My sister reminded me of these the other day. Back in the 1980s a bunch of ostensibly family fantasy films by Les Productions la Fete got distributed in the US on basic cable and VHS (I recall one, The Great Land of Small even turned up in theaters one summer when I was visiting grandparents)
The Peanut Butter Solution. The Great Land of Small. Tommy Tricker and the Stamp Traveller.
They are perhaps best described as like French Canadian equivalents of the Russo Finnish films only set in the late 20th century with lower budgets but way more nightmare fuel.
Considering how much fun they had with the RF sequence and family fantasies like the Magic Sword and the Christmas Dragon, I found myself wondering if these would be a good fit.
I have no idea who owns the rights these days. Heck, for all I know the studio is still making them only the distribution deal fell off in the 90s or something.
That was the first one I ever saw. There were several years where in the 80s a bunch popped up on cable, got VHS releases, one even turned up in the theater near my grandparents home in Muncie Indiana….then after 1990 or so they seemed to vanish. I don’t know if the studio ceased making them or they just stopped getting sent here.
Unfortunately, they checked on the rights for the Peanut Butter Solution and were declined. I believe these are all owned by the same producer (pretty sure it’s the director). So if he won’t let them riff PBS, my guess is all the movies are off limits.
Darn it. Great Land of Small even has a bizarre cameo by Cirque du Soleil (playing the slime worshipping inhabitants of a strange alternate world) I’m dying to see their take on. Oh well.
It’s available at that purveyor of glorious schlock, Tubi. It also features Michael Hogan (Colonel Tigh on Sci-Fi Battlestar Galactica) back when he had hair.
