Three Canadian cities Montreal, Edmonton, and Vancouver would showcase Jeremiah Hayes’ award-winning documentary Dear Audrey, co-produced by the NFB, Cineflix Media, to cinemas beginning August 19, 2022.
After devoting all his life to peace and justice, Filmmaker-activist Martin Duckworth decided to concentrate to fighting for the cause of caring for his wife, Audrey Schirmer, through her final stages of Alzheimer’s disease their autistic daughter, Jacqueline’s struggles with her mother’s illness.
Martin commits everything he’s got to making their lives meaningful and still creative, as life-long artists.
The film is a powerful testament to Martin’s love and devotion to Audrey which has deepened over the decades while she gradually fades away.
Jeremiah’s first job after film school in 1991 was with Martin Duckworth at the NFB, as assistant editor on Peacekeeper at War. Their friendship started to grow five years ago, after Martin’s wife Audrey was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and Jeremiah began filming them in their home.
Dear Audrey was photographed spanning nearly 50 shooting days and at least 90 hours of footage, with Martin narrating in his own words, distilled from about 15 hours of interviews.
Theatrical release schedule for the opening of Dear Audrey on August 19 in the following cities is as follows:
- Montreal, Cinéma du Parc (English version with French subtitles)
- Montreal, Cinémathèque Québécoise (English version with French subtitles)
- Edmonton, Metro Cinema
- Vancouver, VIFF Centre
Awards won by the film Dear Audrey
- People’s Choice Award, 2021 Montreal International Documentary Festival
- Cercle d’or for Best Feature Documentary, 2022 Festival Cinéma du monde de Sherbrooke, Quebec
- Feature Winner, Best of Documentary, 2022 Indy Film Fest, Indianapolis
- Winner of the Dr. Sydney K. Shapiro Philanthropic Award, 2022 Phoenix Film Festival
- Silver Winner of Best Feature Documentary, 2022 Tokyo Film Awards, Japan
Produced by Jeremiah Hayes, André Barro (Cineflix) and Annette Clarke (NFB), Dear Audrey is a co-production of Cineflix Media in Montreal and the NFB’s Quebec and Atlantic Studio.
About Jeremiah Hayes
An award-winning director, editor, and writer, Jeremiah Hayes is best known as the co-director, co-writer, and editor of the Rezolution/NFB film Reel Injun, for which he won a Gemini Award and a Peabody Award. Jeremiah is also recognized for the Emmy-nominated and Sundance award-winning feature documentary Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World, for which he received the Canadian Screen Award for Best Editing in a Documentary Program.
About Martin Duckworth
Raised during the Great Depression, Martin began his career at the age of 30, creating films that are artful, raise social awareness, and are award-winning. From 1963 to 1970, he was on staff at the NFB where continued to work with the NFB as a freelancer. He traveled the globe, directed 30 films, and cinematographed 100, which depicted to him the horrors of war in Vietnam, Cambodia, Japan, and Afghanistan. Recently, he has been the recipient of the Prix Albert-Tessier, one of Quebec’s highest honors, for his lifetime achievement in cinema.
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