MONTREAL – Astral Media today launched a new French-language movie channel, Cinépop, aimed at Quebec movie buffs pining to see some of the older stuff.
Not the real old grainy black-and-white movies, but what Astral calls the “cinema classics” from the 1950’s through the Nineties. On this month’s schedule are such films as “The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz”, “All the President’s Men”, “Sophie’s Choice” and “The Colour Purple”.
Cinépop is the first French-language television channel in Quebec devoted exclusively to the film world’s golden oldies, and “confirms Astral Media’s pay-TV leadership and expertise in offering a varied, accessible and memorable movie experience,” said Astral’s Vice-president and general manager Johanne Saint-Laurent in a statement.
Astral already offers Super Écran in French, with 460,000 households subscribing, and The Movie Network in English. Cinépop’s equivalent in English Canada is Mpix.
The schedule will offer at least 20 per cent Canadian content, and as many Quebec-made films as possible, Astral’s communications director Denyse Gagnon told cartt.ca. Those made in languages other than French will be dubbed versions.
“Polls show that people really want to see over again the older films that they liked, instead of newer films that are not so good,” she said, “and they can watch them commercial-free.”
Cinépop is available in Quebec to Vidéotron and Bell ExpressVu digital subscribers. For the moment, it’s not available to cable subscribers outside Quebec.
Glenn Wanamaker is www.cartt.ca’s Quebec Editor.
