Come On Children

Allan King's "docudramas" have always offered an unparalleled incursion into the intimacy of his subjects, allowing us to experience what they are living, at the moment they are living it. Come On Children summons this feeling of being there, in the here and the now.

Interested in the Flower Generation living in the suburbs of Toronto, King wanted to meet them in preparation for this film. After speaking with hundreds of middle-class teenagers between the ages of 13 and 19, a common question seemed to emerge: "Why is there no place for them in our society?" In order to give them the freedom to speak, the filmmaker put together a representative sample (five boys and five girls) who were willing to live together for a few weeks on an isolated farm, away from the authority figures governing their daily lives. This constructed space gave them a place to be, in order to think about where they are at. As time passes, we witness their preoccupations, the cameras capturing (extra)ordinary moments of complicity, exchange, frustration and rambling, offering a timeless evocation of adolescence, this age where everything seems both possible and impossible, where our hopes are already encumbered by the disillusionment of the reality of our world.

An invitation to (re)experience both the exaltation and the stagnation of a youth on the precipice of adulthood, as John sings with candor in the unforgettable opening sequence of the film: 

"You're about to meet 10 people now you never met before / So why don't you sit back and relax, we'll open out our door / I'm not sure what the film is about, hasn't been made too clear / But I hope the movie makes you feel you wish you were here." 

Jason Burnham
Tënk's programming coordinator