Vancouver: Two more Vancouver directors will join local filmmakers Scott Smith and Reg Harkema on the rollercoaster ride of self-distribution.

Mark Retailleau, director of Dogma film noroc, and James Dunnison, director of Stuff, have joined forces to get their digital feature work on the big screen at Tinseltown Cinemas in Vancouver.

Short films What Else Have You Got?, by director Harry Killas, and 237, by director Michael Dowse, will also screen before the features.

Their limited run began Jan. 19 for at least two weeks.

Like Smith and Harkema, whose films rollercoaster and A Girl is a Girl were hits with festival goers but flops with distributors, Retailleau and Dunnison decided to take matters into their own hands.

They praise u.s.-owned Tinseltown for supporting local auteurs when other art houses in Vancouver dismiss films without distributors.

‘We’re doing this by the seat of our pants,’ says Dunnison, who says his p&a budget is $20 for 400 stickers that say ‘Support your local filmmaker’ and the times of Stuff’s screenings. ‘Frankly, we’re resting on our laurels and using the press to publicize the screenings.’

He is also trying to generate interest by sending humorous e-mails to his network of acquaintances and asking them to forward the messages on to others.

Retailleau’s connections to France resulted in the French consulate general hosting a cocktail party for the filmmakers on Jan. 18.

‘We want to make the kind of numbers [money] that will make Canadian distributors sit up and take notice,’ says Dunnison, when pressed about his business goals.

Tinseltown takes 65% of the box office and Dunnison is hoping to cover the costs of preparing the films for screenings on jvc digital theater projectors.

Harkema’s feature about the relationships of young adults had a relatively long run of four weeks at Tinseltown last year. Smith’s teen suicide feature ran for two weeks last fall.

‘It was an amazing experience to put together,’ says Scott about self-distribution. ‘It’s not about the money,’ he adds, declining to say how much rollercoaster grossed.

He does say it is difficult as a filmmaker booking directly with an exhibitor to keep the theater operators interested in extending the runs.

Rollercoaster was just starting to build word of mouth and audience when it was bumped by Arnold Schwarzeneggar’s Sixth Day.

As for lessons, Smith says he has learned a lot about what it takes to get ‘bums in seats,’ but is unlikely to make a writing or creative choice specifically to be commercial. His advice to Dunnison and Retailleau is,’Just get out and do it. The byproduct of entrepreneurship is a stronger creative community.’

noroc explores the immigrant experience in a story about a Romanian photographer. Shot in the Dogma ’95 style, noroc stars Peter Lacroix, Gina Chiarelli, Jay Brazeau, Alan Peterson and Babz Chula.

Stuff is a black comedy about a hospital orderly who accidentally kills his mother. It stars musicians Max Danger (of Toronto band The Deadly Snakes) and Joe Sather (former drummer of Sex With Nixon). *