Shattered City: The Halifax Explosion

Last updated
Shattered City: The Halifax Explosion
Written by Keith Ross Leckie
Directed by Bruce Pittman
Starring
Music by Christopher Dedrick
Country of originCanada
Original languageEnglish
Production
Producers
Cinematography Rene Ohashi
Editors
Running time240 min (including commercials)
Production companies
Original release
Release26 October 2003 (2003-10-26)

Shattered City: The Halifax Explosion is a two-part miniseries produced in 2003 by CBC Television. It presents a fictionalized version of the Halifax Explosion, a 1917 catastrophe that destroyed much of the Canadian city of Halifax. It was directed by Bruce Pittman and written by Keith Ross Leckie. The Film Stars Vincent Walsh, Tamara Hope, Clare Stone, Zachary Bennett, Shauna MacDonald and Ted Dykstra.

Contents

The series was expensive by Canadian television standards with a budget of $10.4 million. It was heavily promoted by the CBC and paired with a number of non-fiction documentaries. The broadcast drew a sizable Canadian audience of 1.5 million viewers. It drew some praise for the adept use of special effects to show the destruction of the explosion. However the miniseries was poorly received critically. One critic at the Globe and Mail described it as "execrably written and acted" [1] while another strained to find positive elements, "At times, there is a plodding workmanlike quality to Shattered City." [2] The miniseries won some technical awards at the Canadian television Gemini Awards in 2004 (photography, special effects, costume and sound) but was passed over for any direction or writing awards and won only a single supporting acting award for Ted Dykstra. [3]

Serious concerns were raised over the depiction of history in the miniseries. Descendants of explosion victims [4] and professional historians [5] objected to the historical distortions and numerous liberties with historical truth. Significant deviations include: [6]

Cast

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Halifax Explosion</span> 1917 maritime disaster in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

On the morning of 6 December 1917 the French cargo ship SS Mont-Blanc collided with the Norwegian vessel SS Imo in the harbour of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The Mont-Blanc, laden with high explosives, caught fire and exploded, devastating the Richmond district of Halifax. At least 1,782 people were killed, largely in Halifax and Dartmouth, by the blast, debris, fires, or collapsed buildings, and an estimated 9,000 others were injured. The blast was the largest human-made explosion at the time. It released the equivalent energy of roughly 2.9 kilotons of TNT (12 TJ).

Sharon Butala is a Canadian writer and novelist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vince Coleman (train dispatcher)</span> Canadian train dispatcher

Patrick Vincent Coleman was a train dispatcher for the Canadian Government Railways who was killed in the Halifax Explosion, but not before he sent a message to an incoming passenger train to stop outside the range of the explosion. Today he is remembered as one of the heroic figures from the disaster.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Halifax Harbour</span> Harbour in Nova Scotia, Canada

Halifax Harbour is a large natural harbour on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia, Canada, located in the Halifax Regional Municipality. Halifax largely owes its existence to the harbour, being one of the largest and deepest ice-free natural harbours in the world. Before Confederation it was one of the most important commercial ports on the Atlantic seaboard. In 1917, it was the site of the world's largest man-made accidental explosion, when the SS Mont-Blanc blew up in the Halifax Explosion of December 6.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shauna MacDonald (Canadian actress)</span> Canadian actress

Shauna MacDonald is a Canadian television and film actress, director, producer, writer, voice actor, and radio announcer. She became known for her role as the national continuity announcer for CBC Radio One.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dan Bigras</span> Musical artist (born 1957)

Dan Bigras is a francophone rock singer and actor from Canada. He has released a number of albums of rock music, beginning with Ange Animal in 1990.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Halifax Court House</span>

The Halifax Court House is a historic building in downtown Halifax, Nova Scotia. Its main section was completed in 1863, with the east wing, built in 1930, being the newest portion. The Italian renaissance style building was designed by William Thomas, a Toronto architect who created prominent structures across Canada, and built by George Lang.

CSS <i>Acadia</i> Former Canadian research ship

CSS Acadia is a former hydrographic surveying and oceanographic research ship of the Hydrographic Survey of Canada and its successor the Canadian Hydrographic Service.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Benjamin Russell (Canadian politician)</span> Canadian politician

Benjamin Russell was a Canadian lawyer, professor of law, judge, and politician in the province Nova Scotia.

