Vancouver: With the box office success of The Prince of Egypt, DreamWorks is moving forward with a sequel called Joseph. And again Bardel Animation of Vancouver has been called in to handle some of the animation chores.

Exactly how much is not known precisely since DreamWorks’ Jeffrey Katzenberg has, as per usual, clamped down on any advance publicity.

What we do know is that Joseph Productions – which is affiliated with Bardel and is using Bardel people – is holed up in two floors of a West Pender and Thurlow office tower. Bardel’s regular office is on Richards.

As for the story, check the Old Testament. Joseph, the beloved son of Jacob, is sold by his brothers into slavery in Egypt. He rises to power despite his jealous siblings.

*Teen angst

The May Street Group in Victoria continues to pull in the production assignments. The latest show is the half-hour one-off called Moon Patrol for vtv’s Storytellers series.

The project seeks to reflect Canadian adolescents grappling with growing up.

Produced, directed and conceived by May Street’s Hillary Jones-Farrow (Smudge, Best Places to Kiss), Moon Patrol stars Adrian Fowler and Tea David, who also partnered up to write the script.

The short film wrapped production Sept. 3 and included a five-day location shoot in Victoria and three days at Cruz Studios, a new production facility in Victoria.

Cruz, which opened for business mid-July, is negotiating a long-term lease for the old truck maintenance hangar at CFB Esquimalt. The facility was supposed to be turned into a studio a couple of years ago when backers of the Westcoast Studios project took it over from the Department of National Defence. But the scheme never took off.

Cameron Avery, president and ceo of Cruz, already has one production in the facility and will spend $150,000 to improve the space with light and soundproofing, facades and washrooms.

Cruz offers 14,000 square feet of stage and 6,000 of office and shop space. Rates, says Avery, are cheap. ‘We want to get the business over here before we go the industry rates,’ he says.

*Outer Limits in, Poltergeist out

It’s season six of The Outer Limits, the mgm/Alliance Atlantis show that crossed the 100-episode threshold last year. First day of shooting on the hour-long anthology series is Sept. 15 and production on the 22-episode season runs until next June. There are few changes, and longtime producer Brent Karl Clackson is back at the helm.

The news is not so good for mgm’s Poltergeist: The Legacy, which has been canceled after four seasons. According to The Bridge Studios, the old Poltergeist stage is being used by the voluminous Mission to Mars, but no long-term tenant has yet been booked.

*Urich double booked

Television actor Robert Urich is shooting back-to-back productions in Vancouver. Final Run, a thriller on a train for cbs, wrapped Sept. 3 and Miracle on the 17th Green goes to camera Sept. 14.

Miracle costars Merideth Baxter (Family Ties) in a feel-good family drama about a 50ish man who pursues his dream to play in the pga with the help of a magic putter. Production on the cbs mow wraps Oct. 15.

*A VIFF of success

The Vancouver International Film Festival is rolling out its roster of b.c.-made productions that made the cut. Scott Smith’s rollercoaster kicks off the Canadian Images series. The moody film, shot on the Pacific National Exhibition midway, is about a group of troubled youths who break into a closed amusement park.

Among the other 23 films in the Canadian program are World Premieres, including Ryan Bonder’s feature DayDrift about a young photographer who is forced to take a road trip to Kamloops and Marc Retailleau’s Dogma 95-styled feature Noroc about an immigrant photographer who must find work.

Mort Ransen’s Touched, an intergenerational love story with Lynn Redgrave, will play at the festival, as will Davor Marjanovic’s My Father’s Angel about how the conflict in Sarajevo continues in Vancouver. Reg Harkema’s directorial debut, A Girl is a Girl, about a man and the women he dates, also gets a screening at home.

Among the documentaries playing the Canadian program are: Oliver Hockenhull’s Building Heaven, Remembering Earth: Confessions of a Fallen Architect, Grant Greschuk’s biography Jeni Legon: Living in Big Great Way and Yue-qing Yang’s Nu Shu: A Hidden Language of Women in China.

*Tokyo roses

On Aug. 23, the National Film Board’s Pacific Centre began three days of production in Vancouver on the documentary Tokyo Girls before taking the show to Japan for three weeks next month.

The project, by director Penelope Buitenhuis, explores the experiences and motivations of the women who work as hostesses in the ‘mizu shobai’ (the world of Japan’s clubs, bars and geisha houses) and the men who pay for their attention. There will be interviews with Canadian women who have traveled to Japan to work as hostesses, their clients, club owners and anthropologists.

Gillian Darling Kovanic is the producer.

In other West Coast nfb news, since April, the Pacific Centre office has handed out $57,000 to 32 independent projects through the Filmmaker Assistance Program, which helps emerging filmmakers with film and video stock, processing and printing, transfers and post-production services.

Among the b.c. titles receiving funding are: Bingo, a documentary by Tami Wilson of Vancouver about the $200-million bingo industry; Double Wheeling in Ouaga, a documentary by Lama Mugabo of Port Moody about the impact of scooters as a means of transportation; Lost and Found, an animated film by Gail Noon of Mayne Island about two children who find street people living under a bridge; The Plywood Girls, a documentary by Don Gill of Victoria about women in a plywood mill; and The Vanelli Family, a short animated film by Mari Kearns of Hope about the effects of divorce on children.