Montreal: Jean Pierre Lefebvre’s portrayal of one man’s passion for flight and the gravity of life that holds him back is the basis of Aujourd’hui ou jamais, the third film in a trilogy which began in 1977. The film completed its 16-day shoot last week in rural Howick, Que., and is being produced on a budget of $1.1 million by Bernard Lalonde of Montreal’s Vent d’Est Films. The first two films in the cycle are Il ne faut pas mourir pour ca (1991) and Le Vieux pays ou Rimbaud est mort (1977).

Coscripted by Marcel Sabourin, Aujourd’hui ou jamais begins with flashback sequences and tells the story of a pilot played by Sabourin who has refused to fly since the death of a friend 15 years earlier. On the very day he decides to fly again, the bank forecloses on his tiny airline operation, his old man Napoleon pulls up in a white Cadillac after an absence of nearly half a century, and a mysterious lady aviator literally falls from the sky.

Lalonde says the film features beautiful vintage aircraft including a 1936 double-winged Tiger Moth and a mid-’40s classic Globe Swift.

Cast includes Sabourin, Claude Blanchard, Jean-Pierre Ronfard, Micheline Lanctot and Julie Menard. Johanne Bergeron is the pm, Gilles Corbeil is the sound recordist and dop Robert Vanherweghem is shooting on 35mm Fuji color film.

Lalonde (Au clair de la lune, L’eau chaude, l’eau frette) and the 15-year-old house are prepping a two-hour Richard Boutet feature doc Enquete sur la fin du monde, an examination of apocalyptic cults commissioned by Radio-Canada.

Lefebvre is the 1996 Prix Albert-Tessier recipient, the annual Quebec government career achievement award in filmmaking.

Funding on Aujourd’hui ou jamais comes from Telefilm Canada and distributor Armand Lafond of Prima Film. A fall ’98 festival premiere and commercial release are anticipated.

-Rainmakers to travel

Montreal filmmakers Robbie Hart and Luc Cote of Adobe Productions are preparing to shoot seven new episodes of the half-hour doc series Rainmakers. Produced at a cost of $972,000, the initial six episodes tell inspiring stories of youth leaders from around the globe who overcome personal difficulties and crusade for social change. The series g’es to air on cbc Aug. 14.

Hart says tentative travel plans for new profiles will take the globetrotting documentarians to the Middle East, South and Latin America, Asia and Africa. Foreign sales for the series, as well as the acclaimed eight-part Turning Sixteen, are handled by The Multimedia Group of Canada.

-M. Grimblat visits SDA

TV movie action at SDA Productions moved into high gear at the end of July with two productions underway through to mid-August ­ the Allan Goldstein thriller Loss of Faith and La Maison des reves bleus, a 90-minute tv drama in the France 2 mystery collection Quai#1. Francois Bouvier is directing from a script by Mario Bolduc.

It means double-duty for popular filmmaker Daniele J. Suissa who is juggling both producer and exec producer jobs on Loss of Faith, a project developed by Suissa and screenwriter Donald Martin, as well as producer duties on the French tv movie. sda president Andre Picard is exec producer on both productions. Former National Ballet of Canada choreographer Ann Ditchburn is Loss’ creative producer.

The Quai#1 movie stars Sophie Duez as Marie St-Georges, a criminal investigator attached to France’s railroad authority.

‘It’s a beautiful story because St-Georges was abandoned on a train as a baby and saved by a train conductor who later adopted and raised her in the world of trains and travel,’ says Suissa.

In this episode, la Commissaire’s investigation of a prostitution ring uncovers an international plot to produce an exotic but dangerous new drug.

Olivier Marchal, Sophie Lorain, Luc Morrissette, Bernard Meney, Pierre Chagnon, Lucie Laurier and Cedric Pepin also star.

sda and Paris-based Hamster initialed a production agreement at the Banff Television Festival in June for collections and series from either party. Hamster president Pierre Grimblat, honored for career achievement by The Reed Midem Organization at last fall’s mipcom, visited the Montreal set last week meeting with sda’s Picard, Suissa et al.

