Josh (Maxime Dumontier, left) and his father Henri (Normand D'Amour) come to terms with the fact that Josh is the only survivor of a suicide pact in the controversial Quebec film Tout est parfait. (Alliance Atlantis Media)

Tout est parfait (Everything Is Fine), Yves-Christian Fournier's startling debut film, has been stirring controversy in la belle province since it opened the Rendez-vous du cinéma Québécois last February. The picture centres on a suburban teenager named Josh, whose four best friends commit suicide, leaving their families desperate for an explanation.

Most critics in Quebec maintain that Tout est parfait was the best film of 2008, and one of the most powerful to come out of this province in years.

Tout est parfait is up for seven Genie Awards, as well as four statuettes at Quebec's upcoming Prix Jutras on March 29. Most critics in Quebec maintain that Tout est parfait was the best film of 2008, and one of the most powerful to come out of this province in years. Last week, the Canadian Academy of Film and Television awarded the film the Claude Jutra Prize for best first feature. But while it has screened at festivals around the world — picking up prizes in Seattle and Namur, Belgium — Tout est parfait is not universally loved at home: it has only pulled in $376,000 at the box office.

Influential La Presse columnist Nathalie Petrowski, clearly irritated by Fournier's subtle approach, said the film missed the mark because it didn't spell out why the four adolescents ended their lives. (The teens videotape a suicide note, but the viewer never gets to hear it.) According to Fournier himself, well-known broadcaster Benoit Dutrizac walked out of a screening shortly after the opening sequence, in which one of the characters shoots himself with a handgun.

A former ad man, Fournier knows how to seduce viewers. Tout est parfait follows Josh (Maxime Dumontier), an angry, taciturn teenager, as he grapples with the loss of his friends and begins to fall in love with Mia (Chloé Bourgeois). The film includes a dreamy animated sequence, as well as a compelling soundtrack featuring artists like Blonde Redhead, Cat Power, Gillian Welch and popular Quebec rappers Loco Locass, whose infamous song Libérez-nous des libéraux (Liberate us from the Liberals) became an anthem for the Parti Québécois and student activists after Jean Charest's Liberals won the 2003 provincial election.

Although it received four Jutra nominations, Tout est parfait was shut out in the prestigious best film category, a fact that drew the ire of this province's film critics and got much ink in the daily press.

"I would rather not have my nomination [for best screenplay]; best film means much more," Guillaume Vigneault told me shortly after hearing he picked up a Jutra nom for his sparse and evocative script. "I think the subject matter makes people really uncomfortable," said Vigneault, the son of legendary chansonnier Gilles Vigneault.

Filmmaker Yves-Christian Fournier. (Alliance Atlantis Media)

Tout est parfait has clearly hit a nerve, likely because it touches on two issues that preoccupy both ordinary folk and provincial policy-makers: male suicides and high school dropouts. At 31 per cent, Quebec has the second-highest dropout rate in Canada. The province also has the highest suicide rate in Canada – it remains the number one cause of death among men between the ages of 20 and 40.

"As human beings, we are confused," Fournier says during a recent interview, sitting in the spacious offices of Go Films in downtown Montreal. The 35-year-old director and father of two believes that the complexity of modern life – which includes technology overload, environmental problems and a lack of spiritual guidance – overwhelms young people.

"Thinking about all these issues we are faced with brought to my mind a character who is feeling empty, although he is full. I wanted to explore that emptiness," says Fournier, referring to the film's lead character. Fournier wanted to communicate emotions the way teenagers often do: without much talk. "I wanted the silence and their facial expressions to speak," he says.

We never learn specifically why the young men chose to commit suicide, but we get an inkling. Fournier has created a generic, North American post-industrial city that combines the grimness of a Baltimore ghetto with the desolation of an abandoned mining town. The architecture is uninspired; the characters attend a large, windowless high school and live in dreary bungalows. They seek solace at concrete skate parks and in old quarries.

The boys come off as bright and curious, but poorly educated. They smoke dope and skip classes. They shut out all adults: teachers, parents and guidance counsellors. Like the animated sequence at the beginning of the film, the five friends are floating in a world that confuses and hurts them. One of the characters, Thomas (Maxime Bessette), lives with his alcoholic dad; the father of one of the other boys, Sasha (Niels Schneider), committed suicide when Sasha was a young boy.

"Women and people between 15 and 40 like [the film], but people over 50 – especially men – don't tend to," Fournier says. "They view it as a criticism of them, of the way they parent. But it's not. It's just that life is hard and the parents in the film don't have much imagination."

Tout est parfait may also be turning off audiences here because its cultural reference points are North American rather than specific to Quebec. Fournier's characters speak bad French sprinkled with English, and come from diverse cultural backgrounds. Two seem to be children of immigrants, although their actual ethnicity is not clear.

From left, Thomas (Maxime Bessette), Simon (Sebastien Bergeron Carranza), Alex (Jean-Noel Raymond-Jett), Sasha (Niels Schneider) and Josh (Maxime Dumontier) are close friends who form a deadly bond in Tout est parfait (Everything Is Fine). (Alliance Atlantis Media)

Fournier is part of a group of young Quebec filmmakers who cast a critical eye on their society without exploring questions of language or national identity. Sometimes referred to as Quebec's New Wave, these films have more in common with recent U.S. pictures like American Beauty (2000) and Elephant (2005) than nostalgic crowd-pleasers like La grande séduction and C.R.A.Z.Y.

Frequently set in anonymous suburbs and featuring emotionally vulnerable characters, these New Wave films are notable for their meditative approach and careful attention to the details of character. In contrast to the practised and frequently dogmatic cynicism of Denys Arcand, New Wave filmmakers such as Rafaël Ouellet (Derrière-Moi) and Stéphane Lafleur (Continental, un film sans fusil) provide a compassionate portrayal of a society in spiritual and social crisis.

This group of more than a half-dozen filmmakers also includes Henry Bernadet and Myriam Verreault (L'Ouest du Pluton), Maxime Giroux (Demain), Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette (Le Ring) and Denis Côté (Nos vies privées). They deny membership in a collective movement, but they have much in common: all came of age after the 1995 referendum defeat and many practiced their art within the Kino short film movement. Furthermore, none of them seem terribly concerned with box-office receipts.

"I feel privileged to be making films at this time," Fournier says. "There is a distinct community committed to cinema as an art form. In the past, filmmakers such as Denys Arcand and Denis Villeneuve were alone. Now there is a group."

Mainstream producers and distributors here have been making headlines with their complaints about Quebec's so-called box-office funk. It's true that ticket sales for Quebec films have dropped by half since 2005, when C.R.A.Z.Y., Maurice Richard and Les Boys 4 charmed the province. But the last few years have produced a slate of exceptional indie films that have been lauded at festivals around the world.

Films such as Continental, un film sans fusil, L' Ouest du Pluton and Tout est parfait express a new sensibility; their stories are not rooted specifically in traditional Quebec culture, but the disquiet and confusion of contemporary post-industrial society. While Tout est parfait doesn't have the same box-office pull as Bon Cop, Bad Cop, its insight is profound.

"I don't want to simply entertain people," says Fournier. "We are living in hard times. It is the job of art to reflect that."

The Prix Jutras will be broadcast on March 29.

Patricia Bailey is a writer and broadcaster based in Montreal.