Vancouver: The renewal of the landmark labor agreement between the B.C. Council of Film Unions and Canadian and American producers is underway and could be concluded in Los Angeles the first week of April.

‘Negotiations are going along fine,’ says Council spokesperson Tim Hiltz.

‘It’s taken more time than we thought. The foundation was laid last year, but this [as a three-year agreement] is more complex. Everyone wants to get it right.’

The current one-year agreement expires at the end of March. Ratification of the labor pact, if negotiations are concluded in early April, should be concluded by May.

Qualifying projects shooting prior to April 15 will work under the old agreement. Those projects commencing principal photography after April 15 will work under the renewal.

-Oscar and Juliet

Good luck to Pender Harbour art director Doug Hardwick who is up for an Academy Award March 24 for his work on the 1996 feature Romeo & Juliet. He’s currently toiling on Disney’s Eaters of the Dead.

-Pass the Baton

Perambulators on Vancouver’s hippest downtown corner will get to watch studio happenings at civt. The new Vancouver station has signed a lease in Vancouver’s old main library, a modernist heritage building at Burrard and Robson that has undergone substantial retrofitting and is now home to a Planet Hollywood restaurant and Virgin Records.

Known as Vancouver Television, the station will be in the heart of Robson Street’s trendy shopping district that attracts tourists, locals, and, on weekends, teens cruising in their cars.

The Baton Broadcasting station – which will be on the air in September – has rented about 45,000 square feet. civt expects to build a street-level interview set and occupy several levels of the building.

The Vancouver Sun reports the tenancy – which is dependent on whether civt can put satellite dishes on the roof – is a 15-year lease worth up to $14 million.

-All in the family

The Hart clan has descended on Vancouver to shoot Connections, an mow for Showtime. Exec produced by mother Paula, the story about a rapper (Hammer) who takes four kids under his wing stars Hart siblings Melissa Joan (Sabrina the Teenage Witch), Emily, Brian, Elizabeth and Alexandra. The tv movie shoots until April 11.

A Call to Remember, an mow for the starz cable service in the u.s., shoots until April 15. It stars Blythe Danner (Prince of Tides) and Joe Mantegna and tells the story of a couple who come to America after surviving the holocaust.

The tv movie Mountain of Fear stars Markie Post (Night Court) and shoots until mid-April. The nbc show, which is moving in high speed to make May sweeps, is about a couple who are stranded by a snowstorm on a Nepal trek. It shoots in Whistler.

The Perfect Body, a tv movie for nbc about elite gymnasts shoots until mid-April, with Cathy Rigby (Peter Pan on stage) and Amy Jo Johnson (Power Rangers) starring.

-Home brew

Among the locally made works of note: Voyage Media’s documentary My Art Will Rise Up and Speak, about artist Juan Manuel Sanchez and Nora Patrich, shot in Vancouver in March and will move on to Buenos Aires in April.

Scams, Schemes & Scoundrels, a two-hour documentary by Vancouver’s Ark Films, gets its world premiere on a&e March 30. Hosted by professional debunker James Randi, the program retells history’s most brilliant scams.

This Way Up, a new short film from Vancouver filmmaker Nathan Garfinkel, made its world premiere at the Sedona International Film Festival on March 8. The film, says the producer, is about ‘one man, one sock, and the relentless pursuit of time.’

Vancouver producer Stephen Benoit has gone into preproduction with a new kids’ animation pilot called Underlings, about baseball playing mice who battle evil in non-violent ways. The pilot has Korean backing. His new feature Showdown, about a heist in space, is slated for summer production.

The feature is privately financed.

-Show me the money

Stephen Benoit also reports the recent American Film Market in Santa Monica, California, was a moneymaker for b.c. filmmakers. His feature For a Few Lousy Dollars, released in February 1996, is negotiating with American distributors Live, Trimark and Cabin Fever.

Managua, the new feature from Everest Greenlight (note the company’s new name), sold into 16 territories including the u.s., Greece, Mexico, Russia, Malaysia and Benelux. The film stars Lou Gossett Jr. as a spy sent to Nicaragua to kill an old friend who has become involved in cocaine trafficking.

Also selling were Gavin Wilding’s feature Stag and Keystone’s Wounded and AirBud.

-Anything in a size 35mm?

Trade Forum head Melanie Friesen is in Paris and London until March 28 shopping for European film and television buyers to speak at Euroday, a new highlight at this fall’s film business event held during the Vancouver International Film Festival. Friesen is wooing buyers who will talk about what they want to buy from Canada and how much they’ll pay.

The Trade Forum dates are Oct. 8-11, including New Filmmakers’ Day.

-Incubation period

British Columbia Film chose eight successful applicants (from 83 submissions) for the Applied Support Program. Sharing $70,000 for completion and r&d funding are: Michele Sands’ feature horsey, a love story about a bisexual female artist; Richard Baumgartel’s feature The Burial Society, about a man who infiltrates a Hebrew burial society; International Rocketship’s half-hour pilot The Huggy show, about Huggy’s quest for love and flapjacks; Ken Hegan’s Mascot Mayhem, a one-hour ‘doc’ about mascot abuse; Scott Smith’s feature Rollercoaster, about young friends at an amusement park; Cadence Entertainment’s feature Shiney’s Head, a comedy about a preserved head with otherworldly powers; Hillary Jones-Farrow’s Whalesong, a computer-animated children’s series pilot about a beluga whale; and Charles Pitts’ period feature A Wilderness Station, about a woman in an arranged marriage.

-Errata galore

In the Feb. 24 issue, I erroneously renamed b.c. documentary filmmaker Beverley Reid as Barbara. And in the Feb. 10 issue, Jane MacDonald was wrongly identified as a rep from the Trade Forum instead of her real job as director of communications at the Vancouver International Film Festival. Also in that column, I overstated Milestone Productions’ role in the big-budget feature Seven Years in Tibet. The Vancouver company is a line producer working on the Mt. Waddington portion of the film, not the whole shebang as I may have led people to believe. And going for a record, I goofed on the broadcaster for New City’s mow High Stakes. It’s Lifetime-Hearst. Apologies to all.