Closing Night Gala: Emotional Arithmetic
Director: Paolo Barzman
Writer: Jefferson Lewis
Producers: Anna Stratton, Suzanne Girard
Cast: Susan Sarandon, Gabriel Byrne, Max von Sydow, Christopher Plummer, Roy Dupuis
Distributor: Seville Pictures
International Sales: Dreamachine

At first glance, this year’s closing-night film – Emotional Arithmetic – doesn’t look entirely Canadian.

The dazzling international ensemble cast includes Oscar winner Susan Sarandon (Dead Man Walking), Irish powerhouse Gabriel Byrne (The Usual Suspects), Swedish film legend Max von Sydow, Tony and Emmy Award-winning Canuck Christopher Plummer (A Beautiful Mind), and arguably the hottest thesp in Canada today, Roy Dupuis (The Rocket).

Emotional Arithmetic is not exactly ‘a reflection of Canada to Canadians,’ but don’t call it a ‘Holocaust film’ in front of director Paolo Barzman.

‘I really hate that classification and what it means,’ Barzman tells Playback. ‘All of these films are so different, and they deal with it in such a different way. To put them in the same category is meaningless.’

The $6.8-million film’s title refers to the process of dealing with a painful past, as played out at a dinner party including Holocaust survivors Jakob (von Sydow,) Christopher (Byrne) and Melanie (Sarandon).

During World War Two, Jakob protected the other two when they were children in a ‘transit camp’ in Drancy, France. The dinner marks their first reunion, four decades later.

Plummer portrays Melanie’s husband David, and Dupuis is Benjamin, their son and witness to the pain and the promise of redemption.

The script is based on the novel by the late Canadian writer Matt Cohen.

Producer Anna Stratton of Toronto’s Triptych Media believes Emotional Arithmetic has a universal theme about healing in a world that continually struggles with war (a pervasive theme in films at this year’s event).

‘The world is in the grips of dealing with the memories of the past and struggling to move forward,’ says Stratton. ‘How do we move forward as a planet? I hope our film contributes somewhat to that discussion.’

Barzman and Stratton contend that the project is an assemblage of themes played out by an incredible cast.

‘Our challenge in the beginning was to find an ensemble of actors,’ explains Stratton, ‘even including our little Timmy [Benjamin’s son, played by Dakota Goyo], who would really [complete] an ensemble [cast]’ that would build its own dynamic.

‘They each needed to be truly fine actors on their own and to be willing to throw themselves into this distant location in [Montreal] on a relatively small film,’ Stratton continues, praising their courage. ‘It’s quite risky, but that’s what they did.’

The character of Jakob unites the disparate group in the story, and the actor who portrays him, von Sydow, topped the producers’ wish list from the get-go.

Von Sydow’s performance in the late Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal (1957) – is the stuff of cinematic legend, and this legend doesn’t need the work, but he connected strongly with the novel. And it didn’t hurt that he already knew Barzman, as the two had worked together on the director’s first feature, Time Is Money (1994).

The character of Melanie, meanwhile, is a complex one – beautiful, powerful, and yet teetering on the edge of madness under the weight of her own suffering. Who better than Sarandon?

‘We thought from the beginning Susan would be the most wonderful casting,’ says Stratton. ‘She has this incredible range.’ And they got her.

Byrne’s character, Christopher, is a loner – an entomologist who has spent more time with insects than people. But still waters run deep – and once again they scored with casting.

‘We wanted someone who could play that quiet side, but also has this tremendous magnetism, and when this magnetism is ignited, Gabriel is so wonderful at that,’ says Stratton.

Stratton credits the dedication and persuasive power of L.A. casting director Heidi Levitt, originally from Montreal, and director Barzman for inspiring the actors to sign up.

‘Susan, at the time, had problems with some aspects of the script, but it wasn’t a very difficult sell,’ recalls Barzman. ‘Each one of them saw right away the potential of it. In my first encounter with Christopher Plummer, he said he was so happy to be involved with what he said was such an intelligent project, and Roy – he was just coming out of Shake Hands with the Devil. The whole film was on his shoulders.

‘In our film, [Dupuis] has a lot of presence but not that much dialogue. I think he was really intrigued by the story itself, but also to be in a film where he was not carrying everything, to impose a presence without being scrutinized too closely all the time and have tons of dialogue. He did it in an incredible way,’ Barzman explains.

This international cast is also an ensemble cast, so Cancon watchdog CAVCO was comfortable with the naming of Plummer and Dupuis as lead and second lead performers (for tax-credit purposes, Canadian rules dictate that a Canuck actor is usually the lead).

Suzanne Girard of Montreal’s BBR Productions shares producer credit; Tritych’s Robin Cass is exec producer.

This film is dedicated to the late Rebecca Yates (Girard’s business partner) and novelist Cohen. Stratton had been working with Cohen in the late 1990s, and after his untimely death in 1999, she acquired the rights to his novel.

Seville Pictures has skedded the Canadian theatrical release of Emotional Arithmetic for early 2008.

International rep Dreamachine has presold a number of territories, including Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Turkey, former Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Romania, India, Latin America and Israel.