By Jack Blum and Sharon Corder

Special to Playback

Everything changed the week of March 9. On the Monday, things were more-or-less normal. Then, with each passing day, response to the COVID-19 pandemic became increasingly dramatic. By the Wednesday, major league sports basically shut its doors. By Friday, the Reel Canada office was closed.

Film production was stopped in its tracks; a whole industry sent home. The exhibition industry soon followed; all the theatres were closed. One by one the major film festivals were cancelled or postponed. It was impossible to grasp the ramifications. More than a month later, it remains so.

The seventh annual National Canadian Film Day was scheduled for April 22. As usual, the heart of the celebration was to be over 1,000 live screenings in communities large and small, urban and rural, in every corner of the country and in some 30 countries around the world. It was clear that all of those screenings would have to be cancelled.

But it didn’t feel right to cancel the day itself.

We have always had great support from all the major broadcasters, the digital channels and the streaming services, and this year was no different. Maybe there was a way to move the celebration online. Maybe we could somehow get our hundreds of community screening partners – the libraries, the legion halls, the community centres, and, yes, the film festivals – to engage their audiences in regional and national “watch parties.” The local screenings have always been “enhanced” by Q&A sessions with actors, directors and craftspeople – maybe we could replicate that experience in a livestream.

Of course, we were asking the same questions that every arts organization was asking. But, as the days went by, with the crisis deepening at such an alarming rate, we began to feel that it was even more important than ever to make this National Canadian Film Day happen.

For one thing, our whole film community is sitting idle and out of work. We want to applaud them and let them know they are valued. We want to celebrate the great work they have created in this country and express our confidence that there is much more to come when this crisis has passed.

But all Canadians are living through this unprecedented period of isolation and anxiety, which makes it even more timely to be reminded that our stories keep us company. They reflect our shared values, our magnificent diversity, and our precious freedoms that we know will return when this time is done. We can all embrace Canadian film because it is great entertainment and because it can help us to feel less alone.

So we decided to go big and stay home.

We’re producing a four-hour livestream that tracks major regional watch parties from Newfoundland to B.C. It’s our version of a Canadian house party, created by folks in their living rooms, featuring guests in their living rooms, for folks at home in their living rooms. Hosted by Peter Keleghan and Ali Hassan, the lineup is stellar: talented performers such as Sandra Oh, Jay Baruchel, Megan Follows, Colm Feore, Yannick Bisson and Don McKellar; Oscar-nominated directors like Atom Egoyan, Deepa Mehta, and Philippe Falardeau; and even a celebrated American who has appeared in more than one fine Canadian movie, Ethan Hawke. All of us just trying to get through together.

Our major partners – Telefilm Canada, Cineplex, CBC, Encore+, TD Bank and Netflix – are bringing even more to the table, with promotional support and great programming. So are Bell Media, Hollywood Suite, and a host of other broadcasters. CMPA, DGC, ACTRA and IATSE are all engaging their membership. And we’re delighted to see the distributors coming together to release a sensational crop of new Canadian films this week specifically for National Canadian Film Day. And we have to tip our hat to FilmsWeLike for choosing April 22 to partner with 10 independent cinemas across the country to launch a virtual release of Philip Borsos’ classic The Grey Fox in a shimmering 4k restoration.

This is a challenging time. But there is no better moment to stand up and celebrate all the great work we have managed to produce, and look ahead to the heights we will attain when this crisis is over.

This National Canadian Film Day, watch a great Canadian film, join with your neighbours and fellow citizens from house to house to house on our livestream, and let our stories keep us company.

Jack Blum (Executive Director) & Sharon Corder (Artistic Director) are Toronto-based filmmakers who have written and produced dozens of episodes of some of this country’s most celebrated dramatic television series, including Traders, which they co-created. Their feature film Babyface premiered in the Directors Fortnight at Cannes. They have also written many articles about film and the Canadian film industry, been active in lobbying for the cultural industries at all levels of government, and taught many classes and workshops in the craft of screenwriting. Jack and Sharon were founding members of the Reel Canada Steering Committee for its pilot year, and have been responsible for leading the organization from success to success, starting with small festivals in six Toronto schools in 2005-06 through the 1,800 Canadian-film screenings that took place on National Canadian Film Day 150 in 2017, right to this year’s all-online physical distancing edition of the national celebration.