Canadian Second World War drama The Boy in the Woods makes its market debut at the 2022 American Film Market (AFM) this week as principal photography gets underway in North Bay and Callander, Ont.

The film is directed and written by Toronto-based filmmaker Rebecca Snow. It is based on Holocaust survivor Maxwell Smart’s memoir The Boy in the Woods: A True Story of Survival During the Second World War, with Smart also on board as an executive producer alongside his wife, Tina.

Toronto’s Photon Films has Canadian distribution rights, while California’s Myriad Pictures holds international rights, excluding Canada. Myriad will represent the film at AFM, which runs from Nov. 1 to 6.

The drama feature is produced by Robert Budreau under his Toronto-based banner Lumanity Productions and Jonathan Bronfman of JoBro Productions, with Andrew Bronfman coproducing. Photon Films’ president Mark Slone, Undisputed Pictures’ Patrick Patterson and Joel Reilly, and Myriad Pictures’ Kirk D’Amico serve as executive producers. It received financial support from Telefilm Canada, Ontario Creates, and Claims Conference.

Smart optioned his memoir to Lumanity in the fall of 2020 and “has worked closely with the filmmakers in the big-screen adaptation of his life story,” according to a news release. Principal photography is scheduled to wrap in mid-November. The Boy in the Woods will receive a theatrical release from Photon Films in 2023.

Billed as a “true-life, survival story,” the film follows a Jewish boy hiding in the forests of Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe during the Second World War. It stars Jett Klyne (Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness), Richard Armitage (Captain America: The First Avenger), Masa Lizdek (The Waiting Room), David Kohlsmith (Chucky), and Christopher Heyerdahl (Peacemaker).

“In addition to telling Maxwell’s story, we hope to use the film as a platform to educate people and promote inclusion and diversity,” said Bronfman in a statement, noting that the film is being made “at a time when antisemitism is on the rise.”

Smart survived the Holocaust and eventually immigrated to Montreal in 1948. He lost his only sibling and 62 members of his extended family. After participating in Snow’s 2019 documentary Cheating Hitler: Surviving the Holocaust, he was approached by New York City-based publishing company Harper Collins to write about his experience in 2020 and turn it into a book. The Boy in the Woods: A True Story of Survival During the Second World War was published in May 2022.

Photon Films has several films on its distribution slate, including Gail Maurice’s Rosie, Sophie Jarvis’ Until Branches Bend, and Kelly Fyffe-Marshall’s When Morning Comes, which all had their world premiere at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival. The distribution company will also release Kat Jayme’s The Grizzlie Truth, which had its world premiere at the 2022 Vancouver International Film Festival, Renuka Jeyapalan’s Stay the Night, and Ron Chapman’s Revival 69: The Concert that Rocked the World.

Image courtesy of Photon Films