Halifax: It was hard to get away from Ricky, Julian and Bubbles at this year’s ShowCanada. Time and again, there they were. Around every corner, at every podium. Holding a press conference, introducing a highlight reel or smoking out behind the hotel – the boys of Trailer Park Boys were front and center to pre-hype their soon-to-shoot movie.

‘It’s still cameras following us around and interrupting our lives, just bigger cameras from what they tell us,’ grumbled Robb Wells, in character as Ricky, at a press conference on April 28.

News that the feature version of the hit series will shoot this summer in nearby Dartmouth – with series creator Mike Clattenburg at the helm under exec producer Ivan Reitman – dominated the opening days of ShowCan. Reitman signed on to the project last year and recently finished the script with Clattenburg, while leaving room for improvisation.

‘The story is more focused,’ says Reitman. ‘When the story is told over six, eight episodes there’s this loosy-goosy quality to it. Part of that is the charm of the show, but part of it has to be focused down a little bit. So it can be told in 90 minutes.’

‘We work with a script, but if it’s not sparking we throw a match on it,’ Clattenburg adds. ‘So there’s always some life to the scene and there’s always that spark of comedy happening for the first time.’

Promotion-wise, it was a good fit. The boys are popular here – the show shoots just on the other side of the harbor – and the prospect of their popularity playing out on the big screen raised eyebrows among the 700-odd exhibitors and distributors in town for ShowCan.

The four-day convention moved into three hotels in the Nova Scotia capital late last month – mainly to promote coming releases, wholesale popcorn, projector lenses and the like to theater chains. The trade floor hosted a record 52 companies, while the major distribs screened spring and summer movies such as Madagascar (DreamWorks), Crash (Maple Pictures, taking over for Lions Gate) and It’s All Gone Pete Tong (Odeon Films).

The show helped put a big spotlight on the province, says Ann Mackenzie, CEO of the Nova Scotia Film Development Corporation, which cohosted a well-attended breakfast presentation on April 29. ‘It was an excellent opportunity to put in face time with distributors,’ she says. Funders from Newfoundland and Labrador, New Brunswick, Manitoba and Saskatchewan also took part, the highest turnout of the bodies since ShowCan opened its doors to them three years ago.

ShowCan is a chance to get distribs involved with projects and to gather intelligence about up-and-coming filmmakers, says Mackenzie.

‘I think it was a great convention. Lots of industry work got done,’ says organizer Adina Lebo, pointing to the provincial funders and a series of closed-door meetings. ‘The provinces were extremely happy.’

But conventioneers also took time out to talk about production, marketing and writing jokes at an April 29 panel about English-Canadian cinema.

Michael Kennedy, EVP of film programming at Famous Players, noted that comedies such as TPB and the forthcoming Good Cop Bad Cop, a comedy about the culture clash between Quebec and Ontario, are still English Canada’s best chance at box-office success. That, plus other genre pics.

‘We can do comedies, just make them funny. We can do horror, just make it scary,’ he said.

‘Or we could just ban all American films,’ joked Mike Mosca, SVP and COO of Equinoxe Films, sitting next to him.

Mosca agreed that comedies, horror and some high-end drama are still Canada’s strong suits and stand the best chance of competing against the Hollywood juggernaut. ‘Make me laugh, cry or be scared,’ he said, nodding to the success of Ginger Snaps, Meatballs, My Big Fat Greek Wedding and others.

It’s no accident, someone added, that the maligned-but-profitable movies such as Porky’s and Black Christmas are the ones getting remade. Clattenburg and Hollywood producer Joe Medjuck (Evolution, Old School) were also at the table.

But Kennedy went on to charge that many Canuck filmmakers don’t put enough thought into marketing – waving off the oft-heard complaints that exhibitors give a cold shoulder to domestic films and trailers. Producers need to think about their film’s appeal and target audience, he said.

‘If it’s crap, it’s crap. I don’t care where it’s from,’ he said. ‘I’m not in the business of selling DVDs and I’m not in the business of helping a producer get a TV deal.’

Kennedy also took a shot at Atom Egoyan’s The Sweet Hereafter – remarking that ‘sixteen schoolchildren sailing off a cliff in a bus does not compel me to sell tickets’ – but applauded the market know-how of Denise Robert, noting that the Barbarian Invasions producer ‘always brings a plan to the table.’ Famous Players is also already in talks to play the TPB trailer.

The next ShowCanada is set for Victoria, April 26-30, 2006.

-www.showcanada.ca