From sea to sea - movie making in Canada

The East Coast film and television scene took another giant step forward with the formal announcement of the launch of the Newfoundland Film Development Corporation. Taking a cue from the success of the Nova Scotia provincial agency, the Newfoundland version will begin with a $1-million initial budget. A special capital expenditure of $300,000 has been allocated to the legendary Newfoundland Independent Film Co-op for new equipment--digital and otherwise. Now Newfoundland can keep that important post-production work in the province. When John Walker shot his documentary about Davis Inlet, Utshimassits--Place of the Boss (twice Gemini-nominated in 1997: for Best Documentary and Best Direction), he had to go to Halifax for post. The announcement comes as two major productions gather steam. The second stream of Bill MacGillivray's Gullage's is in the can, while Mary Sexton is proceeding with a pilot for a Mary Walsh-vehicle entitled Dooley Gardens. It's a twisted situation comedy set in a rundown community rink. Meanwhile, back in Halifax, CBC-TV has confirmed its order for a second season of Barbara Samuels' and Wayne Girgsby's Black Harbour dramatic series. Likewise with the Salter Street-produced Lucy Maud Montgomery saga, Emily of the New Moon, even though it has yet to go to broadcast. On the other hand, technical delays have held back Lexx: Tales from the Dark Zone by about six months. Salter Street is also in pre-production on a four-part mini-series entitled Major Crime, to be shot in Halifax and Toronto. Andrew Cochrane and Associates are going ahead with an Eric Till-directed feature costume drama entitled, Pit Pony. It's a turn-of-the-century tale of youngsters and horses pressed into service in the coal mines of Cape Breton, New Glasgow and Springhill. What's obvious about all this activity is that the Atlantic Region's rapidly expanding industry is being producer-driven. Chris Zimmer's Imagex Production house, for example, recently announced a 10-picture co-production deal with the British. A few days later, Imagex went public with plans for its own sound stage project to be operational in the spring. The Electropolis waterfront studio complex is also creeping towards reality, having cleared some key environmental hurdles set out by the Public Utilities Board. There is apparently going be enough production activity to keep the sound stages operating over the next two years with features and series. On a final note, legendary actor, screenwriter and NFB producer Sam Grana (90 Days, The Masculine Mystique) has been appointed the first Director and CEO of Film New Brunswick.

Ron Foley Macdonald

Montreal

1996 was Quebec's best moviemaking year in ages, with 54 Canadian and foreign feature film and TV movie productions bringing in more than $100-million to the province's economy. So 1997 is getting ready for the harvest. Pursuing a trend that seems to become more and more popular these days in the film industry, many big-budget Canadian action movies with international star appeal are scheduled for release in the coming year. Among these, are Filmline's latest thriller, The Peacekeeper, directed by Frederic Forestier and starring Dolph Lundgren and our own Michael Sarrazin; Jim Donovan's Provocateur, a spy movie, starring Jane March (who's all grown up since The Lover) and Canadian expatriate Nick Mancuso; Alain Zaloum's Suspicious Minds, starring Patrick Bergin, Gary Busey and Canadians Jayne Heithmeyer and Daniel Pilon, set for release sometime in the fall by Cinepix; and finally, Kingsborough Greenlight's two American co-productions, Jean Pellerin's For Hire, with Rob Lowe, Joe Mantegna and local up-and-comer Bronwen Booth, and Peter Svatek's Hemoglobin, with Rutger Hauer and Quebec superstar, Roy Dupuis. On a somewhat smaller scale, another long-awaited "thriller" of a different kind is set to hit theatres this spring: La vengeance de la femme en noir is Roger Cantin's much anticipated follow-up to his 1991 smash comedy hit L'assassin jouait du trombone. Germain Houde and Anais Goulet-Robitaille return in the starring roles as two would-be detectives caught against their will in a convoluted and hilarious revenge-assassination plot. Caught with them in this crazy adventure are Raymond Bouchard, Julie St-Pierre, France Castel and super baddie, Marc Labreche. Next in line for Cantin? A sequel to his other huge Quebecois success, Mathusalem, a pirate movie entitled Mathusalem II: Le dernier des beauchesne which began shooting in February. Finally, this past February, the annual Rendez-vous du cinema quebecois celebrated the Cinematheque quebecoise's grand reopening after two years of renovations. Anne-Claire Poirier's, Tu as crie Let Me Go opened the festival. The film is a documentary about heroin--addiction, life on the street, loss, death and, ultimately, acceptance. Above all though, it is Poirier's tribute to her daughter, Yanne, who was murdered a few years ago in a drugs-related affair. Although unquestionably crude at times, the film is a highly moving and personal journey towards understanding and deeper meaning in life.

