Terence Macartney-Filgate (6 August 1924 – 11 July 2022) was a British-Canadian film director who directed, wrote, produced or shot more than 100 films in a career spanning more than 50 years.

Early life

Born in England, Macartney-Filgate lived in India until the age of nine. His family returned to England in 1933 and three years later he became an admirer of documentaries after seeing the 1936 film ''

Night Mail ''Night Mail'' is a 1936 British documentary film directed and produced by Harry Watt and Basil Wright, and produced by the General Post Office (GPO) Film Unit. The 24-minute film documents the nightly postal train operated by the London, ...

'', which was narrated by

John Grierson John Grierson (26 April 1898 – 19 February 1972) was a Scottish documentary maker, often considered the father of British and Canadian documentary film. In 1926, Grierson coined the term "documentary" in a review of Robert J. Flaherty's '' ...

(the founder of the NFB) and based on a poem by W.H. Auden. Macartney-Filgate was only 15 years old at the outbreak of

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

and ultimately joined the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

as a flight engineer, flying more than a dozen operations in Europe. He then went on to obtain a degree in politics, philosophy and economics from

Oxford University The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the second-oldest continuously operating u ...

, in 1946, and held down a succession of jobs before immigrating to Canada.

National Film Board

Macartney-Filgate, who had long admired the work of the

National Film Board of Canada The National Film Board of Canada (NFB; ) is a Canadian public film and digital media producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary films, animation, web documentaries, and altern ...

, applied repeatedly for a job with Canada's public producer, before being hired as a scriptwriting assistant in 1954. The technical knowledge of airplanes picked up while in the RAF served him well, and he wrote commentary for sponsored films at the NFB from 1954 to 1957. He soon graduated from assistant scriptwriter to director-photographer and producer and directed his first film in 1956. Macartney-Filgate worked the NFB's Unit B, with such filmmakers as Wolf Koenig,

Roman Kroitor Roman Kroitor (December 12, 1926 – September 17, 2012) was a Canadian filmmaker who was known as a pioneer of ''Cinéma vérité'', as the co-founder of IMAX, and as the creator of the Sandde hand-drawn stereoscopic 3D animation system. He ...

, ''Stanley Jackson'',

Michel Brault Michel Brault, OQ (25 June 1928 – 21 September 2013) was a Canadian cinematographer, cameraman, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He was a leading figure of Direct Cinema, characteristic of the French branch of the Nationa ...

, and Pierre Perrault, all of whom were at the forefront of the new unscripted, observational documentaries. He worked extensively as a director and cinematographer on the Candid Eye series. The NFB was able to sell the series of 14 30-minute shorts to the

CBC CBC may refer to: Media * Cadena Baja California or Grupo Cadena, a radio and television broadcaster in Mexico * Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Canada's radio and television public broadcaster ** CBC Television ** CBC Radio One ** CBC Music ** ...

, and Candid Eye (1958–61) was broadcast. Executive producer Tom Daly oversaw the filmmakers, and the shorts were shot on location using new lightweight equipment with an emphasis on recording everyday life. Macartney-Filgate was personally responsible for seven of the fourteen films and he helped shape the series' unscripted and observational approach.

Robert Drew Associates

In 1960, Macartney-Filgate left the NFB and Canada to work freelance for the U.S-based. ''Robert Drew Associates'' – Bob Drew's stable of pioneering documentarians that included

Richard Leacock Richard Leacock (18 July 192123 March 2011)
The Telegraph (Lon ...

, D.A. Pennebaker and Albert Maysles. This group produced three films for Time-Life Broadcast that year: ''Yanqui, No!'', ''Eddie (On the Pole)'' and ''Primary''. He was the principal (though uncredited) cameraman on

Primary Primary or primaries may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels * Primary (band), from Australia * Primary (musician), hip hop musician and record producer from South Korea * Primary Music, Israeli record label Work ...

, a seminal documentary about the 1960 Wisconsin Democratic presidential primary campaign between senators

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), also known as JFK, was the 35th president of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was the first Roman Catholic and youngest person elected p ...

and

Hubert Humphrey Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was an American politician who served from 1965 to 1969 as the 38th vice president of the United States. He twice served in the United States Senate, representing Minnesota from 19 ...

. Macartney-Filgate soon left Drew Associates and worked freelance throughout most of the sixties in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

Other projects

In 1962, he was hired by American producer Robert Hughes to assume the direction and photography of a documentary about the poet

Robert Frost Robert Lee Frost (March26, 1874January29, 1963) was an American poet. Known for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command of American Colloquialism, colloquial speech, Frost frequently wrote about settings from rural life in New E ...

when the original director, Shirley Clarke, left the project. The film, '' Robert Frost: A Lover's Quarrel with the World'' (1963), went on to win the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, with Clarke credited as the sole director, despite Macartney-Filgate directing the majority of it. He returned to the NFB briefly to work on the 1963 series ''

Lewis Mumford Lewis Mumford (October 19, 1895 – January 26, 1990) was an American historian, sociologist, philosopher of technology, and literary critic. Particularly noted for his study of cities and urban architecture, he had a broad career as a ...

on the City'', co-directing four of the six films. He won a

Peabody Award The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Foster Peabody, George Peabody, honor what are described as the most powerful, enlightening, and in ...

