The NFB and Roman Kroitor The National Film Board of Canada has made revolutionary contributions to the world of cinema. Willing to push cinema into new territories, the NFB was created to bring together Canadian filmmakers and produce films that showed the world that Canada was a force to be reckoned with in the vast expanses of cinema. Particularly interesting was the NFB’s creation of a series of films that focused on the ‘Faces of Canada’, shedding light on the plethora of people from different walks of life that inhabited Canada between the 1950’s-1960. At the forefront of this series was Roman Kroitor’s 1953 documentary Paul Tomcowicz: Street-railway Switchman, which will be the focus of this essay. The film is a cinema verite style documentary that focuses on the unsung heroes that keep a community running, in this case the city of Winnipeg. Production of the film took place in 1953, a time where the power of Canadian cinema was beginning to blossom and become noticed across the world. As an NFB colleague, Roman Kroitor set out to make a film that painted an intimate portrait of a Polish-Canadian man and his job as a street-railway switchman in Winnipeg. Fully funded by the NFB, the film became a well recognized and important artifact among Canadian and International filmmakers, theorists, and scholars because of its honest portrayal of a man content with his life and the multiculturalism connotations present throughout the film. After the release of the film and the production of several more films for the NFB, Kroitor went on to truly change cinema with his co-founding of the Imax Corporation and developing of the Imax film format and the techniques used in the production of Imax films. Before this however, Kroitor made important films such as Paul Tomcowicz: Street-railway Switchman that laid the groundwork for the legacy he would leave behind in the world of cinema. At the forefront of Canadian documentary filmmaking, Kroitor chose to use a cinema verite style of filmmaking to capture his subject. The film is a mixture of handheld and static camerawork allowing the subject of the film to be viewed from up close and from afar, a technique used to great effect. This combination allows the viewer to see how Paul Tomkowicz is positioned in the grander scheme of Winnipeg life; he is presented as an isolated man in a sea of hustle and bustle yet without him, the daily life of the citizens of Winnipeg would grind to a hault in the dead of winter. By using handheld cameras, it allowed the crew to be right there with Tomkowicz as he swept snow and ice from streetcar tracks on one particular winter night. The visuals are often arresting such as a silhouetted profile shot of Tomkowicz sweeping the tracks with a bright streetlight to the side of him. Narration is used to great effect throughout the film. The viewer gets to know this man over the course of the 10 minute runtime, we learn of his beginnings in Poland, his age, how long he’s been in Canada, his thoughts on Winnipeg life etc. One particularly haunting snippet of narration comes towards the beginning of the film when Tomkowicz reminisces about a letter he received from his sister from the village that he was born in. She writes of soldiers entering their village and murdering 29 villagers, 2 of which happened to be his brother and his brothers wife. His sister asks him why, he answers “I don’t know.” The film, more specifically the narration, presents him not as a larger than life figure, but as someone just as confused yet content with life as any normal citizen of Canada. Furthermore, the narration in the film attempts to create a narrative flow to the images on screen. Tomkowicz is nearing the end of his days as a street-railway switchman and the narration attempts to sum up his attitude towards his life and job and look into what the future holds in store for him. The film presents Tomkowicz as a simple man with simple thoughts, as is the case when Tomkowicz wonders what he is going to do on his night off towards the end of the film. Will he take a bath or see a show? He concludes that he will stay home. These are everyday questions and as a film with the intent of presenting a ‘face of Canada’, the narration makes it successful. To truly expand on the style employed by Kroitor in this film, a sequence analysis is useful. The last scene of the film starts with a shot from inside a restaurant with the camera facing towards the window. Tomkowicz is seen outside looking in through the window as the camera cuts to a medium shot of Tomkowicz. He signals to the waiter behind the counter, cut to a reaction shot of the wiater acknowledging him then back to a medium shot of Tomkowicz walking away from the window. The camera then cuts to outside the restaurant as Tomkowicz sweeps the street-railway tracks as a group of men stand on the sidewalk opposite from him waiting for the trolley to arrive. The film then has a series of close-ups of Tomkowicz and the people on the sidewalk as he sweeps and the trolley eventually arrives, signaled by a sound of a bell and a long shot of the trolley in the distance. During this montage, narration comes over the images and Tomkowicz contemplates what he is going to do that evening, eventually deciding the read the newspaper and the bible. The film then cuts back to the interior of the restaurant as Tomkowicz enters it and sits down to eat. This sequence in the film is partially staged, such as the shots from inside the restaurant, Tomkowicz standing at the window and then later his entering of the restaurant. These staged moments, of which the film contains many, are evident of the cinema verite style of filmmaking. It is a hybrid of documentary and fiction and allows for a closer connection to the subject. Also this sequence proves the idea that the film is presenting Tomkowicz as a simple, average Canadian. He does his job, as is signaled by his declaration of “Finished” before he moves inside, and then spends the rest of his day much like everyone else, eating and returning home to enjoy his leisure time. As is present in many documentaries, they often present their subjects as separate from life, meaning the subjects they focus on are taken away from what it means to live; to have a job, to decide what your going to eat, what your going to do with your time off etc. They can focus on a specific period during a person’s life or the accomplishments or failures that a person has garnered. While some of these qualities are present in this film, Tomkowicz is presented as much more grounded to what it means to live in Winnipeg and in general. Kroitor made this film with the intent of two things; to shed light on a person not known for what they invented or who they killed etc, but a person simply living in Winnipeg and their duties and way of life and second to address multiculturalism in Canada. So on the one hand you have an intimate look into the life of a Polish-Canadian immigrant living in Winnipeg and on the other you have an examination of the integration of a different culture the Canadian way of life. The idea of multiculturalism is especially important here. With WWII having ended less than 10 years before production began, Canada was still trying to assert itself as a country that accepted people regardless of their nationality, religion, culture etc. With the focus of the film being on a Polish-Canadian immigrant, Kroitor further established Canada’s role as a country that will greet you with open arms no matter who you are and cemented his place as a major player in the evolution of cinema.

Works Cited

Kroitor, Roman, dir. Paul Tomkowicz: Street-railway Switchman. 1953. National Film Board of Canada. Film.