Seven is a charm for Victorious Films’ first feature, Century Hotel, which wrapped Nov. 4 in Toronto.

With seven different stories taking place in seven different eras, seven different sets and a budget of $750,000, the film, a first feature for director/ cowriter David Weaver (Moon Palace), is an ambitious one, to say the least.

‘It’s really challenging to make a movie on $750,000 because the city is well used to much, much larger films,’ says Weaver on day 17 of a 20-day shoot that all took place in studio.

‘Being low budget, we were up against everyone in the service industry,’ adds producer Victoria Hirst (Joe’s So Mean to Josephine). ‘I was surprised we could maintain the same crew [non-unionized] for 20 shoot days, but everyone was so committed, which given how busy it is outside, has been really incredible. This is what collaboration filmmaking is all about, and it has given most of us a renewed faith in the filmmaking process.’

But perhaps what’s most noteworthy about the film, besides the fact it was one of only four features greenlit by Telefilm Canada’s Toronto office this year, is the high profile of its key cast – which totaled 24 – as well as the incremental way in which the film was shot and the actors were employed.

With such Canadian brand-name talent as Colm Feore (The Perfect Son), David Hewlett (Traders), Tom McCamus (Possible Worlds), Julian Richings (The Zack Files), Mia Kirshner (Exotica) and Lindy Booth (Relic Hunter), the film was shot in three-day segments.

‘We could attract the bigger actors because we’re only using them for three days at a time,’ says Hirst. The three-day rotation also helped in sustaining the actors’ energy and keeping the crew rejuvenated, adds Weaver, who cowrote the film with Bridget Newson (Franklin). However, shooting in this way also caused scheduling nightmares, which at times forced the crew to turn around sets in 24 hours.

Century Hotel is set in a single hotel room that sees every kind of human drama, including an illicit love affair, an unsolved murder and a young woman’s first sexual encounter. Billed as a journey through the twentieth century from the perspective of a seemingly anonymous hotel room, the film opens on an opulent 1921 setting and runs through to contemporary 1999.

On day 17, it is 1968. The hotel room, a 12 x 24 space, is accessorized with lava lamps, orange burlap curtains over tin-foiled windows, brown bedding, ashtrays overflowing with cigarette butts and Jimi Hendrix-postered walls. Only small slivers of light make it through the cracks in the foil, illuminating the room’s smoky haze.

Singer/songwriter Raine Maida (Our Lady Peace), who makes his feature film debut, is playing a self-abusive, Brian Wilson-type musician who’s been holed up in the room for two years. His wife, Canadian chanteuse Chantal Kreviazuk, plays a hotel maid vying for his attention to no avail.

For Weaver, the confined shooting space was an ongoing challenge. ‘I like to move the camera and avoid shooting the film in a tv style with coverage. I hope people will feel it’s a designed film, like a Bertolucci film.’

With each new era in the film comes a completely different look and feel – for example, the 1933 set is very restrained with a lot of green and gray tones, while the 1921 set is almost nostalgic, sun-filled and ornamental – creating an ongoing challenge for cinematographer David Greene (Water, Earth, Air and Fire), who’s best versed in shooting music videos and commercials.

Funding for the film started with Citytv then onto TVA International, which has worldwide distribution except in Germany.

With a broadcaster and distributor behind them, Weaver and Hirst then applied to the ctf, but were refused on the grounds the film was ‘not Canadian enough.’

‘This infuriated me because the film is clearly set in Toronto and there are so many Canadian themes and references,’ says Weaver, who has first-hand experience on both sides of the fence: he worked at the Ontario Film Development Corporation for two years as a development officer in the early 1990s when the ofdc was still giving equity funding to film.

‘A system that is so narrowly focused isn’t benefiting anyone,’ he adds.

Nonetheless, the final piece of the financial pie ultimately came from the eip, via Telefilm Toronto.

And while Weaver says Century Hotel ‘was conceived to work on a low budget,’ projects currently in development will take the new feature film director to the Canadian higher-budget district.

Among these is Swag, an mow for cbc that tells the story of the infamous bank robber Red Ryan. The film is being written and associate produced by Andrew Berzins (Scorn) on a budget of roughly $4 million.

Weaver is also halfway through writing a feature film adaptation of his short Moon Palace, which is being packaged by his agency in the u.s., Todd Hoffman.

In the early stages of development is an untitled thriller to be produced by Jennifer Jonas (The Perfect Son).

Finally, his original screenplay Eliza Fraser is being exec produced for an estimated $12 million by Michael Hausman, who is currently in Rome producing Martin Scorsese’s Gangs of New York.

Among Hirst’s projects in development is The Living End, a feature film about curling being written and directed by Denise Blinn.

Meantime, Century Hotel, associate produced by casting guru John Buchan, is intended to hit the festival circuit next year, followed by a limited Canadian theatrical release. *