Hamilton Babylon: A History of the McMaster Film Board

by Stephen Broomer

Overview

Founded in 1966 at McMaster University by avant-garde filmmaker John Hofsess and future frat-comedy innovator Ivan Reitman, the McMaster Film Board was a milestone in the development of Canada’s commercial and experimental film communities. McMaster’s student film society quickly became the site of art filmmaking and an incubator for some of the country’s most famous commercial talent – as the well as the birthplace of the first Canadian film to lead to obscenity charges, Hofsess’s Columbus of Sex.

In Hamilton Babylon, Stephen Broomer traces the history of the MFB from its birth as an organization for producing and exhibiting avant-garde films, through its transformation into a commercial-industrial enterprise, and into its final decline as a show business management style suppressed many of its voices. The first book to highlight the work of Hofsess, an innovative filmmaker whose critical role in the MFB has been almost entirely eclipsed by Reitman’s legend, Hamilton Babylon is a fascinating study of the tension between art and business in the growth of the Canadian film industry.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781442647787
Publisher:	University of Toronto Press
Publication date:	02/05/2016
Pages:	280
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 9.28(h) x 0.91(d)

About the Author

Stephen Broomer is a filmmaker and film historian whose films have been screened at the Toronto International Film Festival, the Berlin Directors Lounge, and Lincoln Center.

Table of Contents

Chapter One: A Dangerous Precedent
Chapter Two: Assembling Pleasure
Chapter Three: A New President
Chapter Four: Participatory Democracy
Chapter Five: Seize the Projectors
Chapter Six: Sync Sound Arrives, 1970
Chapter Seven: The Film Board Presidents on Trial
Chapter Eight: The Appeal
Chapter Nine: Show Business

Appendix: McMaster Film Board Filmography

What People are Saying About This

Andre Loiselle

“Hamilton Babylon is a well-written and engaging narrative of the events that led to the creation of the McMaster Film Board, its ‘rise to fame,’ and its demise. Informative and entertaining, it will be of interest to both cinephiles and Canadianists.”

Blaine Allan

“Broomer has unearthed a mass of information on the McMaster Film Board, its productions, its accomplishments, and its trials, both literal and figurative.”

Editorial Reviews

"In Hamilton Babylon [Stephen Broomer attempts] to recuperate the history of the student-run McMaster Film Board – particularly with the story of its founding member, experimental filmmaker John Hofsess. "

—Jeff Fedoruk, Canadian Literature Reviews, 234 Autumn 2017

"This is an interesting, and often passionately written, contribution to Canadian film history that shines a light on a key moment in the creation of the country’s independent cinema, and, in particular, argues for a re-evaluation of both the artistic and historical importance of the era’s experimental cinema."

—David Hanley, Carleton University, University of Toronto Quarterly, vol 87 3, Summer 2018

“Hamilton Babylon is a well-written and engaging narrative of the events that led to the creation of the McMaster Film Board, its ‘rise to fame,’ and its demise. Informative and entertaining, it will be of interest to both cinephiles and Canadianists.”

—Andre Loiselle, Department of Film Studies, Carleton University

“Broomer has unearthed a mass of information on the McMaster Film Board, its productions, its accomplishments, and its trials, both literal and figurative.”

—Blaine Allan, Department of Film and Media, Queen's University

From the Publisher

"In Hamilton Babylon [Stephen Broomer attempts] to recuperate the history of the student-run McMaster Film Board — particularly with the story of its founding member, experimental filmmaker John Hofsess. "

Canadian Literature Reviews, 234 Autumn 2017 - Jeff Fedoruk

"This is an interesting, and often passionately written, contribution to Canadian film history that shines a light on a key moment in the creation of the country's independent cinema, and, in particular, argues for a re-evaluation of both the artistic and historical importance of the era's experimental cinema."

University of Toronto Quarterly, vol 87 3, Summer 2018 - David Hanley