Félix Rose’s new documentary, La bataille de Saint-Léonard (The Battle of Saint-Léonard), chronicles the language and education protests of the late 1960s that made national headlines for many months. What began as a local dispute soon exploded into a wider political conflict that demanded the intervention of both the provincial and federal governments. The crisis eventually paved the way for Quebec’s Charter of the French Language (Bill 101), adopted a decade later, which forever changed the linguistic and cultural landscape of Quebec. A film devoted to this pivotal, albeit largely neglected, moment in Quebec’s history was long overdue.
Applauded by Francophone media since its release, the film’s titular battle is recounted through the personal accounts of two leading activists of the time on opposing sides of the conflict: Raymond Lemieux (1933-2018), a central figure of the Mouvement pour l’intégration scolaire – MIS (Movement for School Integration); and Mario Barone (1931-2025), an Italian immigrant, borough councillor and real estate developer who helped transform Saint-Léonard from a small farming town into a modern suburb that Italian immigrants began to settle in the 1960s and 1970s.
In an interview in Panoram Italia Magazine, Rose explained that he strived to reflect both sides of the Saint-Léonard crisis objectively, giving each side roughly the same amount of screentime, though someone with an Anglo-Italian background might see things differently. The documentary begins by establishing the historical context of the crisis: two hundred years of English dominance over the social, economic and political affairs in Quebec, and the unfolding of the Quiet Revolution that would lead the Francophone majority to flourish in their language.
However, Rose’s La bataille de Saint-Léonard presents the events that led to the Saint-Léonard Crisis merely as a cumbersome obstacle for Lemieux and the MIS to overcome in their larger quest for Quebec’s cultural and political sovereignty. Hardly mentioned in the film is how the MIS denounced bilingual education as an existential threat to French Quebec. It is on this nationalist foundation that the film seems to anchor its overarching narrative.
The interviews with the Barone family humanize the Italian parents and their motivations, but in the larger context, the film distorts certain historical facts and inaccurately frames the Italian immigrant community not as defenders of bilingual education but as naïve pawns in a larger political crusade against the MIS and their ethno-nationalist ambitions.
At the start, the film makes the case that during the 1950s and early 1960s, Italian immigrant parents deliberately chose to send their children to bilingual or unilingual English schools instead of unilingual French schools. While this may be true for many, several historians have pointedly documented how during that period, the children of Italian immigrants were systematically (if informally) refused entry into French Catholic schools in Montreal. In research conducted for his Master’s thesis, Giuliano D’Andrea, proposes that part of the reason for these exclusions came from prejudices towards Italian labourers, who some Francophone Quebecers considered “dishonest” and “disgusting” for accepting lower wages than their French-speaking counterparts. This sentiment was captured by Quebec nationalist historian Léandre Bergeron in his 1972 manifesto Pourquoi une révolution au Québec (Why There Must Be a Revolution in Quebec):
There are other groups that pose problems, the immigrants […] the Italian workers […] They come here to take our jobs. If they didn’t agree to work for less than us, okay. But they’ll take 75 cents an hour! Us, we’ve got more self-respect than to work for crumbs. We’re unemployed while the Italians collect their pennies, buy duplexes and rent us their upper floor! Osti!
That most Italo-Quebecers today are English-speaking remains the legacy of these early discriminatory practices. Even after Bill 101 obliged many Italians (and the children of other newcomers to Québec) to enroll in French-language schools, many immigrant parents remained understandably skeptical, fearful that their children would face harassment and discrimination.
There are many instances in the film that show Italians committing acts of violence during the numerous rallies and protests, but not the MIS activists. In contrast, several articles in the Italian weekly Cittadino Canadese and the Montreal Star reported physical injuries on both sides, particularly during a school board meeting on September 3, 1969. Lemieux took a gash to the forehead that required medical treatment, and one Italian parent had several teeth knocked out. But Rose’s documentary only details the injuries suffered by Lemieux. In an editorial published in La Presse a few days later, Renaude Lapointe expressed regret over how Italo-Quebecers at the school board meeting “lost their patience and allowed Lemieux to pose as a martyr.” She further wrote that Lemieux and the MIS’s cause were part of a larger ethno-nationalist project, saying they would “shout [at the Italian immigrant parents] ‘Le Québec aux Québécois!’ [Quebec belongs to the Quebecois.] But which Québécois? Are those who’ve legally settled in Quebec not themselves also Québécois?” The irony here is that Raymond Lemieux was himself the son of immigrants to Quebec: his Franco-American father was born in New York state and his Irish-American mother was born in Chicago. English was the first language he learned at home, and he did his six years of elementary school in English.
