
            Jacob Obus is a 75 year old jazz musician, collapsing into darkness and isolation. He is world famous. His instruments are completely unique, not just in look, but in function. Each is modeled after a woman's body and he never speaks to the models. Obus blows on, strokes, fondles, and generally makes love to those bodies each time he plays the stage, symbolically speaking. Every instrument is special, played with various fingerings, combining woodwind, string and whatever it takes to recreate the woman's body. Each instrument reports a sound never heard before. And still he won't speak to any of the models. Until now...Avril will not be turned away. She will experience all of Obus, inside and out. She turns the tables. Obus, while modeling for Avril, who is also photographer, is stripped naked and exposed. In his vulnerability, he confesses that the love he makes on stage is a ruse. He has never been with a woman, and alas we understand why he is isolated. She is moved, and they fall in love. Avril is also having an affair with Obus' instrument concept artist, Arthur, a much younger man. Arthur fights for Avril. He disparages his employer, and alleged friend, at every turn.All the while, we are in communication with the world's first Marsonautes, who are traveling at relativistic speeds to the planet next door. It's fuzzy math time, as we are speaking to them live, even though they are supposed to be experiencing time dilation. Despite their training for the mission, time dilation is explained to them on camera. We also follow Eugène Spaak (Arthur's father and Jacob's friend), who theorizes about Mars and fabricates Obus' instruments in his makeshift laboratory. According to Spaak, music, women and the mysteries of the universe are tightly linked.After finally finding love, Obus must lose it, as Avril has teleported to Mars to be the first woman Marsonaute. (She couldn't transport before now, because a capsule hadn't been placed on the other side until people landed on Mars.) A lovesick Obus, finally receiving the instrument modeled after Avril, finds that he cannot play it. At least not alone. Obus realizes he needs Arthur to play the instrument with him, and to love Avril. Together, they can both love her, without either possessing her.Ultimately the journey leads inside one of the instruments (or is it inside the Red Planet?), where Obus finally makes the decision to trust his love for Avril and Arthur to fight against his own demon: loneliness. For the finale, we wonder if this entire experience is just Obus' death poem, or a love song, played with the rest of the band. In the end, it doesn't matter. "Mars et Avril" follows the foregone conclusion of the form: tragic loss and noble sacrifice for love, peppered with saccharine redemption."Mars et Avril" was filmed with a low budget, nearly volunteer wages for the visual effects team, and the coup of Canadian actor Robert Lepage's appearance in a starring role. This is so astounding, that director Martin Villeneuve has given a TED talk: Martin Villeneuve: How I made an impossible film (2013).
    

Jacques Languirand

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