“Until the end, Érik was extremely courageous, strong and resilient. He gave us a great lesson in life,” reports his brother, actor Nicolas Canuel, reached by telephone. “I accompanied him and his girlfriend when the disease became more virulent. Until his last days, he had a passion for cinema, he was happy and wanted to make us laugh. He would have liked to end his days in the countryside, but when he decided to go to palliative care, it lasted two days. »
Born in Montreal in 1961, son of actors Yvan Canuel (1935-1999) and Lucille Papineau, Érik Canuel did not take long to discover his vocation, as his younger brother recounts: “We shared a passion for the profession since childhood since we worked in the theater with our father, then together in the cinema. Very, very young, he made comics, he already had the frame in his eye. Very early on, his cinematographic language developed. He knew how to make the camera talk. He was always reading books about filmmaking techniques and directors. He had a pretty incredible memory of craftsmen. »
After studying film production at Concordia and directing several music videos, episodes of the British-Canadian series The Hunger (1997-1998) and the Quebec series Fortier (1999), as well as the American television film Blackheart: Monster Masher (2000) and the short documentary Hemingway: A Portrait (1999), for which he won a Genie Award, the director made a notable entry into the Quebec cinematic landscape with his first feature film, The Pig’s Law (2001), on a screenplay by Joanne Arseneau.
“That film was relaxing! », remembers Patrick Roy, at the time vice-president of Alliance Vivafilm. “It was unheard of in Quebec, a very American, very modern thriller, with black humor, a small miracle achieved with few resources. I loved working with Erik. Beneath his rock’n’roll exterior, he was someone endearing, friendly, pleasant, a good guy who was quite direct, very sensitive and someone who was easy to work with. With Érik, we always had confidence. »
While he pursued a prolific career in English Canada and the United States, Érik Canuel established himself in Quebec and demonstrated his versatility with the sentimental comedy Red Nose (2003), the thriller The Last Tunnel (2004), where he directs two giants, Michel Côté and Jean Lapointe, and Le Survenant (2005), based on the novel by Germaine Guèvremont.
“Erik Canuel was a war machine with extraordinary energy. He trusted me with two defining projects in my career, The Pig’s Law and The Survenant. […] It was impossible not to embark on his trips, he galvanized the team so much with his delirious enthusiasm. Erik, you were a larger than life character. A bad boy with a huge heart. You gave me a great deal! », Shared Catherine Trudeau on her social networks.
“Le Survenant may not have come naturally to Érik, but having seen it again two or three years ago on TV, it remains a magnificent film that has aged well. Érik showed all his sensitivity and proved all his versatility. He could do anything, he was an excellent technician,” says Patrick Roy.
In 2006, with the police comedy Bon Cop, Bad Cop, where Patrick Huard and Colm Feore formed a powerful duo, Érik Canuel smashed the box office with revenues of more than 12 million. If the Jutra for directing escaped him in 2007, he won the one for the most successful film outside of Quebec the following year.
“There were financing issues,” says Patrick Roy. With Patrick Huard, who was also one of the screenwriters, he had to make significant changes. He proved his great professionalism and that he was capable of turning around on a 10 cent in conditions that were not always easy. Erik had a very unique style, which has not been imitated; he was one of the first to make genre cinema. He took our cinematography where it had never gone. »
“Erik Canuel was not only a director of genre films, he was the director of all genres,” Marc Lamothe, director of partnerships at Fantasia, wrote on Facebook. Like Jean-Claude Lord, Yves Simoneau, André Melançon and Roger Cantin, he is an artist who knew how to break down doors to allow generations to give in the genre in Quebec. Starting last winter, I spoke regularly with Érik, because the festival wanted to award him the Denis-Héroux prize this summer, a career prize recognizing an exceptional contribution to the development and dissemination of genre cinema and independent Quebec cinema. . »
The prize will be awarded posthumously at a screening of a 35mm print of The Pig’s Law on July 22. Since 2019, when he signed four episodes of the series Transplant, Érik Canuel, to whom we also owe Cadavres (2009) and Lac Mystère (2012), had not filmed.
“My brother was the biggest movie fan I knew. He still wanted to make films, he had two or three projects in mind. He still received offers, but it was no longer possible due to illness. Our last production together was 9 – the film, written by Stéphane E. Roy; I played in the segment that he had directed, “Restaurant rest”,” confides Nicolas Canuel.
“Erik had so many projects, he had this madness of wanting to shoot everything. He had a blast telling stories with such energy, such generosity. For seven or eight years, he made one film per year. Few directors have navigated genres so intelligently; he knew how to make cinema commercial, accessible and unifying. It’s a big loss for cinema,” concludes Nathalie Brunet, who was the filmmaker’s agent for 28 years.