Perhaps the film’s greatest flaw is the depiction of the violent clashes that occurred on the night of September 10, 1969. Viewers are shown selective footage of Lemieux and his fellow activists marching peacefully on Jean-Talon Street, taunted by a cohort of belligerent Italians who begin to throw fists and bricks at the group. Photo close-ups of shattered shopfront windows and toppled, burning cars convey the extensive damage. Newsreel footage of injured MIS members being arrested make it seem like they were the victims: peaceful protestors unjustly attacked by the Italians, and the provincial and city police.
The historical facts are actually quite different. According to articles in La Presse, Le Devoir and the Montreal Star, it was the MIS demonstrators who provoked the police, and the Italo-Quebecers who initially exercised restraint. After the MIS protestors thrice circled the police lines and regrouped behind them, they converged in front of Jérôme-Le-Royer School on Jean-Talon, according to articles in La Presse, Le Devoir and the Montreal Star. A brick was thrown by an MIS protestor into a police car, injuring an officer. Then someone from within the MIS crowd threw a Molotov cocktail at the police, who responded with tear gas. What followed was a spree of smashed store signs and shop windows of the businesses along Jean-Talon Street.
According to witness interviews documented in the Montreal Star, anti-Italian signs went up and chants were shouted through the night: “Saint-Léonard français,” and “Pas de wops anglais!” [No English wops!]. Most Italians who lived in the apartments in the area remained home to avoid confrontation. An editorial in the Cittadino Canadese had advised Italians to not engage the MIS protestors. But upon learning of the property damage being caused, Italians took to the streets. Soon scores of Italians and MIS demonstrators were injured and arrested.
What Rose’s documentary doesn’t mention is that the vast majority of Italian parents – those most directly affected by the entire affair – were not involved in the fracas. Nor does the documentary dwell on the vandalized shops, preferring to remain ambiguous as to who was behind it. Still, we must ask, why would the Italians vandalise their own businesses?
Promo poster of La Bataille de Saint-Léonard by Félix Rose
The film makes the case that Italian-Quebecers, at best, stood in the way of the MIS’s cause, and, at worst, were hapless pawns in a larger political game between Quebec nationalists and the federal government. Raymond Lemieux himself was quoted in a La Presse article following the September 3rd skirmish at the school board as saying that: “Our true enemies are not the Italians, nor other immigrants. Our enemies lurk in the shadows, and they send the Italians to fight for them.” Lemieux’s actions eventually led to charges of sedition, and though he was quickly acquitted, this only bolstered the MIS’s claim that their fight was against an oppressive federal regime.
The characterization of the Italians in the film aligns with Lemieux’s notion that Italians were duped, while the MIS is shown as holding the moral high ground. This denies the Italo-Quebecers of Saint-Léonard agency and their preference for bilingualism, which many regarded as important to communicate with relatives who had settled in other parts of Canada, the United States, and Australia. These motivations are not mentioned in the documentary.
Though some audiences may indeed interpret La bataille de Saint-Léonard as documenting a proxy war between English and French Canada, the case can be made that the film more accurately depicts the conflict as a battle between unilingual and bilingual Quebec: two opposing visions for the future of the province. With the adoption of Bill 101, that made French the official language of education, business and daily life in Quebec, the forces of unilingualism prevailed.
It’s impossible to contemplate La bataille de Saint-Léonard outside the context of Quebec’s current political climate. The adoption of Bill 96 by the current Quebec government led by the Coalition Avenir Québec which further restricts the use of English in the province and Bill 21 which bans public servants from wearing overt religious symbols, seems to propel Lemieux’s mission into the present. In the previously cited interview, Rose states, “the language issue is getting out of hand. We’ve forgotten this page in our history, and by remembering it, we might avoid repeating the same mistakes.” One has to wonder if by this he is suggesting that people simply avoid contesting and protesting laws that promote an exclusionary vision for the future of Quebec.
Despite Felix Rose’s stated purpose, I couldn’t silence the thought during my bus ride home after watching the film, that maybe I shouldn’t take it so personally. It seems that the overarching message of La bataille de Saint-Léonard wasn’t meant for Italo-Quebecers.
Anthony Portulese is an Italo-Québécois writer, born and raised in Saint-Léonard. He holds degrees in civil and common law from McGill University, and currently works as a legal editor in Montreal. He is also working on his first novel.
