Snakes, mud and natural disasters best describe the conditions endured throughout the production of 100 Days in the Jungle, a very ambitious MOW for CTV coproduced by Edmonton’s ImagiNation Productions and Vancouver’s Sextant Entertainment Group.

One may suggest the film’s producers, cast, crew and director Sturla Gunnarsson (Rare Birds) had an idea of what they were getting themselves into shooting on location in Costa Rica, but, says ImagiNation coproducer Nicolette Saina, the experience barraged the 150-person production team with elements they had never faced in their production careers.

Based on a true story written by Sean O’Byrne (Mystery, Alaska), 100 Days is about seven Canadian and one American oil workers taken captive by Colombian guerillas in Ecuador and the efforts to free them. There was a general concern from the project’s inception that the same sort of thing could happen to the cast and crew, because of a threat made in an Internet chat room just prior to preproduction.

‘If our movie went ahead [the Internet posting said], there would be a kidnapping similar to the one in our movie,’ says Saina, who produced along with Mary Waterhouse, with Sextant’s Tom Rowe as exec producer. ‘We thought it was likely a hoax, but we had to take it seriously and take necessary precautions.’

Comforted by the protection of armed guards and letters of support from several arms of the Costa Rican government, the shoot went ahead. The crew and stellar cast that includes Peter Outerbridge (Marine Life), Nicholas Campbell (Da Vinci’s Inquest) and Michael Riley (Power Play) assembled in Costa Rica for the first day of filming on Nov. 12. They made it, but much of their gear was stuck at customs being thoroughly checked by Costa Rican officials in the wake of Sept. 11.

‘That threw a big wrench into everything,’ says Saina. ‘Tens of thousands of items were put on manifest lists. Despite the fact that we had the support of the Costa Rican government, there was a procedure that still had to be followed.’

Items like prop guns, explosives and bogus ammunition were heavily scrutinized. The delay at customs pushed principal photography back only a day, and according to Waterhouse, everything shot on schedule from there on in. It was not the end of the challenges, however.

‘Every day there was something,’ says Saina. ‘The poor actors in the mud saw two or three new kinds of insects a day. They were really at risk.’

A poisonous snake had to be removed from the ladies washroom in the production office. Hurricane Michelle and an earthquake registering 5.9 on the Richter scale made shooting questionable. Poisonous lizards, spiders and frogs crept and hopped all over the set. And more. Saina, herself, was bitten by a poisonous bug beneath her eye, causing her to black out. Perhaps the scariest single incident saw Campbell nearly drowning after getting caught in a riptide in the Caribbean Sea during some downtime. A few of his cast mates pulled him to safety.

‘The drama behind the camera was sometimes more intense than what was going on in front,’ says Saina.

But what happened in front of the camera is what made the shoot all worthwhile, says Waterhouse.

‘It’s not like any other movie I’ve ever made,’ she says. ‘The experience we all went through is all on the screen. It’s very raw and there is a realness. It’s not pretty at all. The reality makes it a different kind of movie.’

Produced on a budget of $4.4 million, 100 Days was funded by CTV, Telefilm Canada’s EIP, the Licence Fee Program, CFCN, CFRN, Cogeco, CanWest Global, Sextant International Distribution, Carlton UK Distribution, the Alberta Film Development Program and federal tax credits. Saina says the producers received no financial support from Costa Rica (although rumblings about a Canada/Costa Rica coproduction treaty may materialize eventually). The partners did not access any Costa Rican tax incentives, however, they did use some of the locals as cast members. Apparently finding actors in Costa Rica was not a big challenge, given that the country has a thriving theatre community (and one of the highest number of theatres per capita in the world).

And where was director Gunnarsson in all this? Behind the camera with DOP David Frazee (Suddenly Naked), and enjoying every minute of the experience in the jungle.

‘Every single moment of every day there were problems, but what so often happens with these stories is that it becomes a tale of woe, and honest to God that was not what anybody felt like,’ says Gunnarsson. ‘We had a ball. The problem-solving is part of the joy of the whole thing.’

Artistically speaking, says Gunnarsson, the biggest challenge was setting up shots in the jungle. The mud left by the Costa Rican rainy season and Hurricane Michelle aside, the director had to figure out how to stage complicated scenes with many actors and extras.

‘The actors were so committed to the characters they had taken on that eventually it took on a very organic flow,’ says Gunnarsson. ‘The scenes began to stage themselves. When you’re in the pouring rain and up to your knees in mud, it’s like [actor] Brendan Fletcher [The Five Senses] said, ‘No acting required. You just do it.’ ‘

When Playback caught up with Gunnarsson, he was safely back in Edmonton and had just returned from a location scout for the film’s final homecoming scenes. He says shifting gears from the dramatic intensity of the jungle isn’t nearly as difficult as one might expect.

100 Days wrapped in Edmonton on Dec. 21, two years to the day the hostages the film is based on returned to Canada.

‘This has been a very challenging experience,’ says Saina. ‘It is a movie of epic proportions. Yet I think the way in which we have all responded to elements beyond our control has actually improved the creative. We have all walked through fire together, been on the edge of the edge, and I believe we have created a powerful movie as a result.’

ImagiNation and Sextant will deliver the film to CTV in April. Sextant is handling the distribution, with sub-distribution by Carlton UK Distribution in London.

-www.sextantentertainment.com