Tina Kakadelis
As a millennial American, the name Brian Mulroney didn’t ring any bells when I was going through the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival program list. It would have been easy to ignore Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney. What did capture this cinephile’s eye, though, was the name of the film’s director. Matthew Rankin co-wrote and directed the 2024 film Universal Language, which can be described as the best parts of Wes Anderson filtered through an absurdist Iranian-Canadian lens. With Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney, Rankin has now created a documentary like you’ve never seen before.
Brian Mulroney was Canada’s 18th prime minister and began his tenure in 1984. He was a member of the Progressive Conservative Party, which sounds like an oxymoron, but as the French Canadians would say, c’est la vie. He became a well-known name in 1976 when he ran for party leader but came in third. Seven years later, he ran again and won. The following year, Mulroney captured a landslide victory and claimed the title of Prime Minister. Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney takes viewers from that first Progressive Conservative Party election in 1976 to his major win eight years later.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney is a bafflingly bizarre collection of archival footage edited to highlight the absurdity it originally captured. Sound effects are added, like squeaking shoes and sloppy chewing noises, but the essence of what Rankin is poking fun at still comes through. All the pomp and circumstance that goes into political theater should be commented on. One could call this film a pastiche, or a collage of madness. Anyone who didn’t come in knowing the ins and outs of Canadian politics won’t be able to ace a test on what happened during Mulroney’s tenure, but they’ll understand the feelings of a nation.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney is deranged in a beautiful, psychedelic manner. To give you an indicator, the talking pineapple puppet, Anana, from Téléfrançais!, a 1980s kids’ program, looks entirely at home in the kaleidoscopic colors and chaos Rankin has created. An awkwardly photoshopped Brian Mulroney head sits on a trenchcoat-wearing body as it strolls through the Museum of the Brains of Canada’s Conservatives. All these components are tied together by an ’80s-style faux television show simply titled Mulroney. It has the feel of a public access series made by someone with too much time and too many drugs.
Rankin’s experimental documentary played as part of the Midnight Madness program. That slot is usually saved for films like The Substance or Obsession, where blood flows freely and often. There’s no gore in Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney, but there is more than enough chaos to go around. As the film goes on, it becomes harder to tell what Rankin has exaggerated and what is true. Some of Brian Mulroney’s political ads seemed too strange to be real, but no, he really was referred to as a man with “Paul Newman eyes and Robert Redford hair.” The full quote, which isn’t featured in the documentary, goes on to say that his jaw was carved by “Gibraltar.” Not exactly what one would expect when discussing a political figure. Or at least not what one would hope would be an enduring legacy.
Half the gags in Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney wouldn’t translate, should I attempt to recall them in writing. A personal favorite, though, is the glowing blue eyes the film adds to children when talking about the rise of blue (Progressive Conservative) in Canada. The impressive feat of Ladies and Gentlemen, Brian Mulroney is not only its carefully constructed madness, but also the collection and synthesis of what must have been thousands of hours of footage. This is not your father’s history documentary.
