John Zaritsky, director, is shown during the shooting of his thalidomide documentary No Limits.
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In the nearly 40 years that John Zaritsky has been making documentaries, the veteran Canadian filmmaker has returned to one subject three times: thalidomide. No Limits, the third film in what has become a trilogy, is an eye-opening and often enraging examination of the Nazi involvement with Grunenthal, the German pharmaceutical company that manufactured the drug. No Limits explores how the company kept concerns about the drug's horrific effects under wraps while continuing to promote thalidomide heavily, and includes interviews with several victims, now middle-aged, including people who have appeared in earlier Zaritsky films.
And, Zaritsky has mused, it might be his final film.
"I wanted to go out on a film that was sort of typical of my career. And on a cause that I was devoted to," Zaritsky says during an interview at the Whistler Film Festival. "So I thought, well if you're going to have a swan song, maybe this is the time to go – on this note."
Zaritsky was at Whistler not with No Limits (which airs on CBC's documentary Channel on Sunday), but with Mr. Zaritsky on TV, a film he did not produce or direct. The documentary, made by Jennifer Di Cresce and Michael Savoie, shows him at work, making No Limits.
No Limits examines the Nazi involvement with Grunenthal, the German pharmaceutical company that manufactured thalidomide.
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Zaritsky, 74, began his career as a journalist and has had a prolific career as a documentary filmmaker. His film Just Another Missing Kid, which aired on CBC's The Fifth Estate in 1981, went on to win the Academy Award for best feature documentary. Zaritsky says after winning, he was determined to never cheapen that Oscar or its integrity, and has always sought out worthy projects. If there's been a driving force in his prolific career, he says, it's to make socially conscious films about ordinary people who have been victimized by the system in some way.
"I have no sympathy for fat cats. I mean, what's interesting about fat cats?" he says in Mr. Zaritsky on TV. "But underdogs; that's something different. That's something I can really get my teeth into."
Despite the grave subject matter of No Limits, the film within the film of Mr. Zaritsky on TV, like its subject, is full of life, colour (Zaritsky has a thing for bright pants) and humour.
In the opening scene, he is handed a copy of a 1972 Globe and Mail letter to the editor and reads it aloud, on camera. "Mr. Zaritsky on TV," he begins. "An ominous heading if there ever was one."
The scene gave the filmmakers the title for their documentary and sets the tone for the film.
Zaritsky has said No Limits may be his final film.
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The letter concerns Zaritsky's behaviour – he was a Globe reporter then and there was a strike at the CBC. "A few days ago on the TV screen we were watching the absurd spectacle of one of your reporters by the name of John Zaritsky jumping around trying to prevent a CBC crew from shooting some film.
"Who does Mr. Zaritsky think he is?"
Mr. Zaritsky on TV – the film, not the letter to the editor – is much less a biopic than it is an observation of a documentarian at work. An all-access observation of Zaritsky, it was shot in 2015 as he travelled through Europe, interviewing thalidomide victims and nailing down damning details about Grunenthal's shocking Nazi connections and the drug's development. The circumstances are often trying: In addition to the gruelling subject matter and long, emotional interviews, there are long shooting days without a producer on-scene, logistical obstacles and some dreary conditions. In the middle of it, a key subject pulls out – a development that is captured close-up in one intense, unrelenting scene.
"The behind-the-scenes, what happens when you're making these things, is oftentimes as interesting as what's happening in front of the camera. There's this whole world that exists back there that's my life," says Savoie, who met Di Cresce at Sheridan College. Savoie was a teacher, Di Cresce a student, and they ultimately became business partners.
Their initial intention with the project was to make a film about the art of documentary filmmaking. When they learned Zaritsky was planning another thalidomide doc, they were sure they had their subject. Zaritsky was less sure. Savoie and Di Cresce pitched the idea over dinner near Zaritsky's then-Vancouver home, but he turned them down.
"This was after I spent 600 bucks on his dinner, too. I just want to point that out," Savoie says. He adds, about the bill, "It wasn't the food."
A few months later, they gave it another shot. This time, he agreed.
Zaritsky is seen preparing for an interview with participant Monika Eisenberg-Geginat.
"I was really dragged kicking and screaming," Zaritsky says over breakfast the morning after the film had its world premiere at Whistler in December. "If it hadn't been for Michael, I would never have considered it."
Zaritsky and Savoie have been in the trenches together for years, Savoie shooting six of Zaritsky's projects, including Romeo and Juliet in Sarajevo and Born in Africa for Frontline. They have developed the kind of shorthand and trust that comes with that.
"We've been in some very tough places together. We were in Sarajevo during the war. We were in Africa during the AIDS pandemic. The tough slums of America," Zaritsky says. "He and Jen were very persistent. So finally I said okay. I felt I kind of owed it to them. If it hadn't been for them I would still be in my safe, anonymous position."
A hitch was that Zaritsky wanted Savoie to shoot his thalidomide doc, putting Savoie in the bifurcated position of producer/director of his own project and director of photography for the other.
Zaritsky, too, was compelled to participate in a second project at the same time as he was busy making his own film.
John Zaritsky speaks with film participant Louise Medus-Mansell outside her home.
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"We were trying to figure out when was the best time to get him? Do we need to ply him with a glass of wine first? Do we get him at the end of the day when he's tired and vulnerable? Do we get him in the morning when he has more energy? We were always trying to figure out when would be the best time to kind of spring a question on him?" Di Cresce says.
The answer?
"The glass of wine," she says, no hesitation. "He's got to have a full stomach and a glass of wine."
Even a veteran such as Zaritsky says he learned something about the craft he has practised for decades by agreeing to become the subject of someone else's documentary.
"It was really an educational experience," he says. "I finally understood the terror that film subjects can have as they're sitting down to be interviewed."
When he sat down, a bit apprehensive, to watch it, he approved immediately. It demonstrated the extent to which documentary filmmaking is a team sport, he felt, as well as exposing other, unglamorous realities of the craft: lousy budgets and conditions, impossible deadlines, sometimes difficult producers and many difficult moments for the director, too.
"What I like about the film is not the way I was treated in the film but the fact that it's an honest film," Zaritsky says. "It shows me at my best and shows me at my worst."
No Limits airs on CBC documentary Channel on Sunday at 9 pm ET/PT. Mr. Zaritsky on TV will air on CBC documentary Channel later this year, likely in the spring.