Mckennon Films

The business of the family film is a struggle. For the first generation of film-makers, doing the job from start to finish is a rough process for survival. What happens afterwards becomes even more difficult. Years later, more talented but still unsuccessful, they attempt an entirely new approach, an ingenious idea that suddenly seems possible. While they fail, they have their time to cultivate friendships, raise children, and tend to each other's businesses and lives. They work together in the twilight of their careers.

James and Lola MacDonald were the first husband and wife to live and work in the late twentieth century with the film business going through its most turbulent years. (The trouble also largely influenced their fortune.)

The MacDonalds found a way to make film work that had not been done before. James cut his teeth in business, selling videos to local establishments in Montreal. Lola did the same. Together they invested thousands of dollars in equipment, sending their sons, Robert, Mark and Ian, to school at the McGill and Rosedale campuses. Eventually they moved into building studios to run the business from. When they were in their forties, they opened their studio in St. Jean sur l'Isère in 1962, where the first film on videotape was loaded from the lathe. Before long, they were producing films in every corner of the world.

Lola read of the film industry's troubles, and their own, with the same trepidation she has heard others experience. Still, they relied on their equipment and found temporary works in Toronto and Montreal. While they were hard-pressed for capital in the late 1960s, by the early 1970s they had raised and financed another studio to keep the good times going.

They also learned from the people they had learned from in the past—friends—and, with the help of the government, built a business that still exists today. Through this amalgamation of old and new businesses, the MacDonalds were able to keep coming home after years abroad.

In the early years, James and Lola developed a somewhat cozy relationship, according to co-workers at the company that employed them. When they encouraged their sons to come out into the market, they promoted the films in their workplace. The film business is in their blood, which was inherited from James's childhood in the West End of Montreal and his training in sales.