Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould 1993

Set against memories of a cottage by Lake Simcoe, Colm Feore portrays Glenn Gould as a man who carries the past like a quiet, persistent melody from childhood into a unique adult career. He recalls the moment he seemed destined to be a concert pianist at age five, a path he believes his Mother had already mapped out for him. The film gently unfolds Gould’s early gifts—reading music before he could read words—and his first lessons in Bach, learned from his mother, whose influence threads through everything that follows. This is less a simple rise to fame than a meditation on how a prodigy builds a private world around an astonishing gift.

As Gould grows, he imagines interviewing himself, turning the lens inward to question why he walked away from performing live at thirty-two and chose instead to communicate with audiences through media. He repeatedly returns to a core image: the musician as an autocrat, a figure who wields control over performance and perception even when he tries to be genial. The film uses these internal dialogues to explore the tension between precision and humanity, between an artist’s demands and the messy reality of human connection.

In parallel, Gould’s work on radio documentaries emerges, most notably The Idea of North, a piece about how environment shapes solitude and isolation in Northern Canada. In conversations with interviewers, he explains that this project is one of only five to address isolation and reveals a faint weariness about gravity of serious expression, hinting at a future shift toward comedy. The dialogue probes why he pursues musical perfection with such restraint, and why he answers questions only by telephone. The interviews probe whether Gould’s fascination with technology is really a shield from genuine relationships, a barrier that keeps others at a comfortable arm’s length while he remains intensely focused on his craft.

The narrative thickens as financial markets falter. Gould receives a tip from the bodyguard of visiting Sheik Yamani to invest in Sotex Resources, a move that makes him the sole winner amid the meltdown’s chaos. Yet this windfall sits beside quieter, unsettling scenes: a bathroom crowded with medications—Valium, Trifluoperazine and Librax—that raise questions about how much pressure a life of genius can bear. Gould’s lighthearted insistence that he isn’t taking all the pills at once stands in stark contrast to the ominous undertone of a man edging toward the edge of control.

As his birthday nears, the specter of loneliness looms. He fears that no one will attend his funeral, even as his work continues to sell robustly in Central Europe and Japan. The film confirms Gould’s death at age 50 by stroke, a moment that could feel abrupt but is instead handled with quiet gravity. His cousin, Jessie Greig, challenges that fear, insisting that the funeral was, in fact, heavily attended, and that Gould’s influence outlived his own doubts. The closing note ties Gould’s life to a larger cultural footprint: Voyager I and Voyager II carry Bach’s music — a final, public testament to the music he made and the way his art travels beyond one life.

Throughout, the film remains deeply reflective, weaving memory and truth into a portrait that celebrates Gould’s artistry while acknowledging the personal costs of reaching for perfection. The result is a measured, compassionate, and thought-provoking examination of a musical icon who chose to speak to the world not just with notes, but through the evolving medium of media itself.