<i>Shattered City: The Halifax Explosion and the Road to Recovery</i>

Shattered City: The Halifax Explosion and the Road to Recovery is a 1989 Canadian non-fiction book by Janet Kitz describing the experience of the Halifax Explosion with an emphasis on the experience of ordinary people and families who became victims or survivors of the 1917 munitions explosion in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The book broke new ground, making extensive use of oral history interviews conducted by Janet Kitz to tell previously unknown stories from the event, illustrated by documents and photographs collected by the author as well as images and artifacts from the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic. The first book published in many years about the explosion, it broke the record for the largest number of books ever sold at a book launch in Nova Scotia and has been credited as creating a renaissance in published accounts about the 1917 disaster. The book has been reprinted several times and has remained a definitive account of the disaster which has influenced numerous works that have followed. Janet Kitz went on to write two follow-up books: Survivors: Children of the Halifax Explosion (2000) which explored in more detail the stories of children who survived and December 1917: Revisiting the Halifax Explosion (2006) with Joan Payzant which looked at the impact of the explosion on the landscape of Halifax and Dartmouth.

SS <i>Mont-Blanc</i> French cargo ship

SSMont-Blanc was a cargo steamship that was built in Middlesbrough, England in 1899 for a French shipping company. On Thursday morning, December 6, 1917, she entered Halifax Harbour in Nova Scotia, Canada laden with a full cargo of highly volatile explosives. As she made her way through the Narrows towards Bedford Basin, she was involved in a collision with Imo, a Norwegian ship. A fire aboard the ship ignited her cargo of wet and dry 2,300 tons of picric acid, 500 tons of TNT, and 10 tons of guncotton. The resultant Halifax Explosion killed approximately 2,000 people and injured about 9,000.

SS <i>Imo</i> Norwegian steamship

SS Imo was a merchant steamship that was built in 1889 to carry livestock and passengers, and converted in 1912 into a whaling factory ship. She was built as Runic, renamed Tampican in 1895, Imo in 1912 and Guvernøren in 1920.

<i>Halifax Explosion Memorial Sculpture</i>

The Halifax Explosion Memorial Sculpture was a work of public art in Halifax, Nova Scotia, created in 1966 by the Quebec artist Jordi Bonet to commemorate the Halifax Explosion. The sculpture was located at the Halifax North Memorial Library but was dismantled in 2004 by the Halifax Regional Municipality and accidentally destroyed while in storage.

Stella Maris was a steamship built in 1882 as the Royal Navy gunboat HMS Starling and converted to steam tug in 1905. Stella Maris played a major role in the events of the Halifax Explosion in 1917.

The Halifax Explosion, a disaster that occurred in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, on 6 December 1917, when a French cargo ship laden with high explosives collided with Norwegian vessel, has frequently been the subject of works of popular culture.

The Crime of Ovide Plouffe, also known as Murder in the Family in its television run, is a Canadian film and television miniseries from Quebec. The project consisted of two parts: a two-hour theatrical film directed by Denys Arcand which was released to theatres in 1984, and a six-hour television miniseries which aired in 1986, with four hours directed by Gilles Carle leading into the Arcand film as the final two hours.

The United States Revenue Cutter Morrill was built at Wilmington, Delaware, and commissioned in October 1889 under the official name Lot M. Morrill. She served off Florida and in the Spanish–American War. She then served on the Great Lakes. After the United States entered into World War I in 1917, she came under the operational control of the United States Navy. She rendered particular assistance in the aftermath of the December 1917 Halifax Explosion. Following the war Morrill again served on the Great Lakes. She was decommissioned in October 1928.

Marie Plourde is a politician, media personality, journalist, and occasional actress in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. She has served on the Plateau-Mont-Royal borough council since 2013 as a member of Projet Montréal.

The Canadian Screen Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama Series or Program is an annual Canadian television award, presented by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television to the best supporting performance by an actor in a Canadian dramatic television series or television film. Previously presented as part of the Gemini Awards, since 2013 it has been presented as part of the Canadian Screen Awards.

The Canadian Screen Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series or Program is an annual Canadian television award, presented by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television to the best supporting performance by an actress in a Canadian dramatic television series or television film. Previously presented as part of the Gemini Awards, since 2013 it has been presented as part of the Canadian Screen Awards.

References

  1. Russell Smith "Virtual Culture" Globe and Mail, Feb. 19, 2004, page R1
  2. John Doyle "Halifax Miniseries Meanders till the Sparks Fly", Globe and Mail, Oct. 24, 2003, page R2.
  3. ACCT – Canadian Awards History Search Archived 2011-07-16 at the Wayback Machine
  4. Steve Garrity, "Shattered City Missed the Mark", Halifax Chronicle Herald, Nov. 2, 2004, page B4.
  5. David Rodenizer, "Shattered City Disappoints Historians", Daily News, Oct. 29, 2003, page 7
  6. Conlin, Dan. "Historical Distortions and Errors in the Film Shattered City" . Retrieved 2006-12-15.