(the Institutional Award for Television Education) for his 1964 documentary, ''Changing World: South African Essay'' and, working again with Robert Hughes, conducted a rare interview with

Vladimir Nabokov Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov ( ; 2 July 1977), also known by the pen name Vladimir Sirin (), was a Russian and American novelist, poet, translator, and entomologist. Born in Imperial Russia in 1899, Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Rus ...

. In New York City, he worked with

William Greaves William Garfield Greaves (October 8, 1926 – August 25, 2014) was an American documentary filmmaker and a pioneer of film-making. After trying his hand at acting, he became a filmmaker who produced more than two hundred documentary films, and w ...

, who he had previously collaborated with on the ''Candid Eye'' series, and made films for television about such writers as

Harold Pinter Harold Pinter (; 10 October 1930 – 24 December 2008) was a British playwright, screenwriter, director and actor. A List of Nobel laureates in Literature, Nobel Prize winner, Pinter was one of the most influential modern British dramat ...

Marshall McLuhan Herbert Marshall McLuhan (, ; July 21, 1911 – December 31, 1980) was a Canadian philosopher whose work is among the cornerstones of the study of media studies, media theory. Raised in Winnipeg, McLuhan studied at the University of Manitoba a ...

and

Henry David Thoreau Henry David Thoreau (born David Henry Thoreau; July 12, 1817May 6, 1862) was an American naturalist, essayist, poet, and philosopher. A leading Transcendentalism, transcendentalist, he is best known for his book ''Walden'', a reflection upon sim ...

. He returned to Canada in the late sixties and again rejoined the NFB briefly to work on the Challenge for Change series, before moving to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. At the CBC, he directed the ''Lucy Maud Montgomery: The Road to Green Gables'' (1975), ''Grenfell of Labrador: The Great Adventure'' (1977), and '' Fields of Endless Day'' (1978). Perhaps his two most accomplished films for the CBC were '' Dieppe 1942'' (1979), which was co-written by

Timothy Findley Timothy Irving Frederick Findley, (October 30, 1930 – June 20, 2002) was a Canadian novelist and playwright.

and William Whitehead and was nominated for seven

Genie Awards The Genie Awards were given out annually by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television to recognize the best of Canadian cinema from 1980–2012. They succeeded the Canadian Film Awards (1949–1978), known as the "Etrog Awards" for sculpt ...

, and '' Timothy Findley: Anatomy of a Writer'' (1992), which won the Donald Brittain Award for best social/political documentary program at the 7th Gemini Awards in 1993. Macartney-Filgate also won two Canadian Film Awards for ''Blood and Fire'' (1958) and '' The Hottest Show on Earth'' (1977) and received an Ontario Film Institute Award in 1981. In the 1970s, Macartney-Filgate taught at the Department of Film,

York University York University (), also known as YorkU or simply YU), is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's third-largest university, and it has approximately 53,500 students, 7,000 faculty and staff, ...

Toronto Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...

, when James Beveridge was chair of the department. While still a student, Jennifer Hodge de Silva worked with Macartney-Filgate as assistant director and associate producer on ''Fields of Endless Day'', "one of the first Canadian productions to significantly chronicle nearly 400 years in the history of African Canadians." In 1979 she was associate producer for ''Dieppe 1942''.

Retirement

In retirement, after 1990, he continued to work with

Adrienne Clarkson Adrienne Louise Clarkson ( zh, c=伍冰枝; ; born February 10, 1939) is a Canadian journalist and stateswoman who served as the 26th governor general of Canada from 1999 to 2005. Clarkson arrived in Canada with her family in 1941, as a refuge ...

on her arts show for CBC Television, '' Adrienne Clarkson Presents''. In 1995, he worked with the NFB once again, directing ''Canada Remembers'', a 3-part series about Canada's role in World War II. In 2007, he completed ''Raising Valhalla'', a television documentary about the opening of a new opera stage at the Four Seasons Centre for Performing Arts. As an advocate of small-format video, he worked freelance, based in Toronto.

Honors

In May 2011, Macartney-Filgate was given Hot Doc's outstanding achievement award, which included a retrospective of his work. Also in 2011, Macartney-Filgate was made an Officer of the Order of Canada.

Personal life

Macartney-Filgate died in

on 11 July 2022 at the age of 97.

References

External links

*
Watch films by Terence Macartney-Filgate Filmography
at the

Terence Macartney-Filgate Filmography at CITWF
{{DEFAULTSORT:Macartney-Filgate, Terence 1924 births 2022 deaths Canadian documentary film directors Canadian cinematographers Canadian male screenwriters National Film Board of Canada people English film directors English emigrants to Canada Canadian Broadcasting Corporation people English documentary filmmakers Academic staff of York University Canadian film educators Officers of the Order of Canada British people in colonial India Royal Air Force personnel of World War II Royal Air Force airmen Screenwriters from Ontario