The importance of Ararat

As an artistic medium, film can have a myriad of purposes. Although entertainment may seem central to many, film serves an important role in our culture as an educator and as a source of information made available in a format that is more appealing than an obscure academic article or a dusty tome.

It is for this reason that I am appalled by your decision to list Atom Egoyan's Ararat as a nominee for "The Movie That Never Should Have Happened" in your Alternative Academy Awards.

Certainly the artistic and technical merit of any film is arguable, and had Ararat been nominated for, say, the dud of the year, I would have simply responded with a chuckle, not spiteful condemnation. But for the Mirror to suggest that the first film to bring the horrors of the Armenian Genocide to the movie-going public should never have been made is quite shocking and reprehensible. Turkish interest groups have been spewing Armenian Holocaust-denying propaganda for almost 90 years, joined by their accomplices in the Western world who have chosen to compromise the truth rather than risk damaging their diplomatic relations with Turkey.

The Mirror's suggestion that Egoyan's film "never should have happened" strangely resembles the position of the Turkish government, who attempted to prevent the screening of the film at last year's Cannes Film Festival.

Perhaps the Mirror should work towards informing their readers of the estimated 1.5-million Armenians who were massacred, tortured, raped and starved to death, rather than shamelessly ridiculing the existence of films that bring the most tragic moments of history out of academic circles and into the public sphere.

» Rob Maguire

Don't gimme shelter!

I'm new to Montreal and the Mirror is one of the papers I pick up to read about the events in the city. Though I somewhat enjoy the writing of certain sections of the publication, I have been disturbed with the combination of, dare I say, "alternative" culture and politics on the one hand, and on the other a truly problematic representation of the very culture you're attempting to subvert.

For instance, the movie reviews are quite funny and refreshingly honest in their biting and justified critiques of really terrible movies. And your journal clearly attempts to break with monolithic cultural notions of gender, sex, race and sexuality. But then I am confronted by your Annual Alternative Academy Awards, of which there is simply nothing alternative.

The "overlooked" performances are not really overlooked, since most of these actors were either nominated for Oscars and other awards and/or entirely hyped (I cannot tell you how much Punch-Drunk Love has been publicized). Indeed, the films and actors you offer for best and worst performances are really not interesting, nor are the categories.

And then you include the "best bod" category? This is not alternative, nor is it interesting enough to be trashy.

If you really want to be the alternative journal you aspire to be, you should not segregate the "queer" events from the rest of the events as you do in your listings section - or do queers do dance, theatre and comedy differently than straight people? Heaven forbid there are queer "kids" not demarcated by the clear titles. And how about where you recently described Bringing Down the House as "An interracial comedy" [Film listings, March. 6]? Hello George Wallace! I thought it was 2003? My mistake.

Give your public more credit and stop sheltering us from that ooh-so-wicked world. Because if your Annual Alternative Academy Awards and demarcation of sexuality and race demonstrate this publication's potential for cultural and political dialogue, then I guess we all should pack up and move to Alabama.

» Julian Vigo

Late-night party rights

If I understand correctly from your recent story on the city council's war on clubbing, thousands of clubgoers, plus hundreds of honest employees who work for these businesses - plus equipment suppliers, restaurants and hotels around them - will once again suffer from Montreal's brain-dead urban planning bylaws ["Rave off," Feb. 6].

It has always puzzled me. Why do some of the same people who enjoy the profusion of commercial and cultural activities in our downtown core become the first to bitch against too much of it? They're only too happy to use the all-night dépanneurs, cinemas, cafés and so on that they wouldn't otherwise find in a quiet neigbourhood, but all they can do is to complain because it is not quiet enough for their own picky taste.

Well I have a message for them: either you move to a quieter and more "family oriented" part of this city (and there's no shortage of them as far as I know), or you come party with us and you forget about the bitchin' to city hall. Montreal seems to have a never-ending supply of politicians without a proper understanding of our city's economics or respect for its workers - the majority of whom elected them - and their needs, one of which may be to party past 3 a.m.

Isn't it time to recognize that some very specific streets and parts of downtown are meant to be busy, 24 hours a day, seven days a week?

As for Mr. Robert Laramée: we're now in the 21st century, plenty of people lead crazy lives and the only time they have to go out is after their midnight shift. All I can tell him is that most people who are old enough to go to afterhours clubs or to make a living out of them are also old enough to vote.

» Louis Veillette, Synergie

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