by MARK SLUTSKY

A portrait of a small business, and a quiet homage to its long, if uncelebrated, history, Roger Toupin, épicier variété, from local director Benoît Pilon, documents the last year in the life of a little dépanneur on the Plateau Mont-Royal, a place as much a store as meeting spot for longtime local residents. It's also a microcosmic study of the rapidly morphing Plateau itself, once a working-class neighbourhood and now a residential yuppie hotspot, increasingly expensive with far fewer families.

The film gets its title from the hand-painted inscription on the store's window; Toupin himself had been running the dep since 1975, though its history goes back as far as 1939. That's when his father took over what was then a restaurant and converted it into a grocery store; as of the making of the film, Toupin fils had lived in that same building (in an apartment upstairs) for all of his 52 years.

A slow-moving film, Roger Toupin lingers on the day-to-day life of the man and his dep, like the local stalwarts who come in every day to sit around and drink coffee. In addition to Toupin's own stories, you hear theirs as well - like the fellow who's leaving the neighbourhood after 33 years because of the parking, or the former orphanage resident who talks about how important it was to have a home away from the institution where he was brutalized.

It's a beautiful old place, the kind of family-owned business that seems to be disappearing from the neighbourhood at an ever-accelerating rate. And indeed, the last half or so of the movie chronicles Toupin's inevitable decision to leave the building behind, as he's no longer making enough money for upkeep, taxes, and insurance. It's quite sad to see the man leave the place he's worked and lived in for his whole life, as the neighbourhood changed around him. The film's understated (and beautifully shot) style avoids sentimentalizing its subject too much, and anyone with an interest in how this city is changing would do well to catch this doc.

Roger Toupin, épicier variété opens
Friday, Dec. 19, at Ex-Centris in french with English subtitles

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