That was it, hockey, snow, French Canadians, the shack at the rink with the wood stove........that was my life in the fifties.
Just watched a fabulous movie, 'When We Were Boys', about a bunch of neighbourhood kids in Montreal who play hockey. French, with English sub-titles, the movie threw me. I fancy myself completely bilingual, but I could not follow the "jouale"(sp?) the characters spoke. When I read the sub-titles I got what they were saying after-the-fact, but I was always a beat behind trying to listen.* Nonetheless, the language was perfect! Just as I remember having heard it in Eastview and The Market when I was a kid. Part English, part French, with an accent all its own, with many English words thrown in for good measure.
What a perfect movie for a Canadian. B lived in Montreal as a kid and played lots of hockey. He took sh-t from all kinds of kids because he was an "Anglais". Nevermind, he hung in there. Watching the movie, he was moved to tears at times, so close to his childhood was it. I also lived in an Ottawa neighbourhood where we had a big outdoor rink, a shack with a wood stove, around which we warmed up until our frozen feet and the pain of their thawing forced us to hobble home.
This movie is so Canadian I defy any American or European to even remotely relate to it. Some things are just so "Canadian".
p.s. Boo to Obama for not approving the Keystone pipeline. What a coward.
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*My dear friend A from Embrun would have roared all the way through. There's a gal who would have "got it".
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I would have guessed "jouale" but I see that wikipedia shows "joual". Then again, wikipedia is not an abolutely trusted source.
ReplyDeleteBoo Obama is right; he just doesn't get it.
"Il Etait une Fois, Boys"... found it, as there is a 2009 movie, "When We were Boys", done in Toronto.
ReplyDeleteRe: Joual... six years ago I was dating a woman (in Atlanta) whose ex-husband quite correctly said of her, "Y, if it weren't for me, you'd still be in a gutter in Hull."
For thirty years, her sister had lived with a man (a seemingly prevalent Canadian practice from the point of view of someone who has spent the last twenty years in The Bible Belt) who owned a successful muffler business in Hull. Each winter, they vacationed for ten weeks in Florida in their motorhome, where we joined them for a weekend.
The sister spoke no English at all, the 'husband' could get by. The French they spoke was unbelievable. "Moi" and "toi" were pronounced "Moy" and "toy". Copy and paste this link to get more examples of how to butcher the French language...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joual
The government tried to teach French to my Scottish father. The only thing he came away with was slogan on a Quebec licence plate was named in honor of a man named 'Jimmy Souveens'.
I remember it was "Mmway" and "Ttway" for "moi" and "toi". But it is pretty indecipherable! Thanks for finding the correct title. It was a fabulous movie!
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