It’s been 65 years since groundbreaking filmmaker Norman McLaren founded the National Film Board’s animation department, and the NFB is commemorating the anniversary in style. Norman McLaren: The Master’s Edition is a seven-disc DVD box set featuring the Scottish-born animator’s complete works: 58 films, including ones you probably remember like the Oscar-winning Neighbours, the Oscar Peterson-scored Begone Dull Care, as well as many uncollected pieces you probably haven’t had a chance to see, plus a selection of test footage and unfinished works. In addition, 14 new documentaries about the man and his art were commissioned for the set. It’s a gorgeous piece of work, a hefty brick of film art brilliance, put together with obvious love and great care.

The NFB, in conjunction with the Festival du Nouveau Cinéma and the Cinémathèque québécoise, will be commemorating both the anniversary and the set’s launch in the coming week with a flurry of McLaren-related activity. There’ll be a retrospective at the Cinémathèque, broken down into 11 programs running daily from Oct. 20–26; two workshops and a master class for aspiring animators (those are at the NFB Cinema Oct. 21–23); and finally, a McLaren “VJ Evening” at the Just for Laughs museum on Oct. 23 featuring visual remixes of his work by France’s VJ Oof. McLaren’s stuff hardly needs remixing but it might be interesting to check out regardless. For more info on all this stuff, call 844-2172. —Mark Slutsky