MONTREAL — The feature Borderline had a ‘difficult birth,’ according to producer Roger Frappier, and was denied funding twice by Telefilm Canada and SODEC before it got underway earlier this month in Quebec.

‘That we were refused surprised me,’ says Frappier (La grande séduction ). ‘But we are traveling in uncharted territory with this story and funding bodies are always trying to replicate past successes. It made me realize that I always have to fight.’

Borderline, now shooting with a budget of roughly $4 million, marks the feature film debut of stills photographer and TV director Lyne Charlebois (Nos étés , Bliss). It follows Kiki — played by Isabelle Blais — who is abandoned by her mentally ill mother and raised by her grandmother. The drama centers on Kiki’s life as a child, as a self-destructive adolescent and finally as a woman.

‘Kiki is constantly pushing the limits. At 20, she communicates mainly with sex, and at 30, she has a bad relationship with her professor. But finally she begins to learn to live for herself,’ says Frappier.

The script is based on two loosely autobiographical novels, Borderline and La Brèche by Montreal writer Marie-Sissi Labrèche, who cowrote the script with Charlebois. Frappier says he immediately fell in love with Labrèche’s characters. ‘It’s a fascinating universe of women. It’s about their daily lives, their craziness and their relationships with men,’ he says.

Frappier believes there are too few women helming films in Quebec and around the world. He picked Charlebois, whom he met on the set of 1987’s Un zoo la nuit, because he felt she had the artistic vision and sensitivity to do the job. ‘I wanted it to be a woman’s view of a Kiki’s life and her sexuality. I have always followed Lyne’s career and I thought she would be perfect,’ he says.

In order to keep the project afloat and reapply to SODEC, Frappier took $1 million from the Telefilm performance envelope he received for La grande séduction . On the third try, SODEC came through, allocating a portion of the Quebec government’s $10 million in emergency funding for feature films to Borderline.

‘If we didn’t have that cash from the Quebec government it might not have seen the light of day,’ says Frappier. The film wraps at the end of March and likely will be finished in the fall.