Dulude’s voice reads it aloud. She then describes for viewers what’s being shown on camera: we see the white bungalow of the film’s subject, Rosalie Best.
Then a car pulls up in front. “A white woman with brown and grey hair steps out.”
When the woman, a home-care worker named Christine, says hello, an ASL interpreter named Joanna Hawkins pops up in the bottom left-hand corner to translate the dialogue. For the rest of the film’s 15 minutes, she and Dulude don’t stray, giving audiences of all abilities the chance to follow along, making accessibility the rule, not the exception.
Dulude, a former journalist, made four versions of the film: one in French, one in English and one fully accessible version in each language.
“I decided to submit the fully accessible versions (to festivals), mostly as a statement,” she says.
“If you’re not used to seeing an ASL interpreter and having video description, and you find it jarring, then maybe you don’t live in an accessible environment as much as you think. This is what accessibility looks like.”
Supplied ‘I wanted to do something to show... disabled bodies should be celebrated’: Rosalie Best
The filmmaker’s commitment to accessibility was a major reason Rosalie Best agreed to appear in the documentary. A professional accessibility specialist, Best has muscular dystrophy and uses a wheelchair, while her husband is one of an estimated 1.5 million Canadians who identify as having sight loss.
Another reason Best was keen to participate was the film’s subject matter. “I grew up in the early 2000s watching Nicole Richie and Paris Hilton, seeing the size zeroes and the Special K diets,” she says. That led to a warped perspective on what beauty was, she says.
During the pandemic, Best says her self-esteem took another hit: she didn’t even want to look in the mirror.
Supplied Rosalie Best, being photographed by Teri Hofford, embraced the film shoot and the documentary as another way to confront body-image distortion in popular culture.
So when Dulude, who had worked with Best on a podcast for Accessible Media Inc., approached her about potentially working on a film project about body image in 2021, Best surprised herself by saying yes.
Soon, she was in photographer Teri Hofford’s Exchange District studio, posing for one camera while being watched by another.
Hofford’s camera produced snapshots of Best feeling her best, and Dulude’s captured a woman beginning to recognize her own beauty.
“Now, I make myself look at least once a day in the mirror, to look at my body and see it for what it is: a body,” says Best. “It’s not good, it’s not bad, it’s my vessel.”
“Choosing to do the shoot, as a disability advocate, I wanted to do something to show people that disabled bodies should be celebrated,” she adds.
Supplied Rosalie Best, left, surprised herself by saying yes to a boudoir photo shoot with photographer Teri Hofford, which is documented in the short film I Would Lke to Thank My Body.
To that end, in the film, Dulude uses human-first language, resulting in a resounding message of self-love.
Thanks to the accessibility measures implemented, it’s a message every viewer or listener can receive, loud and clear.
ben.waldman@winnipegfreepress.com
Sunset beach screenings
A highlight of the annual Gimli film fest are the free showings on the shores of Lake Winnipeg at 9:45 p.m. nightly.
● Friday: The Greatest Showman
● Saturday: Top Gun
● Sunday: Buffy Sainte-Marie: Carry It On
Shuttle to screenings
The festival offers shuttle service from Winnipeg to Gimli every day of the fest. Round-trip tickets can be purchased for $20/day.
The shuttle will leave Winnipeg in the morning and return after the Sunset Screening each evening. Pick-up/drop-off locations are:
● University of Winnipeg (drop-off loop in front of Lockhart Hall, facing Ellice Avenue)
● McPhillips Superstore (parking lot at 2132 McPhillips Ave., southeast corner).
See the festival’s website for details and departure times.
Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University’s (now Toronto Metropolitan University’s) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben.
Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