Claire Valade

Toronto

Strange things are happening on the streets of Toronto these days. Local journalist/broadcaster David Giammarco has turned our avenues into those of American murder landmarks, specifically the John F. Kennedy assassination. In a bold attempt to parody Oliver Stone's JFK, Giammarco has written, produced, directed and stars in DMG, his first feature film starring a slew of celebrity walk-ons. "It's an exact parody of Stone's JFK," says Giammarco who's financing the project himself. "There's, of course, the big conspiracy. There's the second gunman, the third gunman, there's the lone patsy that gets killed, every sort of aspect of JFK is parodied in this. We've been shooting in 16mm, super-8, and all the different film stock, basically what Oliver Stone used in JFK. We're also doing all the quick-cutting, quick-editing, black and white, colour, camcorder news footage, everything." Celebrity walk-ons include Don Rickles, Dan Aykroyd, Leslie Nielsen, Nicholas Campbell, Denny Doherty and Stone himself. "He laughed, he thought it was funny," says Giammarco of Stone's reaction to the movie. "I told him that my Director of Photography was duplicating the lighting from JFK exactly, with strong overhead bright lighting. He laughed and said, `You guys better be careful with that lighting. We burned Tommy Lee Jones' hair three times.' He's got a good sense of humour." Giammarco hopes to complete DMG by the summer. The quirky duo that brought us Roadkill and Highway 61 have turned their attention to television these days. Bruce McDonald is directing Twitch City, a six-part half-hour series created by and starring Don McKellar for the CBC. This comedy about a loner who only watches television, and which also stars Molly Parker, Daniel MacIvor, Callum Keith Rennie and Bruce McCulloch, is produced by Susan Cavan's Accent Entertainment and Shadows Shows, in association with the CBC, and with financial support by Telefilm Canada. The Ontario Film Development Corporation has announced the appointment of Sara Morton to run the Ontario Film and Television Tax Credit program. Morton, who has several years experience in entertainment law specializing in production financing for independent producers, will oversee the refundable tax credit that is available to eligible Ontario based production companies, based upon qualifying Ontario labour costs. PS Production Services, one of Toronto's oldest production rental facilities run by Doug Dales has just announced a merger with Partners, Toronto's largest TV commercial house, and one of the largest in North America.

Angela Baldassarre

Winnipeg

An invitation-only screening of Guy Maddin's eagerly awaited Twilight of the Ice Nymphs was one the hot tickets for the 10th anniversary celebrations of the Manitoba Motion Picture Industry Association (MMPIA). The celebrations included the Blizzard Award for excellence in Manitoba film and video, "Best Film of the Decade" (John Paisz's Crime Wave), a three-day forum on filmmaking with Peter Wintonick, John Walker, Deepa Mehta and actress Shelley Duvall (who stars in Ice Nymphs), and the premiere screening of Shawna Dempsey's and Lorri Millan's Good Citizen: Betty Baker. In conjunction with the MMPIA celebrations, Winnipeg's first international children's film festival, aptly called Freeze Frame, paid homage to Radio-Canada's Oscar-winning animator, Frederic Back, and included the premiere of Richard Condie's 1997 Oscar-nominated La Salla. Quebecoise director Lea Pool was in Manitoba in February to shoot a docudrama about the internationally reknowned Manitoban author, Gabrielle Roy. A joint production of Buffalo Gal Pictures and the Montreal company, Les productions de l'impatient, the film will pay tribute to the author's work and life with archival material, interviews, and a re-enactment of Roy's life by actress Sylvie Malo. Marble Island Pictures and Alberta filmmaker Don Scott are co-producing the feature, See Bob Run, a story of "first love, incest and murder" based on the play by Daniel MacIvor. Soft Like Me director Jeff Erbach is rewriting the script to be shot in the late summer. John Aaron Productions has several projects in development after the success of The Arrow mini-series. Director Aaron Kim Johnston and producer Jack Clements could serve as a model for self-distribution in the U.S. with their aggressive promotion of their earlier features, The Last Winter and For the Moment. After a lukewarm response from American distributors, the duo decided to do it themselves by faxing and phoning key theatres with publicity material. For the Moment opened in Chicago, New York and Los Angeles, and landed a home video release with Fox Video. Although he wouldn't recommend it to everybody, Johnston said, "We discovered screens are accessible if you have the right movie."

