Ladies and Gentlemen... Mr. Leonard Cohen

Ce film réalisé en 1965 brosse un portrait décontracté du poète, romancier et auteur-compositeur Leonard Cohen. On le voit tantôt lisant sa poésie devant un public qui boit ses paroles, tantôt seul ou en compagnie de sa famille et de ses amis.

Alden Nowlan survived rural poverty to become the winner of Canada's 1967 Governor General's Award for poetry. His empathy with ordinary people ran throughout his work as poet, journalist, short-story writer, novelist and playwright. His writing is admired far beyond his native Maritimes, but he never forgot his roots, which he drew on for inspiration. This film, shot just before his death in 1983, records him reminiscing and reading from his work.

Author of one of the major novels of the century, Under the Volcano, Malcolm Lowry fought a winning battle with words, and a losing battle with liquor. On-location shooting in four countries, photographs, readings by Richard Burton from Lowry's novel, and interviews with the people who loved and hated him give the film a terrifying immediacy. More than a portrait, it is a reflection on the greater agony of man.