Film Description:
"It's the summer of 2001 in Montreal, and the city is sweltering. Violent confrontations between increasingly militant homeless people and police are hitting the news. Afraid that bad publicity will affect tourism, the city allows a legal squat. Fifty people, including single parents with kids, move off the streets into an empty building surrounded by a couple of acres outside the citys core. Director Eve Lamont, unabashedly allied with the squatters, is inside filming as they debate responsibilities, share meals, graffiti the walls and hang militant banners from the roof. But the mayor is up for re-election, the media keeps up the heat with sensationalist broadcasts, and it's soon a major political issue. Within weeks, a literal army of building inspectors, fire marshals and police descend upon the building in a relentless campaign of intimidation and misrepresentation. Squat! is a powerful, rowdy film about the squatters' political vision and city halls drive to squash it. Cinema verité and political filmmaking at its best."
-- Lynne Fernie
(source)
Film Description:
"Montreal, summer 2001. During the city's acute housing crisis, young militants and people with poor lodging or none at all barricaded and occupied a vacant building, voicing their right to decent housing and a desire to live their own way. Their cliché ridden portrayal in the media makes them wary of the reporters sent to cover what is presented as a mini siege. But they do trust filmmaker Ève Lamont, and allow her to enter their lives, tell their story and present their vision on what life should be. Their project was eventually brutally dismantled, but their experiences in this film acclaimed served to present a microcosm of the harsh effects of real estate speculation and poor planning and indifference of government agencies."
-- Les Productions du Rapide-Blanc
(source)
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