Loss of Faith stars John Ritter (Sling Blade, Hearts Afire) as a once reputable journalist who turns to writing third-rate exploitation, a career move that leaves his marriage and self image in ruins. Following a kidnapping, Ritter’s character is drawn ever deeper into a web of murder and deceit.

Oscar nominee Samantha Eggar (The Collectors, The Phantom), Michele Scarabelli (Deadbolt, Cover Girl), Daphne Zuniga (Melrose Place), Roddy McDowall (Fright Night), Tony Nardi, Linda Roy and Sophie Lorain round out the cast. Both shoots are crewed by the stcvq.

Presales on the $3-million Loss of Faith have been made to wic (Allarcom Pay Television), TMN-The Movie Network, Super Ecran and Television Quatre Saisons. w.i.n. has foreign sales rights. Brainstorming Media has u.s. and Coscient Astral Distribution has domestic rights.

-Allegro shoots Reaper, Random

Allegro Films has an expanded production slate and two new movies in process, Random Encounter from director Doug Jackson (Natural Enemy, Adam and Smoke) and Reaper, a thriller from director John Bradshaw (The Undertaker’s Wedding).

Reaper is an interprovincial coproduction with Phare Est of Moncton, n.b. and producer Gilles Losier.

Chris Sarandon, Catherine Mary Stewart and Vlasta Vrana are the stars of Reaper, a story where fantasy invokes dark reality and a mystery writer witnesses a series of crimes identical to the ones he imagines. The 22-day shoot wrapped in New Brunswick Aug. 7 on a budget of $2 million.

Exec producers are Tom Berry, Josee Bernard and Larry Gersham. Stefan Wodoslawsky, Renaud Mathieu, Cecile Chevrier and Losier are the producers. Vincent Monton is the screenwriter. David Gaucher is the art director. Bruce Chun is the dop and Isabelle Levesque will edit.

Allegro and director Jackson have just completed filming on Random Encounter, a human drama about a professional pr person who has to deal with her own personal disaster when she becomes entangled with a charming blackmailer.

Cast includes Elizabeth Berkley in the lead role of Allie, J’el Wyner, Barry Flatman and Frank Schorpion.

Dick Lowry, Lance Robbins and Allegro’s Josee Bernard are the exec producers. Berry and Bob Wertheimer are producing.

Allegro may have more feature/tv movie action later this summer, says Berry, who’s busy setting up a new and as yet unnamed l.a.-based production company in partnership with Coscient Group.

w.i.n. is handling foreign tv sales on Reaper, with Allegro holding all other rights including the u.s. Saban holds foreign rights on Random Encounter.

Meantime, Allegro and sda are shooting 13 new episodes of the French-track youth series La Courte Echelle.

-Alegria films in Amsterdam, Berlin

Filming began in mid-July and g’es through to mid-September on location in Amsterdam and Berlin on Alegria, the first feature film from the international performing troupe Cirque du Soleil.

In this story scripted by producer Rudy Barichello and director Franco Dragone, the spellbinding world of the Cirque is the backdrop for a tender love story between a street mime and an incandescent singer whose father is the circus boss. The Cirque’s international troupe also appears in the film, with some sequences shot under the Big Top in Berlin.

Cast includes Rene Bazinet (Saltimbanco), Frank Langella (Lolita, Eddie) as the circus boss, Julie Cox (Franz Kafka’s What a Wonderful World) as his daughter, Heathcote Williams (The Odyssey) as an evil taskmaster and Clipper Miano (Smilla’s Sense of Snow).

Alegria is a Canada/France/ Holland coproduction between Montreal’s Lampo Di Vita Films, Paris-based Mainstream and Amsterdam’s Egmond. Barichello, Stephane Reichel, Alexandre Heylen and Hans de Weers are the producers. Cirque du Soleil Images’ (formerly Productions Telemagik) Helene Dufresne is exec producer.

Alliance Communications is distributing Alegria in Canada. Overseas Film Group has international rights. The movie is scheduled for a spring ’98 release.