Saturday, June 6, 2009

The Tom Thomson mystery endures

"But the dark pines of your mind dip deeper...
There is something down there and you want it told."
Gwendolyn MacEwen (1972)

In my student days I sampled CANLIT sparingly but I did read widely in Canadian non-fiction. One book which flourishes in my memory is The Tom Thomson Mystery [1970], which was written by retired Toronto judge William T. Little. Eventually I learned to appreciate the genre known as "True Crime", and I guess I have developed a permanent taste for it. Little's book is open on my desk because I just enjoyed watching a 48 minute documentary film entitled DARK PINES. The film, produced in 2005 by B.C. filmmakers, employs actors to stand in for the principles who were Thomson's neighbors and friends in Northern Ontario. Their skills add much to our understanding of the botched 1917 investigation, and render the mystery more accessible to a modern audience.

The skull of Tom Thomson photographed on a spade, with adhering soil and plant roots. Thomson was exhumed in a remote Ontario cemetery in 1956. Note the small hole in his left temple. [Algonquin Park Archives photo]

The film, which finds it metaphor in a Gwendolyn MacEwen poem, is quick to remind us that Tom Thomson was the single most influential Canadian artist in landscape painting. Thomson's stay at Mowat Lodge on Canoe Lake lasted five years, from 1912-1917. It was time enough for him to prepare for the fifty canvases which remain his legacy for the people of Canada. The documentary does not accept the official verdict of "death by drowning". It posits and recreates two plausible scenarios for the artists' death, both of which would be categorized as manslaughter, rather than premeditated murder.

The iconic NORTHERN LIGHTS painted by Tom Thomson. In one sequence the film uses animation - breaking up the elements of two of Thomson's paintings and desaturating the colours. It works very well in helping explain that Thomson was onto something really novel in Canadian art.

DARK PINES is a speculative investigation which employs dramatic recreations. The cast includes William B. Davis, the "Smoking Man" of the old X-FILES series. The DVD is not available in retail stores but can be ordered online.
DARK PINES has an excellent cast, and the studio interviews of historical figures in costume, combine with re-enactments to weave together threads of sometimes conflicting testimony. I have spoken to writer-producer Ric Beairsto (Laughing Mountain Communications) and learned that the approach borrowed from an effective idea used in a BBC series on Charles Dickens, programs which I also enjoyed. Judge Little, whose 1970 book provided source material for DARK PINES, is represented by an actor playing the role of "William T. Little - Investigator". For those with sufficient interest, it is possible to watch a segment of FRONT PAGE CHALLENGE originally broadcast in 1970, in which the expert panel get to discuss Little's findings and his book. The show is in the CBC DIGITAL ARCHIVES - here. ...It's interesting to note that the CBC spent a couple of bucks in 1970 on some actors who made a crude simulation of Thomson taking his fateful canoe trip.

1 comment:

  1. Judge Little's book is a crock of bull. See http://www.algonquinelegy.com/Fraud.html.

    ReplyDelete