Dave Barber

The Prairies

This year's very cold winter across the prairies has proven the harbinger of a relatively barren spring in the production community--at least that's the way things look for now. Hope springs eternal out West though, and for good reason it seems. In Alberta, North of 60's funding reprieve meant a short Christmas hiatus for cast and crew, and a return to work in late January on 13 new episodes for the show's sixth season. In Edmonton, no decisions have made regarding the future for Jake and the Kid. Will the production move to Saskatchewan? It's possible, as CanWest continues to seek what it hopes are greener pastures after losing its recent CRTC request for Alberta stations. Across the border, those looking for their first big break are finding it in Saskatchewan. The Saskatchewan Motion Picture Association's Debut Program brings together writers and directors to work on their first half-hour dramas. SaskFILM has contributed $75,000 each to two projects already up and running. The Rink wrapped principal photography at the end of January, and Dirty Money will begin shooting in March. The budget shortfall for these productions was made up from a variety of sources, including the production companies themselves, Telefilm Canada and the Federal JobStart program.

Fran Humphreys and Andrea Kingwell

Vancouver

A major project on the go from the West Coast is Dirty--a sort of Husbands & Wives meets Secrets & Lies in East Vancouver--directed by Canada's answer to Mike Leigh, Bruce Sweeney (Live Bait). Dirty is a darkly comedic slice-of-life ensemble film that takes us on a journey through the emotionally charged mine fields of bankruptcy, bulimia and sexual addiction. It showcases the range and talents of some of Vancouver's finest actors--Babz Chula, Tom Scholte, Benjamin Ratner and Nancy Sivak. Principle photography is set for the end of March. Gary Burns (The Suburbanators) has recently completed his second feature, Kitchen Party. Set in the "burbs" around Vancouver, the film revisits one of teen-hood's most anxious moments--when the party at your parent's house goes seriously off the rails. Are you interested in cannibalism, madness and cross-dressing in the High Arctic? Director Erick Whittaker and producer Dave Bouck have recently received Telefilm Canada development assistance for their second feature, Franklinstein, which follows the mysterious disappearance of the ill-fated 1845 Franklin expedition. Nettie Wild (Blockade and A Rustling of Leaves: Inside the Phillipine Revolution) has returned from seven months of filming the Zapatista uprising in Chiapas province, Mexico, and will spend the next seven months editing A Place Called Chiapas. Shot in super-16, the film should be ready for this year's festival circuit, and CBC-TV's Witness has already set an air date for November. Raymond Massey, whose feature production credits include Whale Music and Impolite, has joined forces with Mort Ransen and Ranfilm, the company that was behind the success of Margaret's Museum. Currently Ranfilm has several projects in development, including Shegalla, set in the interior of B.C., and written by Joan Hopper and Mort Ransen. And for something completely different, Walt Disney's long-delayed live-action Mr. Magoo with Canadian mega-goof Leslie Nielsen as the famous cartoon character is finally set to go this spring in Vancouver. Finis.

John Dippong

COPYRIGHT 1997 Canadian Independent Film & Television Publishing Association
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