The Santropol Generations is an immersive film about a beloved Montreal neighbourhood, its citizens’ continuing struggles for community, and an urban oasis now under threat. 

In 2026, the Santropol Café and the Housing Coop will celebrate their 50th anniversary. Their offspring, so to speak, Le Santropol roulant has been delivering nutritious low-cost or free meals-on-wheels for 40 years. “Le Roulant” as it is called is a thriving center of inter-generational community activities, a fountainhead of projects for a sustainable future. A dynamic young crew of le Roulant are teaching children and unhoused people how to grow food. Under the leadership of elder nun Soeur Nicole Gaudet, children cut flowers in the Hôtel-Dieu Convent’s spectacular walled garden for distribution to meals-on-wheels recipients.

Nestled on the Eastern side of the Hôtel-Dieu Hospital and Convent founded in 1644 by Montreal’s co-founder, French colonist Jeanne Mance, the Santropol Café, Santropol Housing Coop and Santropol roulant are vital focal points of a neighbourhood that was slated for demolition in the 1970s and saved by citizens, including Hospital nuns, featured in this film.

The Santropol Café is a pillar in the Plateau Mont-Royal neighbourhood, which has gone from being unpretentious to being considered prime property. Now, in order to survive, the Café has had to increase its prices so that the staff can afford to pay their rents. Will this rare gem of a café survive gentrification in the present cost-of-living crisis?

Our film starts off with sounds of explosions on a black screen. Slowly, we focus on a little girl walking next to a demolition site, a scene filmed in 1975 by Oscar-winner Beverly Schaffer, a story about an immigrant family living in fear that their humble home will be demolished along with so many of their neighbours’ houses. 

I am particularly invested in this film, as I have lived in this neighbourhood that I love for almost 40 years. I’ve seen it evolve from being a well-kept secret where an art de vivre was enjoyed at low cost to being a hotspot of gentrification. In the 1990s, I was active in delivering meals-on-wheels with Santropol roulant. The Santropol Café has been my second home, a place where I can connect, where I’ve always been warmly welcomed by the staff, who are for the most part practicing young artists in various disciplines. With an empathetic view on a fragile present and a nostalgic look at a Bohemian past involving characters like Leonard Cohen and Eartha Kitt, this film will tell the multi-generational story of the Santropol Café, the Santropol Housing Coop and the Santropol roulant. It is a film about “a village in the city”, about a community determined to endure.

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