Blake

Blake (1969)

An eccentric history buff lives in a cabin in the woods but spends most of his time flying his biplane.

Date of release
1969-01-01
TMDB
6.3 / 10 (6)
Runtime
19m
Genres
Documentary
Director
Bill Mason

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Awards: 0 · Nominations: 2

Blake is a 1969 Canadian short documentary film produced by the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). The film was directed by Bill Mason, and his fellow filmmaker Blake James, who pilots his own aircraft and lives by a unique code. Blake is Mason's cinematic testimonial to his friend and his "hobo of the skies" lifestyle.

Production

Mason and James first met at a commercial art studio in Winnipeg. They later worked together at Crawley Films, before both going to the NFB. James' film credits include an animated vignette on Canadian aviation pioneer Wilfrid R. "Wop" May. He also starred in Mason's acclaimed short film The Rise and Fall of the Great Lakes (1968).

Aerial filming involved both Mason and James, with Blake's biplane equipped with film cameras on the wingtips and in front of the cockpit. Filming Blake was fraught with difficulty and was sometimes dangerous; on one occasion, Mason lost sight of James while filming from another aircraft. It was discovered that James had been forced to land on an island in the St. Lawrence River after forgetting to switch on his main fuel tank.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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